Basketball can be viewed differently by a lot of people, it’s a very subjective sport.
Many people view it from a numbers perspective only, meaning players who score a lot are good players, although there are some guys who do that at the expense of everything else, so they aren’t really important to winning teams.
We hear it all the time in conversations about basketball, and we can cite examples right on our own Cleveland Cavaliers.
We believe people undervalue Larry Nance Jr. because he’s not a scorer, his career high in points per game is the 9.4 he tallied this season.
But Nance does a lot of good things on a basketball court. First, he makes 52% of his shots, meaning he understands his limitations in that area. He also grabbed 8.2 rebounds and dished out a career high 3.2 assists.
A big man who can pass is very valuable. Look at Nikola Jokic for the Denver Nuggets, who averaged over seven assists a game for the team with the second best record in the Western Conference.
Conversely, we aren’t big fans of Jordan Clarkson, who we believe is nothing more than a scorer for bad teams. Think about it, the Cavs averaged 104.5 points per game, and they were one of the worst teams in the NBA.
Someone has to score those points. When Clarkson did play for a good team, the second half of the 2017-18 season with Cleveland, he was invisible much of the time, particularly in the playoffs.
He doesn’t do much else to help a team win, and in our view, that’s why he is very replaceable.
Another thing that irritates us is talk of a players’ legacy, or determining who is the leader of a team.
Leadership is a very difficult thing, getting people to follow you isn’t easy. One thing we believe is that leaders don’t have to tell you they are the leader. Everybody just knows.
LeBron James did inform the media all the time he was the Cavs’ leader, but the players seemed to understand that as well. The holdovers from last year’s roster talked a lot this season on the work ethic that carried on even though James was in Los Angeles.
James led by being prepared for every season and every game. He is talented enough that he didn’t have to be, but he was. His teammates saw that.
And sometimes, players thrive when they aren’t a featured performer.
For example, Kyrie Irving wanted badly to have “his own team”. Right now, the phrase “be careful what you wish for” comes to mind.
Irving is having a problem with the leadership role, and really, there’s nothing wrong with being the second best player on a team that wins a title.
Look at how people view Klay Thompson or Scottie Pippen. They are thought of as great, even though they played with better players. They are important reasons as to why their teams are champions.
There seems to be too much self awareness in the game today. Why not win as many titles as you can? We understand that players can be free agents and can play where they want, and we don’t begrudge that. They’ve earned that right.
But shouldn’t the goal be to win? And win as much as you can?
It may be a generational thing, we guess.
Basketball is a beautiful game when played well. And as we said, it is a very subjective sport. This was our view.
MW
Cleveland Sports Perspective 