Cavs Lose Game One, Doesn’t Mean It’s Over

The city of Cleveland is left bemoaning a lost opportunity last night, as the Cleveland Cavaliers lost to the Golden State Warriors, 108-100 in overtime in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.

The Cavs had the ball at the end of regulations and it was in LeBron James’ hands. But, Andre Iguodala did a good job defensively, James missed, and the resulting rebound/flip at the hoop by Iman Shumpert just missed winning the game.

Overtime was a disaster, as Cleveland didn’t score until less than a minute remaining, and Kyrie Irving limped off the floor with an apparent knee problem, perhaps aggravating his tendonitis.

However, let’s look at the bright side.

The wine and gold almost won this game despite not getting much offensively from Shumpert and J.R. Smith. James Jones played 16 minutes and took one shot, missing it.

This means James and Irving, who scored 23 points in an excellent performance, had little help from the players who have performed so well from the perimeter in these playoffs.

And Golden State got a tremendous game from Andre Iguodala, who scored 15 points on 6 of 8 shooting. This year, when shooting more than five times in a game, Iguodala had this kind of performance just five times. Meaning, considering the stage, he played the game of his life, at least offensively.

He’s a 47% shooter from the floor, 35% from behind the arc, yet last night, everything he shot went in the basket. Do we think that will happen again? It’s doubtful.

The problem is, Golden State has other players who can, and it is likely that Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson will score more than the 47 points they combined for yesterday.

However, is it equally likely that the Cavs will get more out of Smith, Shumpert, Dellavedova, and Jones? We would say yes to that as well.

Obviously, the key is Irving’s health. Can he possibly go in Game 2?

Remember, all the Warriors are doing right now is holding serve. No matter what happens Sunday night, if the wine and gold win their home games, the series will be even a two games apiece.

Cleveland had a chance to take this one. There’s no reason to think they can’t do it again, especially if they put the same defensive effort and get more offensively from their long range shooters.

Other thoughts on the game–

Timofey Mozgov was outstanding last night, scoring 16 points and 7 rebounds. He may have to play at that level, at least offensively if the Cavaliers have a chance in this series.

The officials did play a part, making a horrible traveling call on Mozgov late in the fourth quarter on a play that would have given Cleveland a two point lead with less than a minute to go. We understand they missed plays on both side, but that was just wrong.

Also, could they call any one of the five or six moving picks on Andrew Bogut? He’s like a pulling guard on the football field. No wonder Curry and Thompson get wide open looks.

One adjustment the Cavs made was to challenge outlet passes after missed shots, somebody jumped back to try to slow down the Warriors from racing down the floor. It slowed the tempo just enough. A good move by the coaching staff.

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.

Cavs’ Success Has National Media Confused

We must have forgotten all of the crazy stuff that goes on when LeBron James is on your basketball team.

Early in the season, when the Cavaliers were struggling, it was easy for the media, both local and national, to find things to write about this basketball team.

The stories ranged from David Blatt being on the precipice of being fired, to James and/or Kevin Love opting out of their contracts after the 2014-15 season and heading to the free agent market.

When LeBron was in Miami, those stories simply didn’t exist about the Cavs, because no one cared about him.

There were even times when stories were dug up several weeks after the fact, such as Tristan Thompson turning down a huge contract extension.

Actually, Thompson turned it down before the second game of the season, right before the deadline to do such extensions, but it became a big story when the wine and gold was struggling.

Then, GM David Griffin made the deals which re-shaped the roster, and the basketball team starting winning. And winning a lot.

Last night’s demolition of Memphis gave Cleveland there 28th win in their last 34 games, a torrid pace to say the least.

Now, there wasn’t much controversial to concoct about this team.

Except for writing about the two scapegoats of the franchise, Blatt and Love.

We’ve been saying this for several weeks now, when the Cavaliers lose, you can bet the fans and media are blaming two people, the coach and the team’s starting power forward.

Local media people are always asking national types for the perception of Blatt, despite the fact that the last two times the wine and gold have had two days off and a solid practice, they posted impressive wins against Dallas and Memphis.

Why that doesn’t speak to Blatt’s ability and add how quickly the three new players fit in right away is a mystery.

However, he will no doubt be questioned until he wins the NBA title.

