Cavs Enter March with Easy Schedule Ahead
February 28, 2010While We’re Waiting… Mid-Market Excuses, Eric Berry’s Stock and D.A. to ARI Rumors
March 1, 2010Brian Windhorst tweeted tonight that Cavaliers center Shaquille O’ Neal will have surgery on his injured right thumb tomorrow with a hand specialist in Baltimore. Windhorst inferred that the recovery time will most likely be 6-8 weeks for O’Neal which would effectively end his regular season. Shaq would most likely be back in time for a playoff series against the Orlando Magic and Dwight Howard – a primary reason for his addition to this Cavaliers squad. Windhorst tweeted that Shaq had been in excellent shape and that conditioning would most likely be the primary concern upon his return in the middle of the postseason. A postseason return is not guaranteed as the Cavaliers have not set an official timetable for his return. While there have been numerous reports since Friday that Zydrunas Ilgauskas intends to return to the Cavaliers, we still await official word from Z and his agent announcing this to be the case. In the interim, the Cavs will be without a true center for the foreseeable future.
49 Comments
Ouch look at the bright side it’s not LeBron James. As long as LBJ is ok the Cavaliers can play without Mo or Shaq or even Z but not #23. Tell me there isn’t some sense of irony though after the Cavaliers trade Z leaving Shaq alone as the sole presence in the middle Shaq gets hurt and is lost for the regular season. Welcome to Cleveland! Hopefully the reports that Z will return are true because the Cavaliers will need his presence.
The other positive is the schedule but hopefully Antawn Jamison can get going if so his offense will more then make up for missing Shaq. I also think the Cavaliers will move and fastbreak more now without Shaq but time will tell.
Leon Powes clearance is very timely. Sucks but as long as he is good by the playoffs I think the cavs manage just fine.
this is never good but we only need shaq against the magic and lakers. Hopefully he will stay in shape and be ready to go for a run in the playoffs. get well soon big fella! thank god powe is healthy now and hopefully we get z back
Just so long as he keeps in shape in the meanwhile.
Also, I hope we see the Celtics in the postseason. I don’t want anyone else to send them home early this year. It has to be the Cavs. I’m seething right now.
I hate to be the glass is half empty guy, but this injury wouldn’t force Z to re-think his decision to come back to us would it? I’m sure he’s coming back for more than just a chance to win a championship (kids, wife, friends, history with team), but if winning a ring is a large factor in his coming back to the Cavs you would have to think he might mull his options a little longer with this news…
@REEP – It’s worth pondering, but I don’t see it significantly affecting Z’s decision.
I knew this was not a good injury from the moment it happened – they were saying as early as before the end of the Boston game that it was a “SEVERE sprain.” You just know that’s not good.
It’s a huge shame seeing as how he had just hit his stride too. Let’s hope it’s a blessing in disguise and the Diesel comes back with fresh legs for the playoffs.
I agree, this maybe just a Cleveland curse or it may be a blessing in disguise. If Z comes back, which is hard to imagine him not returning, I think we will be fine the rest of the season. We have enough offensive firepower to out-score opponents and when our defense comes back we will be fine. As long has he comes back, at the latest, mid-postseason. March schedule isn’t scary but early April has some tough games but Z should be back by then.
two words:
cleveland curse
how serious is this?
HE DIDNT EVEN BREAK THE THUMB…
This rots, but good stretch of schedule for this to happen. Very good that it happened in the last Boston game and not the next one, he’d be out for the playoffs for sure. How nice does the Powe pickup look now? The timing of his return could not be better.
One thing we can assume. Much like the mighty African Elephant, Shaq never forgets. He will not retire until he ends fellow LSU alum Glen Davis.
This sucks.
@ Mark
I agree wholeheartedly. I know things could be worse, but that doesn’t make me feel a whole lot better.
I wonder how the people who were so adamant about “standing pat” at the deadline feel now? Ugh. Thank God for Jamison
might be a blessing… i like the way the cavs have played w/o shaq so far. z might be even happier to come back knowing he’s got his starting position again.
I agree with Todd.
Our small lineup creates serious headaches and mismatches for teams.
Mo – point guard
LeMVP – shooting guard
Jamison – small forward
JJ – power forward
Andy – center
who the eff has a two guard that can guard LBJ? Powe, Jackson and soon Z off the bench. I ain’t worried. Shaq back for playoffs (Orlando / Denver).
Oh and no you didn’t read that wrong…..Fear the Denver Thugetts.
@boogey, careful with the jinxing there
Finally Z can start again. I’m perfectly ok with Z starting and Andy and Powe sharing minutes at center. It’ll be rough until March 22nd, but ultimately this will be a good thing.
Christopher – Wow, just a little late to the party with “Fear the Denver Nuggets” …No kidding, and everyone else has known that they are for real since the start of the year. Had you gone out on a limb and said “Fear the OKC Thunder” at the start of the season then maybe you would have been on to something.
