Some Things Bothering Us With The Tribe

The baseball season is still very, very young. That’s why no one should be too upset about the Cleveland Indians start after 14 games.

The Tribe is 5-9 for the season, and really the only problem with that record is that Kansas City and Detroit have launched the 2015 regular season on a hot streak.

The Indians were 5-9 at the same point in the season in 2013 and went on to win 92 games that season and made the playoffs.

If you are looking at how games behind Cleveland is in the standings, be advised that on May 18th last season, they were 10-1/2 games out of first. They still went to the final weekend of the season before being eliminated from the post-season.

However, there still are some disturbing trends that have shown up in the first three weeks of the season, and they are being carried over from a year ago.

Defense. The Indians thought this would be improved from last year because Jose Ramirez replaced Asdrubal Cabrera at SS, and Carlos Santana was established at 1B. It’s still a problem.

Ramirez has booted some routine plays in key situations giving opponents extra outs, and the fears about Brandon Moss in right have proven true. He has missed cut offs routinely, and several fly balls which looked to be outs off of the bat have fallen in safely.

On a team built on pitching, the hurlers deserve better defense behind them.

Let’s face it, shortstop and centerfield are the most important defensive positions, and the organization’s best defender at SS is in Columbus.

Michael Bourn/Top of the lineup. The centerfielder’s career has been in decline since arriving here, and to this point, nothing has changed.

In his years in the National League, Bourn was a career .272 hitter with a .339 on base percentage and a 704 OPS. In two years with the Tribe, those numbers have dropped to .257/.313/.667.

While it is very early, Bourn isn’t off to a good start, hitting below .200 and second on the team in strikeouts despite having just two extra base hits.

He’s never been a very good leadoff hitter because of his on base average, but he’s becoming a liability at the top of the order. It will be interesting to see how patience Terry Francona has with the veteran.

The guy batting after him, Jason Kipnis, is also struggling. He has just one extra base hit in 58 at bats. Just two years ago, Kipnis had 57 extra base hits for the season, today, he ranks last on the club.

It wouldn’t be as bad if Kipnis was getting on base, but he’s drawn just two walks on the season, meaning his OBP is just .246.

It’s difficult for the offense to get going when every game seems to start with two outs and nobody on.

The Bullpen. Francona has ridden his bullpen hard the last two seasons, and whether it has taken a toll or not remains to be seen. However, the relief corps has had a problem throwing strikes, and that is not good.

Cody Allen has walked six hitters in five innings. Nick Hagadone, whose control has always been an issue, has walked three in six innings of work.

Bryan Shaw has walked two in four innings, but has been behind in the count often, leading to allowing eight hits in that workload. Kyle Crockett, now at Columbus, walked three in less than three innings.

Putting extra men on base especially in key, late game situations is never a good idea. This is an area that could turn around quickly.

We generally don’t form a solid judgment on a team until they get to 27 games, or 1/6th of the season.

But the first two things noted here were around all last year, so it becomes more of a trend.

Sure, the Indians could start hitting this weekend in Detroit and come back home in a much better spot. The starting pitching, especially at the top of the rotation has been spectacular.

Let’s hope the Tribe starts playing much better starting Friday night.

Why Stevens Has Better Rep Than Blatt

One of the story lines in the first round playoff series between the Cavaliers and Celtics is the impact of the young, basketball genius coach of Boston, Brad Stevens.

This isn’t to say Stevens hasn’t earned his reputation as one of the game’s best young minds.

He took a mid major program in Butler, from the same league as Cleveland State, to the NCAA Tournament Championship game two years in a row, losing to Duke and Connecticut, two of the sports’ power programs.

That said, in the first loss by a 61-59 score to Coach K’s Blue Devils, Stevens had the best player on the floor in Gordon Hayward, who averaged 19.3 points per game for Utah this season.

Getting to two straight finals is a tremendous accomplishment to be sure, and to do it without multiple McDonald’s All American high school players shows Stevens did a great coaching job.