As for Love, without question he made the most sacrifices in his own game to come to Cleveland, and he will be rewarded with his first playoff appearance. He has consistently said he will be back with the Cavs next year, but that hasn’t stopped people (even Hall of Famer Alonzo Mourning has weighed in) from saying the former Timberwolf player can’t wait to get out.

And in the past few days, they have blown out of proportion his comments that he and James aren’t “best friends”, and he thought his former UCLA teammate, Russell Westbrook deserved consideration as MVP.

For all of the talk Love did about wanting to be on a winning team, he would look hypocritical if he left the Cavs left one season to go to the Lakers or Knicks, the two most talked about places he will wind up.

Really? That’s all they can come up with?

The point is things are running so smooth right now, that the national writers, who can’t fathom anyone would want to be in Cleveland, have to invent stories to try to disrupt the momentum of this basketball team.

To this point, it hasn’t bothered anyone.

To be sure, they thought J.R. Smith would do something crazy or wouldn’t fit in either, but he’s been a perfect fit here, and Blatt has called him a joy to coach.

It sounds like the players know right now that they have something special going on. They know the playoffs start very, very soon.

There’s Plenty of Time for Rest for Cavs’ Big Three

It never ceases to amaze us on the craziness of Cleveland as a sports city.

We guess until we finally win the coveted championship we’ve waited for over sixty years, it will not change.

Usually, the insanity revolves around the Cleveland Browns, but today’s piece is about the franchise that clinched a playoff spot last night, the Cavaliers.

Making the playoffs is a bit anti-climatic, since the Cavs have won 26 of their last 32 games, and since the hot streak started, we all knew they were going to make the post-season.

But the craziness is about resting the team’s best players: LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love.

Love missed the last two games of the last trip the team was on, sitting out against the Magic and Heat, and when it was reported that James missed the shoot around prior to yesterday’s contest vs. the Pacers, the argument started again.

There is no doubt James is sore at this time of year, but he shares that along with most of the sport’s players. He’s 30 years old, and to be sure his back and knees probably feel much older than that at this point in the season.

However, yesterday, he had a cold! Most of us go to work and perform our everyday functions with a cold. We take some medicine and go about our day.

There were those who said James should sit out, and there were even callers on local sports talk stations advocating that James sit out the rest of the season to have him completely healthy for the playoffs.

That is ridiculous, and those people probably don’t own a calendar.

The regular season ends on April 15th, which for you non-math majors is 25 days away. That would be almost four weeks.

Do we really want LeBron James going into the playoffs having sat for four weeks?

Remember the 2008-09 playoffs, when the Cavs vanquished both of their foes in the first two rounds of the playoffs in four games, and had to sit for a week waiting for Orlando to advance?

The Cavs got a little stale and lost game one at home, and could never regain the home court advantage, nor the momentum they had going after sweeping the first two rounds.

Plus, despite LeBron’s protests, it is better for David Blatt’s team to get the #2 seed in the East and have home court advantage for at least the first two rounds of the playoffs.

And with Chicago just 2-1/2 games behind and playing well as of late, the wine and gold still need to win some more contests.

The guess here is the Cavs can accomplish winning the division, thus clinching one of the top three seeds, probably #2 since Toronto is now three games back, with at least a week to spare.

That means Blatt can sit James, Irving, and Love for a full week if they all want to before the playoffs get underway. That would be plenty of time to ease their collective bumps and bruises.

Plus, after this three game trip to Milwaukee, Memphis, and Brooklyn, the Cavaliers will be at home for seven of their next nine games.

Included in those home games are contests against the Sixers, Celtics, and Pistons. If Blatt were to rest James in any of those games, it would be understandable.

Look we all want the Cavs to win the NBA title this year, but locking LeBron James in a vault for the rest of the regular season isn’t the answer either.

We trust James and Blatt to work together to get the league’s best player the rest he needs heading into the playoffs. Let’s not forget the wine and gold still need to win some games in the regular season too.

Why Mozgov Doesn’t Get Fourth Quarter Minutes.

Since the Cleveland Cavaliers had the audacity to lose a basketball game Friday night, even though it was to the team with the best record in the Eastern Conference, and it was on the road, of course the critics of David Blatt were out in full force.

Did we mention that the loss was also in the midst of a four games in five nights stretch and the Cavs won three of those games?

