It’s Basketball Time For The Wine And Gold

The Cleveland Cavaliers open the 2026-27 NBA season tonight and the expectations on the team are much like the last two seasons. What they do in the regular season will doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, how successful their season is will be determined by how far they go in the playoffs.

Last season, Kenny Atkinson’s squad got to the Eastern Conference finals, a step further than the year before. However, they blew a big fourth quarter lead in the first game and then were pretty much outclassed during the rest of the series.

It was the third straight season they were pretty much non-competitive in the series in which they were eliminated, and that means the good feeling about taking the next step are erased in the view of most basketball people.

Koby Altman did add some height to the roster, especially on the wings by trading for 6’8″ Peyton Watson, and he added 6’8″ Mario Hezonja, who will likely spend time at both forward spots. We also expect another 6’8″ player, Nae’Qwan Tomlin to have a bigger role this season once he returns to the court following a lower back injury.

We would have liked (and still would like) Altman to add another big man to back up Jarrett Allen and Evan Mobley. Currently the main back up is veteran Thomas Bryant, but more likely than not, Atkinson will probably go smaller when Allen or Mobley are not on the floor. (Ugh!)

Altman swung big at the trade deadline a year ago, bringing in James Harden for Darius Garland. Harden brings a lot, both good and bad. He averaged 20.5 points and 7.7 assists in 26 games after coming over from the Clippers. He shot 43.5% from three and 46.6% from the floor overall.

He’s great at finding big men in the pick and roll too. Jarrett Allen averaged almost 20 points per game from February until the end of the season.

However, the ball is in his hands a lot, so ball movement suffers. Also, Harden isn’t exactly quick, which presents a problem defensively. And the Cavs likely will not be getting a ton of transition baskets with Harden on the floor. That eliminates easy baskets.

The veteran averaged almost 35 minutes per game last season, and we know Harden takes pride in being on the floor. We wonder if he would play at a higher level getting fewer minutes, especially in the regular season. We will see how Atkinson divvies up the minutes.

With Harden and Donovan Mitchell or at least one of them on the court most of the time, there isn’t a huge need for a backup point guard, and we are curious about using Craig Porter Jr. there. In our opinion, his ball handling is questionable.

He’s a high energy player for us, but not really a lead guard. We wonder how long before second year player Tyrese Proctor gets minutes at that spot.

We will start getting answers in regard to how the Cavs will play and how the rotations work starting tonight. It’s probably not fair, but barring some bad injury luck, the Cavaliers are building toward starting their real season in April.

The goal should be winning the NBA title, especially this season. The “one step forward” nonsense is just that.

Time For A Little Hoops Talk.

With the Browns opening their season today and the Guardians in the midst of a race to play in the post-season, we thought we’d go against the grain a little bit and talk basketball. After all, the Cleveland Cavaliers did get to the Eastern Conference finals last season, and they open training camp in a few weeks under Kenny Atkinson.

Besides, both of those teams are very frustrating right now.

For years, we have said the wine and gold need to be bigger, and they have made some improvement along those lines. When they swung the big deal for James Harden in February was that if the Cavs were going to have a ball dominant guard who wasn’t a great defender, it is better for it to be the 6’5″ Harden, rather than 6’2″ Darius Garland.

Koby Altman has also acquired two 6’8″ wings in Mario Hezonja and Peyton Watson, who we would think will share time at the small forward spot with Jaylon Tyson. And don’t forget another 6’8″ player in Nae’Qwan Tomlin, who played in 64 games a year ago, getting most of his time before the trade deadline.

Remember that the deal for the 17-year veteran came late in the year. Harden only played in 26 games with the wine and gold, so the offensive became doing what Harden did best, using a lot of pick and roll. We are sure that will be the case again, with Harden getting the most out of Jarrett Allen and Evan Mobley in that way.

Cleveland still has Tyson, Sam Merrill, and second-year player Tyrese Proctor to share time in the backcourt with Harden, and of course, Donovan Mitchell. With those players on the roster, we would love to see Harden’s and Mitchell’s regular season minutes controlled, especially Harden, who is now 37.

We would still love to see Altman add a better big man to back up Mobley and Allen than veteran Thomas Bryant, no disrespect to him, but Cleveland should consider itself a contender to win the title, and particularly in the playoffs, you need another big man who can make an impact. The Cavs saw that need in both their series against the Pistons with Paul Reid and the Knicks’ Mitchell Robinson.

Because the Cavs like to play “small ball’, our guess is they think they can easily slide either Watson, Hezonja, or Tomlin over to the four, but we don’t like that from a rebounding standpoint. Defense isn’t over until you grab the rebound. Thus, the need for someone to play center/power forward and can give the Cavaliers about 18 solid minutes.