And he’s done a very good job this year in Boston. Let’s face it, there isn’t one player who starts for the Celtics that would start for the Cavs, yet, the Celts had the second best record in the Eastern Conference after the all-star game.

Only the Cavs were better.

So Stevens has done a tremendous job with limited talent of getting the most out of his talent and getting his players to buy in and play hard every night.

He’s made his teams over achieve.

We will never know that about David Blatt as long as he has LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love on the roster.

So, the narrative is that Stevens is a better coach, the boy wonder of basketball, and he will out scheme Blatt and keep his team in every game.

That’s not fair to Blatt.

Heck, for all we know, Stevens may be the heir apparent to Larry Brown as the best basketball mind in the country, but the comparison with Blatt isn’t a fair one because the Cavs’ coach has the talent, and hopefully (for fans and Blatt alike), we will never find out what kind of record he could squeeze out of the Boston roster.

And when you coach a very talented team, it is very difficult to get credit, or be considered a coaching genius.

Gregg Popovich gets a ton of credit because of the way the San Antonio Spurs play, and because people refuse to acknowledge that Tim Duncan is one of the game’s all time greats. And Popovich has gotten a lot out of guys cast aside by other teams, like Boris Diaw, Danny Green, etc.

We have always “pooh-poohed” Phil Jackson’s coaching greatness because he never coached a team that didn’t have a great player on it. All of his title teams had Michael Jordan, Shaquille O’Neal, and/or Kobe Bryant on the roster.

Blatt will never get any credit for the Cavaliers being successful because LeBron James is on the team, and he’s still the best player in the league.

Perhaps if he had the team he was hired to coach (no James, no Love) and guided the wine and gold to the playoffs, he would have the reputation as a great coach. But he didn’t. That doesn’t make him a coach who isn’t competent, it just makes him fortunate.

Even if the Cavaliers win a title this summer, the credit will go to the players. And the only credit David Blatt will get will be that he didn’t screw it up.

Please Browns, Stay Away From Mariota

The NFL draft is less than two weeks away, and once again the rumors are flying that the Cleveland Browns want to move up in the first round to take Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota.

Because the Browns need a quarterback. That’s the local and national narrative.

We’ve changed the scenario just a bit. Really, the Browns need a very good quarterback.

We aren’t sure there is one in this draft, so we would pass.

We’ve said this before, but what the Browns really need is to get two players in the first round that can help this team in the 2015 season, because the two guys they drafted last May didn’t really help them in ’14.

You can’t keep picking projects in the first round of the NFL draft. Your first round selections should be starters in the upcoming season.

This isn’t to say Justin Gilbert and Johhny Manziel can’t and won’t be solid NFL players someday, it is way too early to give up on either player.

But teams simply cannot keep taking players who won’t help them when the regular season starts.

That’s why we wouldn’t take Mariota at all, let alone trade up to get him.

Mariota may be an NFL starter at some point in his career, and for all we know, he might be a Super Bowl winning QB or a Hall of Famer eventually.

However, we don’t think he’s ready to start for a team in week one.

Right now, he’s product of the Oregon system, a quarterback who rarely, if ever took a snap from center, and remember the Ducks’ offense was based on lining up quickly before the defense was ready.

That’s not going to happen in the NFL.

Supporters of getting Mariota say that the Browns shouldn’t shy away from the move simply because it would mean drafting a signal caller in the first time in three of the last four years.

That would be true if we knew for sure that the Oregon QB was “the man”.

Carolina drafted Jimmy Clausen, and the following year, took Cam Newton. The difference is, we don’t think Mariota is Newton, and Clausen started ten games as a rookie.

Manziel played six quarters.

Before dismissing the former Aggie, shouldn’t he get more of an opportunity, particularly since it appears he made a drastic change in his lifestyle?

In today’s Plain Dealer, Terry Pluto referenced a new stat from ESPN to show Mariota’s effectiveness and apparently his proof was that Teddy Bridgewater had a similar number last year.

The response from us is that there is no proof that Bridgewater is a great player. His passer rating was 85.2 and he was 6-6 as a starter.