We constantly point out that when the Cavs do lose, it is the fault of either of two people, and sometimes both. Those people was Blatt and Kevin Love.

The criticism on Friday night was the lack of fourth quarter playing time for Timofey Mozgov.

The reason has everything to do with defensive match ups, and Blatt is no different from most NBA coaches in this respect.

He matches up defensively, particularly late in games, and that’s why Mozgov doesn’t see the court a lot at the end of the game.

It also has everything to do with the style of today’s NBA.

Most teams no longer have legitimate low post centers, instead, they favor guys who can get out on the floor and spread out the court. That is not the big Russian’s strength as a player.

The last thing Blatt and his staff want is for their center to get caught 15 feet away from the basket and have the opposition get point-blank lay ups or dunks.

So, the more effective defensive line up at the end of games is to have Tristan Thompson at center, because he is able to defend better out on the floor.

For comparison, Toronto only plays Jonas Valenciunas, he of the tackling of LeBron James on Wednesday night, just 3.7 minutes per game in the fourth quarter.

Why? For the same reason that Mozgov doesn’t get fourth quarter minutes.

The other night, if Valenciunas would have played most of the fourth quarter against the Cavaliers, then Mozgov would have been out there too.

Another Eastern Conference center is in the same boat as Valenciunas and Mozgov, and that would be another traditional big man, Washington’s Marcin Gortat.

Wizard fans are wondering why he only averages 4.4 minutes in the final quarter of games. And it is the same issue for Washington coach Randy Wittman, he doesn’t like the match up problems against smaller, quicker bigs.

A player like Joakim Noah is sound enough and quick enough to be able to guard a player who can stay away from the basket, and so is a guy like Al Horford, but both of those players are really power forwards masquerading as centers.

And you can see that it isn’t just David Blatt’s decisions either. Most coaches feel the same way about having a 7 footer trying to guard someone playing 15 feet from the basket. The inner defensive coach in each one of them don’t want to big man guarding someone out there.

Last night against Phoenix, Mozgov did demonstrate the ability to be a force defensively even though he wasn’t guarding a legitimate low post big man, and perhaps it will earn him some minutes late in the game.

However, when push comes to shove, coaches will go with the match up that causes them the least heartburn on the defensive end. And that’s why Mozgov and other bigs can’t get on the floor in the fourth quarter.

Is This Most Talented Cavs’ Team Ever?

The Cleveland Cavaliers certainly haven’t had a glorious history. Their all-time record since joining the NBA is more than 300 games below .500.

However, they have been to the NBA Finals in 2007, and lost in the Eastern Conference finals three times. And without disrespecting the ’06-‘o7 conference champs, the best team in franchise history may just be the last wine and gold squad to fall one step short of The Finals, the 2008-09 team that one 66 games in the regular season.

That team is a regular on lists of the best teams to not win an NBA title.

Our feeling was that collection of players failed because of Mike Brown’s failure to adjust to what Orlando was doing offensively in the conference finals, and because of the playoff schedule.

If you recall, the Cavs swept each of their first two series against Detroit and Atlanta, and had to wait nine days, from May 11th when they eliminated the Hawks, until May 20th when they took on Orlando.

The Cavaliers were rusty in Game 1, losing on their home floor, where they lost just twice all season long.

By the way, that team won 18 of their last 21 games in the regular season.

Since the current Cavs have now won 16 of their last 18, we decided to compare the current roster to perhaps the best team in Cleveland professional basketball history.

The starters on that team were LeBron James, Mo Williams, Delonte West, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, and Ben Wallace.

Anderson Varejao also started 42 games that season, getting the nod when Ilgauskas and Wallace had injuries. Sasha Pavlovic also started 12 games, mostly for West.

James, who was 24 at the time, averaged 28.4 points, 7 rebounds and 7 assists per game, which is comparable to this season’s figures of 26 points, 6 boards, and 7 assists.

However, that team had no one who can compare to Kyrie Irving, who is blossoming into the superstar in front of our eyes. The fourth year player out of Duke is getting 22 points and five dimes per night as offensive option #2.

Williams filled that role in ’09, getting 18 points and four assists. Irving is taking more shots than Williams did, with both making almost 47% of their tries.