As it has been for the last few years, the biggest question for the Cavs is Evan Mobley. Can he take the next step into being a perennial all-star. His points, rebounds, and shooting all took a drop last season, and we have doubts as to whether or not he can do it. We just don’t think it’s in his personality to assert himself.

We have seen questions about the depth on the team and we will go back to the old adage of “if you don’t play your bench, you won’t have one”. We said it last year and we will say it again, Atkinson has to use and trust his second unit early in the year. It will pay dividends in the second half of the season.

Last season, he went away from Tyson and Tomlin after the trade and probably could’ve used both in the post-season. Hopefully, that’s a lesson learned.

Cavs Make Some Deals And Get More Size

The Cleveland Cavaliers made a move last week, trading veteran guard Dennis Schroder to Charlotte for another guard, Tre Mann. We will spare you our usual comment when looking at a deal made by president of basketball operations Koby Altman, but Mann is 6’4″, which is Altman’s type.

While on merit, dealing a 6’1″ guard in Schroder for a 6’4″ point guard in Mann is a good thing, we are all about the Cavs getting bigger, particularly in the backcourt, but the move seemed likely a precursor to another move, probably for a bigger wing the wine and gold desperately need.

And it was. Last night, the Cavs sent Max Strus and Mann along with a 2031 first round pick away in a five-team deal in which the primary return for Cleveland was soon to be 24-year-old 6’8″ wing Peyton Watson. Watson had his best year with Denver last season, playing in 54 games, 40 of them starts, and averaged 14.6 points and 4.9 rebounds.

He shot 48% from the floor and 36% from beyond the arc and is regarded as a good defender. He was a restricted free agent and as part of the deal, he is signing a four-year deal with the wine and gold.

We hate to see Strus go, as in our opinion he added toughness to the Cavs as well as a decent shooter from outside. But at 6’5″, he was small to play the #3 and is really more like an off guard.

Mann was also part of the transaction and goes to Washington and Cleveland also gets 6’6″ Cam Whitmore in the deal, and he makes less than Mann, giving the Cavaliers’ additional salary relief. Whitmore was considered a sleeper when he was taken with the 20th pick in the ’23 Draft, and averaged 12.3 points in 47 games with the Rockets.

Last year, he played in just 21 games for the Wizards missing most of the season with a venous condition in his shoulder.

Obviously, the key is Watson. Cleveland needed more size on the wing, which they lost when Dean Wade signed with Philadelphia, and the newcomer is a much better offensive player than the departed Wade. And with 6’8″ Mario Hezonja and holdover Nae’Qwan Tomlin, it gives Kenny Atkinson three bigger options on the wing.

The coach could still use more depth at the big man spots, because if Evan Mobley and/or Jarrett Allen can’t play for whatever reason, they really only have Thomas Bryant, and that’s not good enough for a team trying to get to the Finals.

And they could also use another ball handler, although that may not be a huge need with Donovan Mitchell and James Harden probably being on the floor much of the time.

We have seen Craig Porter Jr. mentioned, but although he’s an energy guy and a terrific rebounder for his size, 6’1″, his handle needs work. A better option might be last year’s second round pick, Tyrese Proctor, who played point at Duke in college.

Proctor has a good outside shot and should be improved in his second NBA season.

We have wanted the Cavs to get longer for a few years and by getting Watson and Hezonja, they have accomplished that. The question is how they will fit in with the ball dominant backcourt of Mitchell and Harden.

Remember, in basketball, it’s not just accumulating talent, it’s how do the pieces fit together.

The Clock Is Ticking For The Cavaliers

LeBron James made his decision where to play in 2026-27 and it wasn’t Cleveland. We aren’t one of those Cavaliers’ fans who are upset with James, who is still a good NBA player at 41, turning 42 in late December.

He averaged 20.9 points, 7.2 assists and six rebounds per game last year, and would have been an improvement over analytics darling Dean Wade in the Cleveland starting lineup. But that’s here, nor there.

Our problem is with the Cavs’ front office, notably president of basketball operations Koby Altman, who hasn’t done anything to improve the team that did go to the Eastern Conference Finals last season.

That’s not entirely fair, he did resign journeyman big man Thomas Bryant, who couldn’t get on the floor in the playoffs, and let guard Keon Ellis and Wade depart via free agency. So, as it has most times since Altman has been in charge, the Cleveland bench has a collection of 6’3″ to 6’6″ players, making it impossible for coach Kenny Atkinson to get them all enough minutes.