Andrew Luck’s rating as a rookie was 76, but his record was 11-5.

Robert Griffin III’s passer rating in his first year was over 100, and he was 9-6 as a starter, but we have seen the downturn in his career to this point.

The point is no one is saying Bridgewater is Luck.

Besides, the Browns have other areas that they need to address. Their defense against the run was terrible at best.

They need a game breaking wide receiver. They need a couple more linebackers, they could use another stud offensive lineman so that if an Alex Mack goes down to injury, the unit doesn’t drop to below average.

The point here is if Mariota isn’t a savior, then don’t move up, and resist the temptation to draft him even if he is there at #12 or #19.

Let’s pick up some players who can start when the bell rings on week one.

Now Is Blatt’s Time to Show His Stuff

The Cleveland Cavaliers ended their regular season last night and it truly was a tale of two halves of the season.

As everyone is aware, the Cavs struggled to get going. LeBron James was banged up and needed to rest his body, while the team got off to a 19-20 start.

When James returned, GM David Griffin sprung into action, revamping the roster with two major trades, and the wine and gold closed out the second half with a 34-9 record.

David Blatt has had his share of critics, both from the national media (who love to pick the Cavaliers apart), and also from the local media, who don’t seem to care for his arrogance, something you probably have to have if you are going to coach elite players.

But Blatt should get enormous credit for fitting in the new pieces, Timofey Mozgov, J.R. Smith, and Iman Shumpert, seamlessly. Many times, basketball teams make personnel moves and it takes time for the pieces to fit together and play well together.

Just think back to when the Cavs made a mega-move at the trading deadline in 2008, bringing in Ben Wallace, Delonte West, Joe Smith, and Wally Szczerbiak.

The Cavs were 30-24 at the time of the deal, and finished the season with a 45-37 record. They were basically a .500 team after the deal, and lost in the second round of the playoffs to Boston.

This Cleveland team hit the ground running after the deal, which is a credit to the head coach, the GM, who found the perfect pieces to fit this squad, and the players who made their new teammates feel at home.

Most felt the key to the moves was Shumpert, an active wing defender the Cavs desperately needed. But he was still hurt when he arrived here, which allowed Blatt to use Smith in the starting lineup.

The much maligned Smith fit like a glove, providing instant offense, knocking down open three after open three, playing off James and Kyrie Irving perfectly.

And Smith was active on the defensive end too, which allowed Blatt to give him more freedom on offense.

No one could have seen the huge impact Smith made on this team, and when Shumpert was healthy, Blatt kept things exactly how they were, and Shumpert came off the bench, where he has been very valuable to the Cavaliers.

However, playoff time is where Blatt will make his bones. And it starts right away, as he is matched up against one of the sports’ up and coming coaches in Boston’s Brad Stevens.

The Cavs have a decided talent advantage in the first round, but what we are looking for is how Blatt reacts and counters what other teams are going to do to keep the wine and gold at bay.

This isn’t to say Blatt isn’t capable of doing just that. He’s had success overseas in tournament play, but we are looking forward to seeing how he manages the playoff situation.

And it becomes more of a factor as the playoffs go on. Remember that Mike Brown could never figure out what Orlando was doing in the Eastern Conference finals in 2008-09. He never tried anything different or couldn’t come up with a counter.

Playing the same team a possible seven straight times brings the ability to scheme and coach into the forefront. David Blatt’s time to shine is right now. The playoffs start Sunday afternoon.

Forget the Uniform Frenzy, The Browns Are Improving Under the Radar

Tonight’s the night!

Unfortunately, a lot of attention will be given to the Cleveland Browns unveiling their new uniform scheme this evening.

We guess it will be interesting to see what the powers that be came up with, but in reality, they could wear Lady Gaga’s famous meat dress if they went to the Super Bowl.

We understand that a great deal of sports talk conversation on Wednesday will involve the analysis of clothing, not the Cavaliers’ impending playoff series or the Indians start to their season.