Ilgauskas was the team’s third leading scorer at 12.9 a game, with 7.5 boards and shooting 47%. Kevin Love is the third leading scorer this year at 16.8 points, with 10.3 rebounds. He is shooting just 43% from the floor, although he attempts far more three point shots than Big Z did.

That group’s bench was led by Varejao, Boobie Gibson, and Wally Szczerbiak, while the current Cavs use Tristan Thompson, Iman Shumpert, and Matthew Dellavedova as the primary bench options.

We would give David Blatt’s crew an edge because the second and third best players on this team are much better than those on the 66 win team.

Even the bench appears to be better. Varejao scored 8.6 points and 7.2 rebounds as the first big man off the bench in ’08-’09, and Thompson has better numbers at 9.1 and 8.4 respectively.

That group was stronger defensively, because Ilgauskas was still a force inside and Wallace was one of the best defensive players in NBA history up front, and West was a very good defender too.

However, the three Cavs who joined the team in January are helping greatly on the defensive end. Since Timofey Mozgov joined the squad, he has provided the inside presence Blatt’s team sorely needed. And Shumpert and J.R. Smith have given the wine and gold better defense on the wings.

Can this team go farther in the post-season than the ’09 team? That remains to be seen. But it is looking like this might be the most talented roster ever to play in Cleveland.

That’s how quickly things have changed in the last month or so.

No Deadline Moves for Cavs, Who Did Heavy Lifting a Month Ago.

The NBA all-star break has come and gone and the season will continue for the Cleveland Cavaliers tomorrow night at Washington against the Wizards.

It’s the first of a tough 14 game stretch for the wine and gold which will likely determine whether or not they can finish the season as the #2 or #3 seed in the Eastern Conference.

It was a quiet trade deadline for GM David Griffin because he did all of his heavy lifting in January, curing much of what ailed the Cavs by getting Timofey Mozgov, J.R. Smith, and Iman Shumpert basically for Dion Waiters and a first round draft pick.

Those two deals seemed to have turned the season around for the wine and gold, who responded by winning 14 of their last 16 games.

So, the big moves made today, in which 37 players changed teams, were made a month ago by Griffin, transforming his team instantly, and correcting the moves made during the off-season (except for getting LeBron James and Kevin Love), which failed.

The bad news is the Cavs still have two weaknesses. The good news is that they involve the ninth and tenth men in coach David Blatt’s rotation, an extra big man and another point guard.

The loss to Chicago right before the break demonstrated Cleveland can only go three deep at the center and power forward spots, and if someone is missing (like Love that night with an eye injury) or one of them get into foul trouble (like Mozgov did), Blatt’s alternative is to use James Jones, a three-point specialist, at the #4, or dust off Brendan Haywood, who it appears has nothing left in the tank except his favorable contract.

That means Griffin is left to go after one of the big men who could get a buyout after being traded.

The biggest candidate would Kendrick Perkins, dealt by Oklahoma City to Utah today. The 6’10”, 280 pound center has plenty of playoff experience with 135 games, including three trips to The Finals.

Perkins would clog the middle, and although he is limited offensively, could give Blatt another defensive minded post presence. And he would only need to play around 10 minutes per night.

The Clippers are said to also be interested, as Perkins played for Doc Rivers in Boston, but Cleveland would seem to present a better chance to play in June.

Despite Atlanta’s play thus far, many experts still expect the Eastern Conference to come down to the Cavaliers and the Bulls, and with Chicago having Joakim Noah, Paul Gasol, and Taj Gibson, it would serve the Cavs well to have another experience big man to battle the Bulls’ trio.

JaVale McGee, traded to Philadelphia today, would be another possibility, but the Sixers are said to be keeping the oft-injured big man. He has only played 22 games over the last two seasons, but two years ago averaged 9.1 points and almost five boards a night in 18 minutes.

As for a point, the Cavs can probably afford to stay with Matthew Dellavedova, because James is the primary ball handler, and it would be seamless to use LeBron along with Shumpert and Smith on the floor together with Love and Mozgov or Thompson.

In fact, that group would make the wine and gold very long defensively.

Most of the top teams in the standings did the same as Cleveland today, that is to say stand pat. Griffin was proactive and re-shaped his squad a month ago, giving them a 30 day head start on the teams than made moves today.

