Box Score: Indians 5, Red Sox 3
August 9, 2012Tribe Wins Second Straight Behind Ubaldo
August 10, 2012While We’re Waiting serves as the early morning gathering of WFNY-esque information for your viewing pleasure. Have something you think we should see? Send it to our tips email at tips@waitingfornextyear.com.
“Tom Herman’s Biggest Impact Will Be Felt in the Passing Game. As discussed above, the running game will largely reflect Meyer’s persona and background. But Tom Herman’s impact as offensive coordinator will certainly be noticeable in the passing game. It will particularly be felt in two ways: with the horizontal screen game and with combining concepts in the drop back pass game.
Herman’s offenses have always been based around attacking defenses with a combination of the inside run game changed up with quick wide receiver screens. As with the QB read and option, this prevents a defense’s backside defenders from involving themselves in the run game. As such, either the offense will have a numbers advantage for their base run plays or—if the defense cheats—easy yards on the outside with bubble or flash screens.
Herman’s impact will also be felt with tweaks to Meyer’s base passing game. Specifically, Herman has ‘combined concepts’ together for the Buckeye passing game. The basic premise is to put different route combinations to each side of the field that attack different coverage schemes, thus providing the quarterback options depending upon what coverage the defense shows. Meyer and Herman smartly do so by mixing an outside route combination with a middle crossing route, thereby preventing the defense from having unoccupied roving pass defenders.” [Fulton/Eleven Warriors]
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“I am not completely sure of the circumstances that we used to determine when to make this adjustment, but I believe it had something to do with our playcalls and that it was not a response to personnel or formation changes by the offense.
Walking the LB out puts him in better position to edge rush or to cover TEs or RBs out of the backfield with outside leverage. Of the few plays where we walked a LB out and I have coaches’ film, we blitzed a few times and we played either Cover-1 or Cover-3 other times.” [Rufio/Dawgs By Nature]
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“To be fair, preseason results ultimately doesn’t matter. The last time the Browns played in Detroit, Jake Delhomme finished 20-for-25 with 152 yards and a touchdown. In last year’s Great Lakes Classic at Cleveland, Colt McCoy was 10-for-18 for 96 yards and three touchdowns.
“We’re looking for (Weeden) to go out there and execute and be generally efficient,” Shurmur said. “And then take a lead of that huddle and direct us in to the end zone.”
“Nobody is going to play the whole game, what you want is to go in and be generally efficient. You don’t want penalties, you want to get lined up right, not too many men in the huddle, you want to see the quarterback be able to call the play, execute. It’s the same thing on defense, get lined up properly, defeat the blocks, address the gaps, tackle the ball carrier and when they drop back to pass, I want to see come pass rush.” [Delco/The OBR]
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Grading the Cavaliers’ post-season– “They have done almost nothing, save for the divisive selection of Dion Waiters with the No. 4 pick in the draft, and that’s fine. There is a long list of bad teams with cap room that have used it for the sake of using it and regretted it almost immediately, like Will Ferrell jumping into the bear pit. Signing C.J. Miles made sense because Cleveland is desperate for wing production after Omri Casspi’s disappointing season, but none of the Cavs’ transactions moves the needle.
The Cavaliers are going to be cheap and bad (again) with their current roster, but they have a pile of extra first-round picks and the ability to obtain another one pretty easily by trading center Anderson Varejao. They also have one of the league’s best young players in Kyrie Irving, the rare point guard who combines elite shooting with sound distribution skills, and enough cap space to take on Lakers center Andrew Bynum as a facilitator in a Dwight Howard trade. That cap space isn’t going anywhere, but as the Mavericks found out last month in the Deron Williams sweepstakes, free agency isn’t a fail-safe when a star’s incumbent team can offer more money and an extra year. That’s what will make the Cavs interesting to watch over the next year: Will they stay patient, watch Tristan Thompson’s development and collect another high lottery pick? Or will they essentially use their cap space via trade, dealing for a star who may or may not fit well with Irving’s pick-and-roll game? These are the choices that define the course of a franchise.” [Lowe/Point Forward]
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Hardesty getting ready for the season- “Hardesty’s work came at LeCharles Bentley’s O-Line Academy, a facility in Avon run by the former Saints and Browns center whose career was cut short by a staph infection. Bentley usually doesn’t take backs — among the linemen in his group are Jason Pinkston, Shawn Lauvao and Oneill Cousins of the Browns — but in Hardesty’s case he made an exception.
