Josh Gordon allegedly fails (another) drug test
April 11, 2016On Josh Gordon and the greatness of Deftones: While We’re Waiting…
April 12, 2016Atlanta Hawks (48-33) 94
Cleveland Cavaliers (57-24) 109
Box Score
If the goal of the Cleveland Cavaliers at the outset of the 2015-16 regular season was to cause as much consternation and indigestion for the team’s loyal followers only to end up exactly where they were supposed to, then consider the mission accomplished. A fired coach, trade rumors, word of star unhappiness, some players-only meetings, some Twitter controversies (so 2016), some (probable) lunch-swiping in the break room, and a whole bunch of mediocrity later, and here the Cavs are: as the top seed in the Eastern Conference.
Yes, there was an awful lot of malaise and distress and eye-rolling and audible groans getting to this point, but it’s a still great a place to be. The young, promising, upstart Milwaukee Bucks? Thirty-three wins and not even a whiff of the playoffs. The young, scrappy, ego-less Boston Celtics helmed by a boy genius? Forty-seven wins, and happy to nab the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference.1 The Philadelphia 76ers? A graphic 10-70,2 with a general manager who celebrated his departure with a 13-page screed that quoted Warren Buffett, Abraham Lincoln, and physicist James Clerk Maxwell, and with an eternity of basketball-related suffering ahead.
My point being that there are 27 teams in the NBA that would happily switch bodies with the Cleveland Cavaliers as of Monday night in some type of freak supernatural occurrence resulting from getting struck by lightning while stroking an enchanted monkey’s paw in a water fountain — including the Atlanta Hawks.
Last season, the Hawks were in the enviable position of Chiefs of the East, standing atop the conference with 60 wins. This season the Hawks — a team of renowned UNO card game fanatics — entered Cleveland staring up at a 56-win Cavs team looking to clinch the Numero Uno seed in La Conferencia Este, and though the Hawks threw some Reverses and Skips on the Cavs in the first quarter, it was the Cavs who dropped a stack of Draw Fours on the Hawks and walked away winners. Let’s go behind the box score and see how we arrived at the final scoring tally.
https://vine.co/v/iTjtXLgBFXt
34, 6, 6 – Wow. The last few weeks of games (and their accompanying editions of “Behind the Box Score”) have, more than anything, been about the transformation of mere mild-mannered MVP Runner-Up LeBron James into Super LeBron or Playoff Mode LeBron or Holy Shit LeBron — whatever you want to call it.
H.S. LeBron was on full display on Monday night against the Hawks, pulling an insane 34/6/6 on 13-of-16 (3-of-4 threes) game from the cosmos like an advanced life form. Over H.S. LeBron’s last eight games, he’s averaging 28.1 points, 7.9 rebounds, and 8.3 assists with 65.2/57.1/84.6 shooting splits. It was the seventh 30+, 5+, 5+ game with more than a 75.0 percent shooting of James’ career, which trails only Karl Malone and Charles Barkley (who had 20 such games). There have only been five NBA games in this hyper-efficient category this season, and James is the only player with two of them (the other was only three weeks ago in Brooklyn against the Nets).
It was like watching a superhero bargaining with his own powers, like Spiderman trying to reason with his web-slinging powers, or Bruce Banner scolding his strength for unwittingly ripping off his own refrigerator door.
It was like watching a superhero bargaining with his own powers, like Spiderman trying to reason with his web-slinging powers, or Bruce Banner scolding his strength for unwittingly ripping off his own refrigerator door.
There were two uhh what now? moments that resonated with me on Monday night. The first was a play in which James jumped in a passing lane, back to the ball-handler, with his hands waving in the air. He unwittingly swatted the ball out of the air, sending it out of bounds. Afterwards, James glared at his hands and angrily cursed at them — like he was angry at his limbs for not informing him in advance that they were going to reach the ball so that he could have planned accordingly and snatched the ball out of the air for a breakaway dunk.3 It was like watching a superhero bargaining with his own powers, like Spiderman trying to reason with his web-slinging powers, or Bruce Banner scolding his strength for unwittingly ripping off his own refrigerator door.
The second uhh what now? moment (shown below) came when Matthew Dellavedova found James on a pocket pass off the pick-and-roll (the Delly-James pick-and-roll has secretly become the Cavs’ most unstoppable play). James went up for a dunk that he easily could have converted the conventional way, but at the risk of flying toward the backboard and landing awkwardly to avoid it (you know, normal people problems). Mid-air, James re-calibrated the way to best execute the dunk without an uncomfortable landing, which in his universe is spinning 180 degrees to put his back toward the hoop — using his angular momentum to slow his forward velocity. Plus, he’d then be able to run straight back onto defense. It was his tenth incredible in-game jam in the past month alone. Anyway, it’s been spectacular to watch James over the past month, and even if he’s unable to lead the Cavaliers to a championship or leaves again to play for the Duke Yankees next season, I’m not taking this rare treat for granted. James and Russell Westbrook (who earned his 18th triple-double of the season in the first half on Monday night) are athletically on another plane than anyone else in the NBA and all but a handful of people on the planet.