Clearly, this is bad news; but this is also an opportunity for LBJ to slam home his case for league MVP (as if he hadn’t done that already), as well as for Anderson Varejao’s already immense value to the team to grow.
Denver has no depth. Kenyon Martin’s gimpy knee has really hampered them the last week or so.
Man, this is karma. I’m not saying we’re dead and buried, but this is what we must weather as punishment for trading Z. We still have a darn good chance to breeze through the rest of the regular season (Thank God for our depth!), but the bottom line is that all this lineup shuffling is going to result in chemistry issues.
Hurry home, Z. The starting lineup beckons once more.
Wow you guys are really taking this in stride. I am not loving that we expect to insert a rusty Shaq in our lineup in the frickin conf finals. Could hurt any rythym we might have. Also will cause a lot of wear n tear on Andy, Z, etc.
Nidlees to say, I’m not very happy. And I agree with tbrown. Give me the celtics in the playoffs. I want our team to send their sorry butts home.
The good thing is that the playoffs draw on forever. So Shaq should have off days to get some rhythm back…
Why do we put up with this? Why are we still Cleveland fans?
All I can say is… stay classy Boston Celtics.
The Cavs are coming… especially for you Big Ba(D-bag)by.
I see LeBron going all Magic Johnson on us at some point the during the rest of the regular season–that is, spending some time at the five. He is big enough and strong enough to handle most centers in the league. It would create all kinds of offensive match up problems if we went super quick and small.
@TSR – It is a bit disconcerting to think of Shaq pulling a Jameer this year. But, with that said, it’s not liek his game involves a lot of finesse and touch. I think he’ll be ok.
As I said on the previous post, when I had my thumb and wrist out of place it took about 90 days to get back into shape. This is a good thing for the Cavs, it’s going to force Mike Brown to activate guys into the rotation, and allow players to have themselves ready for the playoffs.
In the playoffs, the combination of Shaq and Z will bring back the high field goal percentage we need to be a scoring threat and keep defenses on their toes.
When everyone’s back together and healthy it ought to be a beautiful NBA Championship run by the Cavaliers.
Shaq is gonna be gone 6-8 weeks. Not like 4 months and coming back in June for a conference finals. At the very most he won’t return until the end of April for the first round of the playoffs. Not to mention Shaq wants to win another ring. I highly doubt he is going to sit out of a playoff series if his hand is like 85%. Hell, even if it’s around 50% I don’t see him missing any serious playoff games.
We’ll be thin in the front court, but who knows if some decent Vet gets cut somewhere that would want to take the Vet min to be on this team. Yes, Danny Green and Darnell would be gone. But, that’s tough for them.
@Cavs Dude: Your medical treatment isn’t nearly as good as the treatment Shaq is about to get. No matter what you say I can bet that you won’t be rehabbing for 8 hours a day if need be. 90 days is way longer than Shaq needs.
Well, I guess Shaq can’t get hurt again before the playoffs
@30 90 days is very reasonable for a dislocated thumb. The Cavs better not risk bringing him back early. Of course he is getting the best treatment possible, however a dislocated thumb affects the entire wrist.
There is no need to rush getting Shaq back especially given the Cavs begin playing well without him. We’re not playing for most wins nor stats this season, we’re playing for rings here.
With the medical attention he’ll receive Shaq should definitely be ready by the playoffs…
):
This doesn’t surprise me. Neither did getting beat by Orlando. Neither did getting swept by the Spurs. Not losing in the ALCS to Boston, or trading away back to back Cy Young Award winners.
This is the same old **** every year.
Fortunately this year, we have depth. Can we match up with the Lakers…no I don’t think so. We need 2 7 footers to beat them. But we’ll get to the finals.
Thanks Glen Davis…..Boston is lucky their trip to Portland was last week, I would have been waiting outside The Nines hotel with a pair of vice grips due for a date with Big Baby’s thumb.
Is anyone else worried about who is gonna grab rebounds? Lebron, Powe, JJ and Andy (and Z when he’s back) will def need to pick up the slack. I also worry about Shaq’s conditioning when he gets back. Expect the 38 year old to be noticeably out of shape when he returns.
For as much credit as Shaq has gotten this season for “stepping up in the big games”, the stats actually start to disprove this theory. While most plus/minus or efficiency numbers would be expected to slightly go down in the games against the toughest opponents, Shaq’s go down at quite an alarming rate compared to a similarly utilized starter.
His plus/minus numbers have been dreadful all year thanks to the poor job of the starting unit, but the splits in this case are interesting. Per minutes in 22 games vs teams with .544 win pct or better as of Saturday, he had only a +2.10 plus/minus with a 54.2% true shooting percentage.