“I know what it’s like when things don’t go exactly as planned,” Bentley said. “A lot of people don’t understand what you’re going through from a mental, physical and emotional standpoint. I just kind of related to it, and to him.” [McManamon/FSO]
35 Comments
“They have done almost nothing . . . and that’s fine. There is a long list of bad teams with cap room that have used it for the sake of using it and regretted it almost immediately . . .”
A lot of wisdom there.
NO more chances in the Bynum/Howard fun
Of course, there’s another list of teams with cap room that used it wisely, but why hope for something like that?
the list is longer on the other side though. the NBA FA market isn’t the most efficient way to spend $$ in most cases.
outside of Batum, there really wasn’t a FA that I was excited about. and Portland wasn’t letting him get away.
*edit* and Ryan Anderson. again, he got paid alot for what he does, but he’s the best outside shooting big man in the game right now (he definitely has his deficiencies as well though)
i’m shocked that Orlando is getting so little in return. protected draft picks (NJ’s were unprotected when they offered), only clearing J.Richardson’s contract (and keeping G.Davis, J.Nelson, and H.Turkoglu?), and not really getting premeir assets to go on a secondary flip trade.
i mean, if Orlando wasn’t worried about salary, then shouldn’t they have flipped Glen Davis and matched on Ryan Anderson?
Well, as old Hippocrates said, “First, do no harm.”
It’s a lot harder for franchises in places like ours to get good free-agent deals. We have to overpay. So the trick is to get value. And if value is not there, then it’s best to let it be.
Doing nothing is better than doing something dumb.
ok, lots of conflicting reports, but here are the best assets I see Orlando getting:
Harkless (combo scoring wing)
Vucevic (young C from USC – liked him coming into NBA)
3 1st round protected picks (Lakers not until 2017)
2 2nd round picks
Christian Eyenga – you read that correctly.
Affalo and Harrington – maybe to flip?
Take care to read the Hippo before riding him, Fellow Nerd. Avoiding harm is not his priority, in ancient or modern versions of the oath, just one of many advisements. Do not abandon me among the plebeians; we need to hold each other to certain standards, brother.
From what i read Orland was absolutely not going to allow Howard to end up in the East. Looks like because of that they forced themselves to take a horrible deal from the West.
Aw, snap!
Here we go, boys! A nerd throw-down! Ima grab my score card, thesaurus, Yoo-hoo drink, and dig in for the fireworks.
Who said Fridays weren’t fun? (Seriously, who said that? Stupidest thing ever said.)
Mike Brown coaching all of those egos in LA now, wow. He couldn’t handle one in LeBron now he’ll have Kobe, Howard, Nash and Gasol. It’ll be interesting to see how these guys come together as a team or if they even can but I’m really not looking forward to the constant Lakers coverage that will be coming. Miami was enough now this, ugh.
LoL wasn’t the same thing said about the FA market for the football team? Now it’s being said about the Cavaliers and the poor Indians are just that poor so we know they can’t really participate in FA. I’d say this applies to Cleveland not the entire sport.
My guess is that Nash was actually brought in as a player/coach to circumvent Brown from meddling with the offense.
so, it’s that much better to give divisional rival Philly Bynum?
you pay more in the FA market. it’s pretty well known and is a basic economic principle (goes straight to auction rules). anyway, the good thing is that in the NBA trades are much, much more prevalent. that is a better and more efficient way to use your cap. if you take on a bad contract, then you usually get a good draft pick to go with it.
and it’s not like Melee Artest doesn’t have an ego as well
Well gee wiz we wouldn’t wanna overpay for proven talent now would we? Here’s hoping the Cavaliers can use all of that cap space and draft pick assets to maybe, just maybe, possibly one day improve the team.
Wait, halt the throwdown, think I may have hurt him.
Mr. C? Hey, you ok? Geez, I was just goofing around.