It’s Browns’ Town. We get it. However, if you want to talk about the Cleveland Browns, why not focus on the improvements the team has made this off-season. We understand this doesn’t fit in with the “Browns are dysfunctional” narrative that both the national and local media have portrayed, but there is no question here that GM Ray Farmer is addressing the team’s needs and remember, he has 11 draft picks coming from April 30th-May 2nd.

We’ve heard about the lack of quality wide receivers for more than a year, and since the season ended, Farmer signed veteran wide outs Dwayne Bowe and Brian Hartline. And we feel another young pass catcher will be added in the first few rounds in the draft.

There is no question the Mike Pettine’s team had a hard time stopping the run in 2014, and they lost veteran Ahtyba Rubin to free agency. Rubin was replaced by Randy Starks, a two-time Pro Bowl player. Yes, Starks is three years older than the man he replaced, but again, many draft experts have the Browns taking another defensive lineman in either the first or second round of the draft. So, they are upgrading for not only next year, but for the future.

They lost CB Buster Skrine in free agency, and replaced him in the short-term with former Green Bay starter Tramon Williams. Ultimately, one of last year’s draft choices, Justin Gilbert or Pierre Desir, will replace Skrine.

Their other major loss was TE Jordan Cameron, and Farmer addressed this by signing Rob Housler last week. Housler is five months older than the man he replaces, and actually has more seasons with more than 30 catches. Outside of Cameron’s Pro Bowl season in 2013 when he caught 80 passes, his next best year was 24 catches in 2014. Housler caught 45 passes in ’12 and 39 in 2013. And he doesn’t have the concussion issues that have plagued Cameron.

Of course, the one position everyone focuses on is quarterback, and that’s why any optimism is muted.

We have said this before, but when they Browns have just decent quarterback play, they can win.

A passer rating of 80 is below average in today’s NFL. In fact, it would rank 27th last season, so it is barely passable.

Last year, when the Browns QB had a rating of over 80, the team went 6-3. When it was below that mark, they were 1-6.

So, if the Browns get competent play at the position, they have a pretty good record.

While it would be nice to have Andrew Luck or even Joe Flacco, what the Browns really need is someone to not be terrible. That’s the low bar set for Josh McCown and/or Johnny Manziel.

And that’s how Farmer and Pettine have built this team, to find ways to win without having a great quarterback. That’s not to say they don’t want one, but you can’t just lose because you don’t have one.

Pettine’s offense centers around a strong running game and a QB that doesn’t make mistakes until he gets THE GUY.

Still, seeing what the Browns do in the draft is more important than the new uniforms. Unfortunately, that will be all the talk tomorrow.

Tribe Roster in Flux Already, No Need to Panic

The major league baseball season is a week old, and already the roster of the Cleveland Indians is in flux.

Even though the Tribe were swept in their first home series of the year by the Detroit Tigers, the biggest loss was that of Yan Gomes, who suffered sprained knee ligaments in a home plate collision on Saturday and will be out 6-8 weeks.

GM Chris Antonetti was forced to do some roster shuffling because of Gomes’ injury, as well as a back problem for Michael Brantley that has kept him out of the lineup for all but two games.

If he isn’t ready to play Tuesday night against Chicago, after three days off, he may join Gomes on the DL.

Brantley’s problem along with other teams throwing southpaws at the Tribe, forced the team to bring up OF/1B Jerry Sands, a right-handed bat to help in this regard.

Then after the home opener and Saturday’s debacle for the relief corps, Antonetti and skipper Terry Francona were forced to bring back Austin Adams, set back to active Sands, and also to bring up Shawn Marcum to provide innings in case T.J. House couldn’t provide innings on Sunday, which he couldn’t.

It just goes to show that major league teams really don’t have a 25 man roster, it is more like 30 guys, with all of the player movement between the big club and their AAA affiliate.

However, it’s still way to early to panic and worry, after there are still 156 games remaining.

This series against the Tigers reminded us of a weekend at home against Oakland last May, when the Tribe lost three games by scores of 11-2, 6-2, and 13-3. Everything the A’s hit that weekend either hit a hole or sailed over a fence, much like the Tigers this weekend.