Against all other teams (ie the 34 games he played against worse teams), he had a +4.62 plus/minus numbers per 48 minutes played alongside a 58.1% true shooting percentage. Certainly the Cavs have done worse against the better teams in those particular games (+5.95 avg margin vs +8.23 avg margin), but fellow starter Anthony Parker actually has a better plus/minus in the games against more difficult opponents on the season.
So well it hurts to have a starter injured for such a prolonged period, maybe we will be able to actually succeed quite easily without Shaq. The plus/minus numbers show that he really has not made that much of a difference, and the whole big game argument might be incredibly overblown.
I’ll be looking for the Cavs to play better basketball in the coming weeks with tough games against teams like San Antonio, Boston and Chicago where our big rotation of Andy/JJ/Powe/Hickson should still do quite well. The only teams I think that absolutely require having guys like Shaq and Z down low are the Magic and Lakers who hopefully we won’t be playing until at least late May anyway.
In terms of his actual contribution on the court, remember that for the year, in 53 games played, he is only averaging 12 pts, 6.7 rebounds and 23.4 minutes per contest. We still do have Tawn (season 8.6 rpg), Andy (season 7.8 rpg) and LBJ (season 7.1 rpg) to mainly pull down boards along with hopefully some better play with more minutes from Powe and Hickson. Should be interesting to see how the rotations play out in the end while the team gears up for the playoffs.
On March 14th Watch out “baby” Davis. We owe you!! He hurt Shaq, on purpose. He tried to end his season, his career, and our chance at a championship. We owe you “baby”!!!
Everyone needs to breathe a little here. Like countless people have said, we only need Shaq to be a presence against teams like Orlando and LA. He doesn’t even need to score, just slow down Howard/Bynum/Gasol. He doesn’t need to be in great shape to do that. Jermain O’Neal and his broken body shut down Howard last night and some slow white guy with baby fat from OKC did a good job against him this weekend. It doesn’t take an athlete to stop Howard, just a bunch of body. With Jamison, the re-emergence of Mo and of course LeBron, the points are going to be there. Our interior defense has looked bad but once Andy/Twan and Z/Twan get some time together, they’ll work out the kinks. Against all other teams, besides Orlando and LA, I think the Cavs are better w/o Shaq anyway.
@Jacob: a well-researched reply to the worry worts! We have a lot of exciting basketball to look forward to both during the season and in the post-season.
This isn’t the end of the world. They’ll keep Shaq in shape, it’s not like it’s a knee or ankle injury. Plus this will ensure he’s 100% fresh for the playoffs. I already stated that the more this team has to EARN victories the better, we need to stay humble headed into the playoffs unlike last year.
Jacob
Was there an upward trend with Shaq? Wasn’t that the buzz before the injury? like, “Hey, he’s really warming up!”
Maybe this gives Shaq time/incentive to polish his shot mechanics w/ Jent (Gent?)
Hopefully Shaq will be back healthy and active enough to win one for the *ahemmm* thumb
@ Scotty
i know i am jumping back in the mix here a little late, but fortune favors the bold my friend.
Yes i understand people have known the Nuggets are for real for quite some time. What i dont think people understand is at this point LA should not be our concern, the Nuggets are. They are last year’s Orlando Magic with us right now. A matchup nightmare.
We matchup great against LA, not Denver, that’s all.
Feel free to reply to me on how i am a loser and your point is so much better than mine. That’s what boards like these are for right? =)
Windy just tweeted Shaq’s out of surgery and will be out for 8 weeks. That puts him back April 26. For reference, the Cavs beat the Pistons in Game 4 (completing the sweep) in the first round on April 26. The Celtics-Bulls first round series, which went to 7 games, finished May 2.
Cavs started the second round against the Hawks May 5 last year. So, it looks like Shaq will be back in time for round 2 if the Cavs take care of business in round one.
i mean, really #24? step away from the ledge #36. have you been watching this team long #37?
we don’t need shaq. there. i said it. the guy is way past his prime, not to say that he isn’t still a great asset, but we have younger more athletic guys who, i think, who will benefit this team more as they see minutes. although this situation is not ideal, i think it will work out in our favor.
if anything, we should be more concerned with the defense of our backcourt down the final stretch.
@ Matt #2 – Great question. I actually wrote about Shaq’s steady statistical improvement a few weeks back at this link here: https://waitingfornextyear.com/?p=24275. In the Cavs past 10 games with Shaq against teams with at least a win pct of .544, the team was actually only 6-4 (in contrast to being 17-7 on the season). The team is still winning by an average of 4.5 points per game in these contests.
In these games dating back to the January 8th loss to Denver, Shaq has ranged from pretty good to pretty bad. His adjusted per 48 minutes plus/minus of +1.02 shows just how mediocre that statistic has been for him during this time. While his true shooting percentage is a much improved 63.1% and he is averaging 13.1 points in just 23.6 minutes per game, he has been a major liability for the Cavs at times. That is shown most specifically in the Boston loss where the team excelled without him on the court with the ability to go small ball.