Hopefully, that pays off when spring arrives.

Cavs Are Improvising in Blatt’s Offense.

It has been said that basketball is to sports as jazz is to music.

The game has structure, but the players improvise, and they have to in order to be successful at it.

That’s why we think it is funny when we hear the Cleveland Cavaliers aren’t running the offense that coach David Blatt wants to run.

The wine and gold are getting more confident with Blatt’s system, which is designed to move the ball without a lot of dribbling, because we are seeing the passing game more and more each game. But the players still go back to one-on-one play from time to time.

Of course, that may be the coach’s compromise to the players, especially guys like LeBron James and Kyrie Irving who can probably break down the player guarding them at any point in the game.

Coaches want the players to be players, not robots. So, if a play is designed and the player sees someone open under the basket, good coaches want the man with the ball to make the right basketball play.

That was in evidence in the Cavs’ win over the Clippers a couple of weeks ago late in the game.

Blatt designed an inbound play late in overtime, with James as the inbounder. Apparently, the play was to get the ball to Kyrie Irving around the three-point line, so if someone was to be fouled, it would be the team’s best free throw shooter.

However, James saw Tristan Thompson break to the hoop, uncovered. So, we made the correct read and fired it to Thompson for a dunk, while being fouled. That’s what coaches want, break the play, especially if it leads to an easy hoop.

No coach wants to run set plays every time down the floor. It’s one way to get the players to carry a grudge against the guy in charge.

Of course, there are coaches who are control freaks and want to micro-manage everything their team does, but usually those coaches have a very short shelf life.

Most coaches probably don’t even want to call plays, because that would mean a lot of transition baskets, and their players would know where the ball should go and when it should move.

Take Wednesday’s win over Portland, which extended the Cavaliers’ winning streak to eight games. Irving was really the only player who had things going for Cleveland, and the coach and his teammates recognized that and got him the basketball.

The result was a 55 point night for the former first overall pick, and a win for the Cavs.

The previous game, only James and Irving were hitting shots vs. Detroit, so they carried the load.

To be sure, that wasn’t the coach’s design going into the game, but everyone adapted, and it led to a victory.

Blatt doesn’t want his team to have to depend on huge nights by his two all-stars to win every night, but right now, a few players are struggling to make shots (yes, Kevin Love is in a bit of a slump), so James and Irving are carrying the load. There is nothing wrong with that.

Tonight, perhaps J.R. Smith might get it going or Love can get hot, or Timofey Mozgov will be able to score inside, and the players will depend and feed off of them. That’s the kind of sport basketball is.

Early in the year, there was too much one on one play and too many players looking for their shots, and the offense struggled. That seems to be changing.

That means the Cavs are playing as a team, and selfishness is disappearing.

That’s a good thing and it could mean better things are yet to come.

Remaining Schedule Should Help Cavaliers

There is no question that the Western Conference of the NBA is much stronger than the East.

Currently, the Brooklyn Nets are the 8th seed in the East with a 17-24 record, a mark that would rank them 12th in the West. The Cavs, who sit in the fifth spot in on the right half of the NBA grid at 22-20, would be on the outside looking in if they played out west.

And there is no question the wine and gold have struggled this season, especially in the first couple of weeks in January, when they lost six in a row before winning the last three.

However, right now the Cavs have played the most games against the tougher conference in the NBA, and they are 6-11 in those games.

The team with the best record in the East, Atlanta, has played 30 of their 42 games in their own conference, a difference of five contests. They are 10-2 in those dozen games, but they will no doubt have a tougher slate in front of them.

Washington has the conference’s second best record and they’ve played 28 games in the East, going 9-5 vs. the West.

Toronto, the third seed, is the only team ahead of the Cavs in the standings that have played a similar amount of games as the wine and gold, having played 26 inter-conference games. The Raptors are 9-6 against the west.

Now, it is most definitely true that a 6-11 mark against the Western Conference is nothing to be proud of, especially compared to the top three teams, but the point is, the Cavaliers have fewer games against the tougher teams, and they don’t have to make any more west coast trips.

Which brings us back to the Wizards and Raptors, who have played four and five more home games than road games so far this season. Of course, this means they will play more on the road in the second half of the season, another advantage for the Cavaliers, who have split their 42 games right down the middle.