35 – Despite James’ great night, Kyrie Irving led the Cavaliers in scoring. Irving scored 35 points, but it took him 28 field goal attempts to get there (so, it took Irving 12 more shots to muster one more point than James did). Irving did make half of his field goals though, an improvement over his recent stretch of shooting woes (only 38.3 percent over his last 10 games). Though at times it still feels like there are three Cavs’ units on the floor — the Cavs defense, the Cavs offense, and Kyrie Irving’s offense — the team needed Irving to get a feel-good game under his belt before the playoffs, and he was electric when he was dribbling and shooting with purpose (as opposed to, you know, aimlessly).
https://vine.co/v/iTIqwvblJxz
Irving seemed grateful after the game, and he seems to understand how much the Cavs need him. He looked like vintage Drew on Monday, and hopefully he’s due for a telepathic breakthrough with his teammates.
Kyrie Irving on adversity and how much LeBron has helped him these last few weeks. pic.twitter.com/gWLCmrcqyg
— Scott @ WFNY (@WFNYScott) April 12, 2016
13 – Those other ten guys on the roster not named “Irving” or “James, LeBron” (there is a “James Jones“) combined for 13 made field goals. James and Irving collaborated for 69 points [juvenile snickering], but the rest of the team mustered only 40 points on 33.3 percent shooting. Kevin Love had a poor shooting night (2-of-8, though he added 14 rebounds), and the reliability of the Cavs’ tertiary characters continues to be a concern.
0 – After coach Tyronn Lue announced that Tristan Thompson would be the team’s starting center for the remainder of the season, Timofey Mozgov got a big donut in the PT category. Everyone knows that Thompson is going to receive the crunch-time minutes, but I don’t see the harm in starting Mozgov some games in the hopes that he attains his level of play from the playoffs last season. Mozgov was a key component of last year’s run, and has apparently been relegated to a role as world’s tallest cheerleader.
21 & 9 – I talked about the Cavs’ inability to stymie Jeff Teague when the team’s faced off a week and a half ago, and the problems continued on Monday. The Hawks absolutely shred the Cavs on the high pick-and-roll, primarily because no one on the roster can stay in front of Teague. It’s mostly Irving who is the object of Teague’s scorn, but Matthew Dellavedova didn’t fare much better on Monday. Teague finished with 21 points (9-of-13) and nine assists. Coach Tyronn Lue and the staff need to scheme ways for the Cavs to better defend the high pick-and-roll against quick guards, or Cavs fans are about to have vivid and horrifying flashbacks to 2010 Rajon Rondo (or, you know, 2014 Stephen Curry).
7 – For all the troubles the Cavs have had with Teague, the team has won its last seven games over the Hawks (including last season’s Eastern Conference Finals), something that’s apparently become a mental hurdle for Atlanta, as typified by Tristan Thompson’s block on Paul Millsap shown below. The Hawks appeared as if they really wanted to win the first quarter on Monday, pushing the tempo and jumping to a 10-0 lead; but all for naught. This is a good sign in the event that the teams face one another in the playoffs, which is still a realistic possibility with the Eastern Conference seeds unfinalized and the Toronto Raptors’ recent history of falling apart in the playoffs.
https://vine.co/v/iTjUqivmw1g
The playoffs start this weekend, and the Cavaliers will be in the driver’s seat without a car as fast as the Golden State Warriors or the San Antonio Spurs on the road. Sure, it’s not 72 or 80 wins, but it could be good enough to lead them to the NBA Finals.
- At the time of this writing, anyway. [↩]
- Again, at the time of this writing on Monday night. [↩]
- Cavaliers color commentator Austin Carr talked about the moment on the FOX Sports Ohio broadcast. [↩]
3 Comments
“the
Delly-JamesIrving-James pick-and-roll has secretly become (always been) the Cavs’ most unstoppable play”…..fixed that for you.
“Afterwards, James glared at his hands and angrily cursed at them — like he was angry at his limbs for not informing him in advance that they were going to reach the ball so that he could have planned accordingly and snatched the ball out of the air for a breakaway dunk. It was like watching a superhero bargaining with his own powers, like Spiderman trying to reason with his web-slinging powers, or Bruce Banner scolding his strength for unwittingly ripping off his own refrigerator door.”
[Standing applause]
Cavs didn’t do a playoff theme contest this year. Waiting for what its going to be.