How did the Indians respond last year? They won 5 of their next 6, including a three game sweep of? You guessed it, the Detroit Tigers.

And as for folks saying this year is the same as last, and Cleveland can’t beat the Motor City Kitties, let us remind you that the Tribe beat the Tigers in four of the first five games they played a year ago, and wound up the season at 8-11 against them.

Again, there is a long, long way to go.

Detroit is hitting .364 as a team, and we are fairly confident that won’t continue for the balance of the year. Also, if you want to have success against them, you have to get their first two hitter and the bottom of their order out.

Right now, Anthony Gose has a .450 OBP, Ian Kinsler’s is .480, and Jose Iglesias’ is .625. Lifetime, their figures are .306 (Gose), .344 (Kinsler), and .335 (Iglesias).

To summarize…the Tigers are red-hot and the Indians caught them at the right time.

Also, the Tigers only saw one of the Indians’ top three pitchers, Corey Kluber, and Saturday’s game featured a meltdown by the bullpen, which isn’t normal for Francona’s team.

Many baseball people say you can’t judge a team until the 40 game mark, but we disagree slightly, saying that at the 1/6th point of the season, 27 games, you can start to get a feel for what is going on.

So, relax. This week the Indians have two with the White Sox and three in Minnesota with the Twins.

Just think, a week from now, the optimism felt by everyone going into the season could very well be back.

Cavs’ Division Title a Symbol of How Far They Have Come

The Cleveland Cavaliers are the Central Division champions.

In the NBA, it isn’t a big deal to win your division title, it really just guarantees you home court advantage in your first round playoff match up. And remember, in pro basketball, more than half the teams qualify for the post-season.

In baseball and football, winning the division makes you stand out more, as less than 40% of the team make the playoffs.

That’s why the Cavs really didn’t celebrate clinching the division, it’s just a step toward their ultimate goal, which is the Larry O’Brien Trophy.

Still, it is a symbol of how far the franchise has come not only from last season, when they won 33 games, but also from earlier this season, when they were once 19-20.

Since then, catapulted by a win over the hapless Lakers, the wine and gold have ripped off 32 victories against just seven defeats. Had they played the entire season at such a pace, they would be rivaling Golden State for the league’s best record.

For Kyrie Irving, who is blossoming into one of the league’s best players before our very eyes, and Tristan Thompson, who spent the first three years of their NBA careers struggling to attain wins, it has to be very satisfying indeed.

Just think of the switch for them, from coming to the arena every night hoping for a win to now expecting a victory.

For Kevin Love, one of the league’s top players but stuck on bad teams, winning the Central is proof that making the sacrifices he had to make by playing with LeBron James and Irving made it all worthwhile.

We think about how lucky J.R. Smith and Iman Shumpert have to feel. They started the year with high hopes, especially after beating Cleveland on opening night, but quickly the Knicks’ season feel into a deep abyss, perhaps the NBA’s worst team.

They both have to think they hit the lottery with both contributing to a team that has a chance to win a world championship.

Timofey Mosgov has to have the same feeling, coming from a team that will lose 50 games this year to another that has won 50. And he is the nightly recipient of lob passes from the league’s best players, and has the most alley-oop dunks since putting on a Cavs uniform.

James Jones has to look at the season as a rejuvenation of his career, playing more minutes than he has since the 2011-12 season. He produced when given a chance and became a guy who earned the trust of David Blatt.

As for Blatt, a man who was said to be clinging to his job when the Cavaliers dipped below the .500 mark, it is vindication. If nothing else, he should get credit for putting his new pieces of the puzzle together quickly. There wasn’t much of an adjustment period at all.

And for James, it is the first step in delivering what he said he wanted to do when he returning to Northeast Ohio. He wanted to bring a title to the seemingly sports cursed area.

He changed the culture of the locker room and prodded, pleaded, and taught Irving how to play winning basketball, not just put up numbers. There is no question that the strides made by Irving this season could not have come without the influence of the man who is still the best player on the planet.