The Hawks, currently in another stratosphere, have actually played more on the road through 42 contests.

Milwaukee, immediately behind Cleveland in the standings, will get to play more at home than on the road for the balance of the season, having played just 18 of their 41 games in Beer Town.

On the other hand, they’ve only played 14 games out of conference, meaning they will see a steady diet of western squads for the balance of the campaign.

All this means that the Cavs have a solid chance to improve their lot in the standings if they stay healthy going forward and continue to play together. And obviously, if they can make up the ground between themselves and the Bulls (currently Cleveland is 4-1/2 games behind), they would get home court advantage for the first round of the playoffs.

With two more games vs. Philadelphia (yes, we know they lost the first game between the two teams), three more games against the Celtics, and two more with the depleted Pacers, they are opportunities for the Cavaliers to make up some ground.

And it is a big advantage not having to travel further than the central time zone again.

It’s no excuse, but David Blatt’s team hasn’t had the easiest schedule thus far, there has been a lot of travelling. Now comes the payoff for that slate, the wine and gold won’t go far from home the rest of the year.

Cavs Biggest Problems: Defense, Three Point Shooting

By the end of this week, the Cleveland Cavaliers will have played half of their NBA schedule, and no one thought they would be struggling this much.

They are currently sitting below the .500 mark at 19-20, far from the juggernaut many experts predicted before the season started with LeBron James returned to the team, and GM David Griffin traded for Kevin Love.

Yes, there are a lot of new players that started the season with the wine and gold, and the recent trades made by Griffin have added three more new players (one of whom, Iman Shumpert hasn’t played yet), and that makes continuity and knowing your teammates very difficult.

The biggest problems seem to be on the defensive end, where right now it appears there isn’t a consistent effort on a nightly basis.

Part of the problem is the lack of quickness on the players defending the perimeter. That problem means they play off of the opponent to stop penetration, and then cannot recover to contest the jump shot. This has led in part to allowing a 51.6% defensive field goal percentage thus far, second worst in the league behind only Minnesota.

It seems like teams hit an inordinate amount of three-point shots against the Cavs, but the wine and gold ranks 19th defensively against the long distance shot. That’s not great, but they are getting hurt inside the arc.

In terms of defensive efficiency, the Cavs rank as the sixth worst defense in the NBA. That needs to improve and quickly.

Yes, we understand that Love and Kyrie Irving aren’t good defensively, but you can cover that up by team concepts. Right now, the team scheme needs to be revamped because it’s not getting it done.

Cleveland allows the sixth most dunk attempts in the league, but don’t allow a lot of layup attempts. However, opponents convert a good percentage of those layup attempts, which Timofey Mozgov should help with.

Where the Cavs get killed is on jump shots of between 16 feet and the three-point line, as opponents are making 46.3% of their shots, two percent more than the next worst team Toronto. Besides the Raptors, no one else is giving up more than 42.6% of these shots.

That’s because the perimeter defenders are having a problem closing out on shooters.

Oddly, this ties into the other problem, the lack of three-point shooting. Cleveland ranks 18th in the NBA offensively, which is disappointing for a team with Irving, Love, Mike Miller, and James Jones on it. The thought before the season was with all the ability the Cavs have going to the basket, these guys would have plenty of good looks from beyond the arc.

Irving shot close to 40% in his first two years in the league, but shot just 36% last year and is sitting around that mark again this season.

Love came into the season hitting 36% of his shots from distance, but he’s dropped to 34% this season.

Miller has been over 40% each of the last three seasons, but he’s dropped to 35.3% in 2014-15.

Jones is a career 40% shooter that is making 36.8% of those shots this season.

The latter two are big problems because they don’t provide the perimeter defense the Cavs need, and they aren’t making as many shots as they have in the past. And quite frankly, if Miller and Jones aren’t hitting shots, there is no reason to put them on the floor.

David Blatt would be better served playing Joe Harris, who is a little better defensively, at this point in time.

At this point, the Cavs still seem to be using the roster turnover as an excuse, which it shouldn’t be half way through the season. They really need to just start playing hard, especially defensively.

One other thing. This team needs to get out and run, but if the other team keeps scoring, it’s difficult to get transition buckets.

The defense has to get fixed right now.