Three games is hardly enough time to make any judgments on the any team and the Cleveland Cavaliers are no exception. A lot could change during the next eight games for the wine and gold, especially because seven of those games are on the road.
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremonies are the reason for the games away from Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse, by the way.
It might surprise you based on the team’s first two games, but the Cavs have moved up to 20th in the league in defensive rating after the victories over Atlanta and Denver.
Much was made about the five words on the wall in the Cavs’ practice facility being the coaching staff’s mantra, but we felt until one of those words becomes “defense”, we fear this team in going to struggle.
Perhaps J.B. Bickerstaff hit on something by switching to a zone, with rookie Evan Mobley at the top of it to start the second half in Saturday night’s victory over the Hawks. The rookie can be a monster in this defense with his length and quickness, and he covers up for most of the lack of ability defensively by his teammates.
It will be interesting to see how often Bickerstaff goes to this defense on this trip.
Also interesting is the rotation employed by the coach, who right now seems to only trust nine players, and with Darius Garland nursing a sore ankle, he played only eight guys in a game he probably figured he needed badly with the long trip coming up.
The only bench players getting time are the veterans, Ricky Rubio and Kevin Love, and Isaac Okoro and Cedi Osman.
He tried to use Kevin Pangos and Dean Wade in the home opener against Charlotte, but neither gave much in the way of performance.
We did not understand Bickerstaff’s insistence on pushing the ball up the court. The last two games, Cleveland has slowed the tempo and taken care of the basketball.
We fear the young players do not make good enough decisions trying to beat teams up the floor and that leads to turnovers. Rubio can handle this. Perhaps later in the year, after watching the veteran, Garland and Sexton can handle this as well. But for now, we love the decision to slow it down a bit.
And as with last season, three point shooting continues to be an issue. The Cavs are still one of the worst teams in terms of shooting the long range shot, and that’s with Rubio knocking down 9 of 23.
The next two players in terms of attempts, Lauri Markkanen and Sexton, have made a combined 14 of 46 shots from beyond the arc (30.4%). Although Osman has hit 5 of 14 shots from distance, 14 of his 24 shots have been threes and we don’t understand why.
In our way of thinking, he’s a slasher and a decent passer once he drives to the hoop, and we feel he would be more effective playing that type of game.
Despite starting three players seven feet tall, the Cavaliers are getting hammered on the board, outrebounded by an average of nine per night. We think this is due to the big men trying to stop the parade of guards going to the basket, and then being out of position.
Once again, that would be corrected with a better defensive concept in the half-court.
It’s going to be a tough trip to start the year, for sure. But starting with a win last night, it certainly was an encouraging start.
Cleveland Sports Perspective 