So, although it is a small step, the organization should take pride in its accomplishment. After a struggle early on, the Cavaliers go into the playoffs as one of the hottest teams in the NBA.

It was a long bumpy ride to get to this point.

Does Media Set The Bar Low For Tribe Ownership?

Over the weekend, the Cleveland Indians made some news off the field.

They announced that they signed 2014 Cy Young Award winner Corey Kluber to a five-year contract with two more season at the Tribe’s option, meaning Kluber could remain in a Cleveland uniform for seven more years.

Later that day, they inked Carlos Carrasco to a four-year deal, an additional three years following this season, totaling a reported $22 million.

Although we advised the team to be careful with the Kluber extension, it’s a good deal for the team because it was done at reasonable dollars and at no time does the contract become untradeable, meaning if either pitcher’s performance drops or they are deemed replaceable, the Tribe isn’t stuck with the player.

As a comparison, there is no way GM Chris Antonetti could move either Nick Swisher or Michael Bourn right now.

No naturally, social media was filled with the usual suspects praising the Tribe ownership and denouncing people who call the Dolan family cheap.

There comments were “see, the Dolans do spend money!”

Really? This is the low bar we set for the Indians organization?

The front office simply did what most major league teams do, that is, they kept young players who are productive and bought some years of arbitration and a year or two of free agency.

Other teams do that all the time.

Look, this really isn’t a hammering of the Dolans, although we have been critical in the past. However, praising them for locking up a player who couldn’t leave for several years (in the case of Kluber) isn’t exactly an earth-shaking decision.

And they did it at money that will likely keep the club’s payroll at the organization’s comfort level. It was really a no-brainer decision for the team. Should they be praised for that?

Besides, our problem with the Indians’ ownership and front office is their willingness, or rather, their unwillingness to go the extra mile.

With their club in contention for a playoff spot in each of the last two years, the biggest acquisition they made was trading for left-handed relief pitcher Mark Rzepczynski.

Last year, they actually traded away two veteran players in Asdrubal Cabrera and Justin Masterson getting prospects in return. Basically, they subtracted instead of added to the roster.

In 2011, Antonetti did make a big move, trading for Ubaldo Jimenez for at the time, two top pitching prospects. The move didn’t work that year, although Jimenez was a big factor in claiming a wild card spot in ’13.

We have said this before, franchises have to take a shot at making the playoffs when they get the opportunity, particularly in baseball, because once you get there, you have as good a shot as any other team.

Look at the Royals a year ago. They made the playoffs in the wild card game and advanced all the way to the seventh game of the World Series.

If the Indians have a chance when the trading deadline comes this July, and they add to the roster for the last two months, then the ownership should get credit and will get credit here.

Until then, let’s not go overboard praising the Indians for signing good players that they developed. That’s something they should be doing all the time.

Prediction: Tribe to Win AL Central

Over the past month, the Cleveland Indians seem to have become the darlings of the national media.

In the winter, the baseball people were talking about the San Diego Padres and Washington Nationals because they either reshaped their entire rosters or made a huge splash in free agency.

Meanwhile, GM Chris Antonetti made only two moves of real consequence, trading for slugger Brandon Moss from Oakland, and signing RHP Gavin Floyd, who is likely out for the year, as a free agent.

But now the Indians are gathering a lot of attention throughout the nation and we happen to agree, the Tribe will win the AL Central Division title in 2015.

First, we came to this conclusion a few months ago, so we aren’t jumping on the bandwagon, and second, if you read this blog or can look up the archives, we don’t pick the Indians to win every year.

Quite frankly, Cleveland is the best balance club in the division.

The Tigers can hit, but their starting pitching took a hit with the loss of Max Scherzer and the decline/injury to Justin Verlander. And their bullpen is still a mess.

The White Sox are a popular pick to make the playoffs with a very productive off-season, but the Pale Hose weren’t in the top half of the league in hitting or pitching last season, so they have a lot of ground to make up.

The Royals are the defending American League champions, but the loss of James Shields, and the fact they overachieved to get into the post-season is something that will correct itself in 2015.