There’s Max Strus, Sam Merrill, Dennis Schroder (who everyone believes will be dealt soon), Jaylon Tyson (who should be the starter at small forward in our opinion), Craig Porter Jr., Tyrese Proctor, and he drafted another one in Meleek Thomas.

There are still no bigger wings, although Atkinson has alluded that last year’s second round pick, Saliou Niang, who is 6’8″ will likely be on the team and of course, Nae’Qwan Tomlin also 6’8″ returns and hopefully will have a more meaningful role, as he was largely ignored after the moves around the trade deadline.

There are rumors about the Cavs being very interested in 6’7″ forward Jonathan Kuminga, the 7th overall pick in 2021 and a player in this third year averaged 16 points a game for Golden State. However, he was in Steve Kerr’s doghouse for the past two seasons, was traded to Atlanta, and the Hawks declined to bring him back.

He played in 36 games last season and averaged 12.2 points per game. We’ve liked him, and just because Kerr didn’t play him isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Coaches may not like something about a player’s game, but that doesn’t mean he can’t play.

There are also rumors Cleveland is interested in Mario Hezonja, a former first round pick of Orlando, who has played overseas the last six seasons. Now 31, he averaged 7 points per game in five NBA seasons with the Magic, Knicks, and Trailblazers. He’s 6’8″.

We will keep harping on this, but as currently constituted, the Cleveland Cavaliers don’t have enough size. They need bigger, athletic wings, the “3 and D” guys talked about frequently. They need more big men than just having Jarrett Allen and Evan Mobley.

And preferably, they need someone inside who has some girth. Allen and Mobley are tall, but in NBA standards, slender. A “bruiser” would be very welcome in Cleveland.

So, Altman is on the clock. Several teams in the East look to have passed the Cavaliers. Certainly, James’ new team, the 76ers, but also the Raptors if they work out the Kawhi Leonard trade. Also, the Pacers get Tyrese Halliburton back, the Pistons had a better regular season record, and Atlanta keeps getting more experience.

From where we are sitting, maybe the Cavs should have promoted Mike Gansey. There is still time to improve the team, but we are worried the wine and gold are now in the rut where a chance for a title might be out of reach.

What Is The Cavs’ Plan For ’26-’27?

While we all wait for where LeBron James will play next season, as of right now, the Cleveland Cavaliers have spent the first week of the NBA off-season watching other teams in the Eastern Conference get better.

Right now, you have to put the NBA Champion Knicks ahead of the wine and gold, and you can make a solid case that Philadelphia (with Jaylen Brown deal), Indiana (getting Tyrese Halliburton back and trading for Ivica Zubac), and Toronto (getting Kawhi Leonard) are all better than the Cavs.

As for Cleveland, thus far Koby Altman has let Keon Ellis leave as a free agent to Brooklyn, Dean Wade go to the 76ers in the same manner, and quickly (for some reason) resigned Thomas Bryant.

Ellis didn’t play much in the playoffs but would seem to be more of an all-around player than Sam Merrill, who is a favorite of the organization. Ellis shot 36% from three last year and in his career knocks them down at a 40% clip. Still, it’s not a huge loss, but we would rather the Cavs embrace players who do more than one thing.

Wade is the darling of many, but not here. He was the team’s best perimeter defender over 6’6″, but as we have noted many time, seemed to refuse to participate on the offensive end of the floor, meaning smart teams didn’t need to guard him. He shoots. 36.7% for his career from the three-point line, but is inconsistent with the shot.

Bryant didn’t contribute much during the playoffs although Kenny Atkinson needed another reliable big man, so we are mystified as to why Altman brought him back. We would have looked around to see what else was out there.

The question is what Altman’s plan for is 2026-27? Does he believe if James returns to the organization, that’s all that is needed to win a title? If so, we do not agree.

Having James back would be great. He’s still a productive player, averaging 20.9 points, dishing out 7.2 assists and getting 6.1 rebounds a night, but remember, he will be 42 years old in December. He would give the Cavs some size on the wing and can be a legitimate “4” as well, but we still believe this roster needs more size, particularly on the wing and more players who are not “one dimensional”.

We also believe that James would change the attitude of this roster, which has been criticized for a lack of toughness.

And what exactly is the plan if James signs elsewhere?

We believe that after acquiring James Harden, who will likely be back, Atkinson and the organization went away from Jaylon Tyson and Nae’Qwan Tomlin, instead of getting them ready for a playoff run. Tyson has the size and toughness, and Tomlin is another wing defender with size.

And both players should be very much in the plans for the upcoming season. But, if the Cavs want to win the East and return to the Finals, Altman have to upgrade this roster. First, Ellis and Wade need to be replaced, and he still needs to address the starters, which are a weird fit right now.

