The San Antonio Spurs completed their sweep of the Cavaliers last night at the "Q", winning 83-82. Even though the wine and gold finally took a fourth quarter lead in the series for the first time, it was too much Manu Ginobili down the stretch as he poured in 27 points to lead the Alamo city boys to their fourth title in nine years. Tony Parker, who was unstoppable for the entire series, was named The Finals MVP, and deservedly so.
The Cavs simply could not make big shots, or any outside shots on a consistent basis. LeBron James seemingly couldn’t score unless he drove through the entire San Antonio defense to get to the basket. He lacked confidence in his mid range jumper, and why shouldn’t he, I don’t think he made more than one or two in the series. The best thing I heard after the game was James’ admission that he needs to get better. He wasn’t satisfied by getting to the Finals, nor was he happy with his game. When he can make that 15 footer jumper on a regular basis, he will be impossible to defend.
Game 4 pointed out the Cavaliers’ biggest problem. They have too many players who are one dimensional. For example, in the fourth quarter, Mike Brown went with Damon Jones and Donyell Marshall to try to spread out the floor for King James, so he could get to the basket easier. However, the trade off was that the two veterans are not strong defenders and it allowed Ginobili driving lanes which caused havoc for the Cavalier defense. It was written here at the beginning of the season, had Shannon Brown been used early in the year, he may have been able to contribute in the playoffs. He didn’t, and perhaps the wine and gold could have used another perimeter defender.
The other problem was the complete lack of outside shooting by Cleveland in the Finals. Although the Cavs are not a great shooting team, they were down right dreadful in this series. Marshall made some inside hoops in the last stanza yesterday, but couldn’t spit in the ocean from the edge of the boat. Daniel Gibson hit some shots in Texas, but apparently left his shot there. Sasha Pavlovic hit some shots here and there, but mostly there. In fact, the best shooter the Cavs had in the series might have been Drew Gooden, and he wasn’t in at crunch time last night, because Brown doesn’t have confidence in his defense of the pick and roll.
Where do the Cavs go from here? First, this is a very good defensive team and that is a credit to their head coach. However, Danny Ferry needs to find a point guard, so LeBron can be a finisher. It was nice to see the Cavs finally put James in the post against a smaller defender, because it is one more area in which he can be unstoppable if he works on that area of his game. Next, Brown needs to bring in an assistant coach who has an offensive concept. The team needs some set plays that they can lean on when they need a hoop. The spread the floor and let James take his defender doesn’t work against good teams. We just saw four games as an example.
The also need to remove some of the dead weight from the roster. Since Ira Newble has only one year left on his deal, he could be a nice chip for a team looking to clear cap space. It will be hard to unload Jones and Marshall, but both are limited and aging. The team doesn’t have a draft pick this year, but since Brown played so little this year, he could almost be considered a new player. It would be nice to get another big man who can play, since obviously the staff has no confidence in Scott Pollard.
There’s no need for a celebration. The Cavaliers didn’t win the NBA title. They will get to add a banner to the rafters signifying an Eastern Conference Championship. However, the headline in The Plain Dealer this morning was wrong. It read "Final Chapter", it should have read "First Chapter". The beginning of hopefully a long run as a title contender with LeBron James as the main character.
JK
Cleveland Sports Perspective 