Don’t worry. I’m sure he’s just data mining the Greek lexicon, preparing his retort. (At least I hope he is, because that would be awesome!). I’m sure he’s okay.
I somehow forgot about Artest but yea the players will probably tell Brown to just relax enjoy getting paid while they run the show. Of course they’ll be doing it on the sly while saying all of the right things.
Et tu, Supercilius?
(Sorry for the delay. For some reason, I’m not getting alerts when someone replies.)
Anyway, yon Fatuous, you are absolutely correct. I did read the Hippo, but I got lazy and went with the popularly misquoted version, foolishly believing that I could sneak one past you.
Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.
no culpa necessitito! (woops, I think I just stepped in a libretto … that’s kinda gross). Stand tall and remember our own nerd oath.
We.
Are.
Quality.
Control.
also, I sometimes receive comment response notifications 2 days later, and by then even a bantering addict like me deems it way stale. And another complaint – since switching to disqus I no longer have a list of others’ most recent comments, as I did before. But maybe this is unrelated to disqus and was a site change. Other complaints and grudges I’ll just nurse for now. After all, Garry hath deemed it Fun Friday and I won’t be Doc Buzzkill.
That’s right. We might still take our share of arm punches and pink bellies in the pursuit of our ideals, but it’s noble work.
Oops, I feel another nosebleed coming on. Later.
Pay attention, folks. This ^ is how name-calling is done. With Browns season nigh, can we please follow Mr. C’s lead and keep it high-brow? What do we say, team?
That is good advice, my pimquillimous friend. Let us not bludgeon each other with truncheons and brass knuckles. Let us aspire instead to slap each other down in a civilized manner with a cashmere glove while making smirking remarks about the foe’s pedestrian pedigree.
Your mother wears Enzo Angiolini overstocks.
If I wasn’t so preoccupied right now with tearing down an opponent’s specious legal arguments, I would turn my significant attention and energies toward up-braiding you with scathing, Churchillian comebacks and reproach. Censure, even. As it is, my brain hurts, my thesaurus is exhausted, I want a nap, and Fun Friday has devolved into laborious . . . labor . . . or something. I’ve been trying for 2 hours to think of something to add to Harv’s nerd oath, and I’ve got nothing. Zilch. Nada. Bupkis.
Now, to top it all off, I don’t even know what an “Enzo Angiolini” is, and that makes me sad and angry. Just in time for Browns pre-season football.
Uncle.
Our friend Harvard’s oath requires neither supplementation nor embellishment. It is as beautiful in its conciseness as “Cogito ergo sum” or “It’s a process.”
Put down the case book, savor a few Great Lakes Brewing Co. Octoberfest seasonals if you can, and enjoy the game.
i’m just saying you can get the same “proven” talent through trades except oftentimes get a draft pick to boot from teams with buyer’s remorse.
crazy idea that I don’t think Philly would actually do, but they might think about:
Thaddeus Young for Anderson Varejao
Thad is younger and better on offense (and more durable), but man AV has the perfect complementary game for Bynum.
as a sweetener, we could take back Spencer Hawes contract and give them Gibson’s non-guaranteed deal.
Sadly (tragically, even), there is not a drop of Great Lakes to be found within 50 miles of where I live. But hey, thanks for the salt. My wounds needed it.
Even sadder [story time alert], the last time I was in Cleveland I brought back a couple of sixes of Edmund Fitzgerald (don’t tell the PA state beer and liquor gestapo), but as I opened the back of the jeep to remove my family’s abundant possessions, the Edmund Fitzgerald wrecked on my driveway. All of it. My tears contributed to the rivers of brown goodness flowing into the ditch. I salvaged some Lake Erie Monster, but it’s long gone now. I’ll have to settle for the clone of Rogue’s Arrogant Bastard that I brewed in my kitchen. The 8.2 ABV should get me through the night.
And you have to have something to give up too if you don’t you are the Cleveland Indians of the NBA.
well, the good thing is that in the NBA because of the cap and luxury tax, sometimes all you have to giveup is cap space
And hopefully this can be accomplished because the Cavaliers don’t have many options when it comes to players which is what I was eluding to originally.
that silly hope thing. yeah, gotta cling to it.