As of right now, all the Cavaliers are doing is watching other teams in the East pass them by.

Like Thomas, But Once Again, Cavs Go Small

The Cleveland Cavaliers participated in this week’s NBA Draft, trading out of the first round, moving back five spots to select Arkansas guard Meleek Thomas. Thomas was projected by several draft gurus to be a first round pick, so Koby Altman got value it appears.

It is interesting that the Cavs list Thomas at 6’5″, but everyone else lists him at 6’3″ or 6’4″. We use NBADraft,net as our guide and they list him at 6’4″. We guess the Cavaliers are a little sensitive to drafting guards whenever they get a chance.

The scouting report on Thomas is good. His shooting is his highest grade, following by quickness, defense, athleticism, and ball handling. Sounds like a potential contributor in the league.

Following the draft, Altman said when they are picking in the 30’s, you really can’t draft for need, which is utter baloney. The next two players selected after Thomas were his Razorback teammate, Trevon Brazile, a 6’10” player with a 7’4″ wingspan (ode to Jay Bilas) who would have addressed the wine and gold’s glaring need for size.

After him was Baba Miller, a seven-footer out of Cincinnati, who also has extensive international experience.

Don’t forget Altman also traded down, and the player selected in their original spot was 6’8″ forward Alex Karaban from Connecticut, who would have provided the team with some “winning” attitude, seeing he played on two NCAA championship teams with the Huskies and reached the title game last season.

We think winning is learned, by the way.

It is certainly early in the off-season, so there is plenty of time for the Cavs to add the size they desperately need, but time and time again, when they have a chance to get bigger, Altman goes back to his comfort zone and adds another player in the 6’4″-6’6″ range.

In other words, Koby Altman has a type.

Look at the Cleveland roster, these players are all in that height range: Max Strus, Jaylon Tyson, Keon Ellis, Sam Merrill, Tyrese Proctor, and of course, James Harden. And we aren’t counting 6’2″ Donovan Mitchell, 6’1″ Dennis Schroder, and 6’1″ Craig Porter Jr.

That’s nine players shorter than 6’6″. In today’s NBA. People wonder why coach Kenny Atkinson likes to play four guards at the same time. Maybe, it’s because more than half of the players available to him are guards.

Free agency starts this week, so again, Cleveland has a lot of time before training camp to reshuffle its roster. Atkinson has already indicated the other of last year’s second rounders, 6’8″ Saliou Niang, will likely make the team next season.

And perhaps the Cavs will move two or three of the glut of small wings to get a bigger wing. One who will be able to combat the size other teams in the NBA already have.

Once Harden opts out of his player option and resigns at a lower number per year which would get Cleveland out of the second apron, Altman can start making moves. It will be interesting to see what direction the Cavs go in.

Despite getting to the conference finals, we don’t think this roster can win a title. What does Koby Altman think?

Time For A Big Swing For Altman

The NBA Draft is coming up this week and shortly after the free agency period starts, meaning this is the time to rebuild or retool your basketball team if you are an NBA executive. So, the question should be what is Cavaliers’ president of basketball operations Koby Altman going to do, if anything?

Most people don’t think Altman will do more than a tweak or two, which we feel would be a big problem. That’s because we think differently than him, or so it would seem.

Our guess is Altman thinks his squad is on the right path. They’ve advanced one round further than the past two seasons, and at least his coach thinks (and we’ll bet he was expressing the view of the front office) the wine and gold should have won the Eastern Conference Finals. At least that’s what the analytics showed.

For us, that’s a mistake. That’s believing what the numbers says instead of what your eyes are telling you. The reality is the Cavs had a chance to win the first game, and frankly if they had, it would have been a little different.

Kenny Atkinson’s crew blew a huge fourth quarter lead, and pretty much the series was decided then.

We believe Altman should do a deep dive on his roster and figure out who can play in the playoffs and who is a regular season performer, because in watching this team over these last four post-season runs, the games are vastly different.

Cleveland needs more size, and not just height, we are talking about bulk as well. That’s why we like Jaylon Tyson, who the coaching staff (or the front office) ran away from after trading for James Harden. Look at the Cavs’ big men, both Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen play with force. That doesn’t make them bad players,, they just don’t bring a lot of physicality to the game.

And again, we will bring up the wings Atkinson has at his disposal. They aren’t tall, they aren’t very quick, and offensively, they are streaky at best. And how many can create their own shot?

There is simply too much duplicate players on the roster, and that has to change. Another fear is Altman has grown too attached to the players he has brought in, a common mistake for a guy responsible for acquiring talent.