Meanwhile, the Indians should get a better season from at least one of these three players: Jason Kipnis (most likely), Nick Swisher (possible), or Michael Bourn (least likely despite a good spring). That, along with adding a guy who can hit 25-30 HR in Moss, should help an offense that sputtered at times in ’14.

And the defense will be better with Jose Ramirez starting the season at shortstop, and don’t forget we will likely see rookie Francisco Lindor, who impressed everyone in Goodyear, at some point in the campaign.

Pitching, we know that the Indians will have a solid bullpen with all of the power arms that Terry Francona has at his disposal, with the late innings handled by Cody Allen, Bryan Shaw, and Scott Atchison, and others who can matchup after the game reaches the 7th inning.

The rotation did take a hit with the loss of Floyd and Danny Salazar’s poor spring, but they still have the AL Cy Young Award winner in Corey Kluber, an emerging Carlos Carrasco, who seems to have figured it out, and our candidate for a break through season in Trevor Bauer.

Most forget that for the first four months of the 2014 season, Bauer was the second most consistent hurler the Indians had. He is just 24, and last year allowed fewer hits than innings pitched and struck out twice as many as he walked. That’s a good pitcher.

The team needs Zach McAllister and T. J. House to be solid at the back-end of the rotation, and at least keep the games close until Francona can ride his relief corps.

Lastly, a big edge for the Indians is that they have Francona and pitching coach Mickey Callaway. Tito has proven to be one of the game’s top pilots and although we disagree with him on some details, we believe he can and does get the most out of his roster.

The Indians have been close to the division title the last two seasons, making the wild card game in 2013 and avoiding elimination until the 159th game last season.

This season, they will kick down the door and a divisional series will return to Progressive Field.

Allaying The Fears of Cavs’ Fans

We have said this for the better part of month, but even when a Cleveland sports team is successful, fans here still have to worry about something.

So, even though the Cleveland Cavaliers have won 27 of their last 36 games, there is still apprehension.

And of course, the national media doesn’t help the situation.

The latest is the claim that LeBron James is calling the ways and David Blatt simply repeats what James has called, basically saying that the head coach is the puppet of the star player.

The worry is how will that impact the team during the playoffs.

If that doesn’t cause enough angst, then fans are worried about how the wine and gold will match up with in the first round of the playoffs, praying that it isn’t LeBron’s old team, the Miami Heat.

First, the Cavs can knock Miami into the eighth seed with a victory tonight, and secondly, in the two losses to Miami this season, one came on Christmas Day on the road, and the other came after the end of a four game trip in which the Cavaliers won the first three games, two of them vs. Dallas and San Antonio.

And the Heat were rested coming into the contest.

While Miami has several players who have been part of four consecutive trips to The Finals, and therefore would present more of a challenge than a young team making the post season for the first time, it is doubtful the Cavaliers will be extended to a seven game series against Dwyane Wade’s squad.

So, it is very likely the Cavs could open up against the Nets or Celtics in the first round.

The other issue that is driving us crazy is the rest issue. It was funny to hear Wally Szczerbiak, who was on the 2008-09 Cavaliers point to the week off between the second round sweep and the conference finals as a key reason for the loss to Orlando.

This points to what we have said all along, too much rest doesn’t help the players.

The Cavs last played on Sunday, so in the next ten days the wine and gold will play a grand total of three games. Blatt gave the team off on Monday and Tuesday of this week, so they will be well rested tonight, and then have two more days off before their next game on Sunday.

And Blatt can give James, Kyrie Irving, Kevin Love and others all of the contests the last week of the season (they play three games from April 12th-15th), giving everybody sufficient rest heading into the playoffs. They will have the #2 seed clinched by then, so those games will be meaningless.

So, expect to see a lot of Joe Harris, Mike Miller, Brendan Haywood, etc. in those games. Miller, along with Shawn Marion will benefit from the time as they could be called upon in the post-season to play a role.

Until the Cavs lose home court advantage in a playoff season, there is no reason to worry right now. So, relax and enjoy the games.

There will be plenty of time to be nervous in May and June.