For example, the number crunchers love Dean Wade and are quick to provide all kinds of numbers to show how good of a player he is. We see a very good perimeter defender that pretty much refuses to participate on the offensive side of the floor, which is not what basketball is.

So, why not try to do better.

Probably the only way to do a reset on the roster is to move either Donovan Mitchell or Evan Mobley, and most likely the latter because of the contract situation. Does Altman have the stomach to do that? No doubt it’s a high-risk move.

Standing pat likely gets the Cavaliers back to the second round of the Eastern Conference, where they’ve been the last three seasons. But if you want to win the NBA title, you can’t be timid. And after four years where you have been blown out in the round the team is eliminated in, It’s no time for the status quo.

We will see in the next two weeks, where the organization’s mind set is.

Numbers Don’t Always Tell The Story

Analytics. It certainly has been a buzz word in sports for a while now, but it seems to be in the news again after Cavs’ coach Kenny Atkinson made his comment after game three of the Eastern Conference Finals when he said if you look at shot quality, his team should be up two games to one.

That may stick with Atkinson for a long time and frankly why he said it is a mystery to us.

Look, this isn’t a piece to poop on analytics. Keeping track of certain things is very valuable and for a franchise to ignore the number would be foolish. However, in Atkinson’s case, the better way to evaluate those games were our eyes, and that metric tells us the Cavaliers got their butts kicked by the New York Knicks.

You have to use both to have success, which makes sense to us, but there are people and organizations that are slaves to the numbers.

Heck, we heard a former player on the Guardians’ telecast say that batting average kind of measures how lucky a hitter is. We guess players like George Brett and Wade Boggs just had a lot of good fortune. Every year.

We heard a perfect example of how analytics should be used pertaining to the Cleveland Guardians. The exit velocity shows Jose Ramirez is hitting the ball as hard as ever despite his numbers not being up to his normal statistics.

Since Ramirez has put up excellent numbers for a long period of time, seeing he is still hitting bullets should allay any fear that he is starting to decline at 33 years old. Conversely, last year people kept pointing out Nolan Jones’ exit velocity as justification that he should play despite a .211 batting average (yeah, we know) and a 600 OPS.

What’s the difference? Outside of Jones’ first year with Colorado, there is no evidence he is a good major league hitter. HIs OPS in the other three seasons are under 700. Past performance indicates that Ramirez should be just fine.

Jones’ history indicates his exit velocity doesn’t indicate any success at the big-league level.

In basketball, we keep seeing people assessing a player’s effectiveness by using +/-, which measures the scoring in the game at the time a player was on the floor. Again, with all of these numbers there is some use, but it should not be the sole judge of a player’s worth.

The darling of this statistic for Cavs’ influencers is Dean Wade. Wade is a very good defensive player, especially on the perimeter. He most definitely has a place in the NBA. However, Wade chooses to be a non-participant on the offensive end. When we were younger, we said players like him had an allergy to the ball, because they get rid of it so fast once they get it.

Apparently, Wade had the highest plus/minus of any Cleveland player in the post-season. Sorry, if you think that makes him super valuable, we wholeheartedly disagree.

In our coaching days, we used to tell players the last thing we looked at to determine who had a good game was the scoresheet. By watching the game, we knew who impacted the game positively. That hasn’t changed.

Numbers and statistics can tell part of the story, but there are things missed by analyzing them.

Should Cavs Look At A Major Move?

If the Cleveland Cavaliers’ front office believes all of the analytics that Kenny Atkinson spoke about following Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Finals (we still can’t believe he said that out loud), then it is probably true the wine and gold won’t do more than a tweak to the roster going into next season.

And as we have addressed before, that’s a big mistake.

We are sure the front office believes it is making progress because they went a step further in the playoffs, going from a first round loss to a pair of second round defeats, and finally getting to the conference finals.

That’s one way to look at it.

The other is to recognize none of the series in which the Cavs lost over the last four seasons have been particularly close. The first three went five games before the sweep at the hands of the Knicks this year.

By the way, the last four seasons are the Donovan Mitchell era, which brings us to our point.

First, Mitchell is a phenomenal player. Since he has been a Cavalier, he’s made first team all-NBA (only the third Cleveland player in history to do so–Mark Price and LeBron James) and was second team once. He’s averaged at least 24 points per game every season in Cleveland.

And by all accounts has been a great spokesman for both the Cavaliers and the northeast Ohio area, going to high school games around town.

He’s also going to be 30 years old, 6’2″, and his contract runs out in two more years. The Cavs are expected to offer him a four-year deal worth $272 million this summer. That’s an average of $68 million per year, and they would be paying him that amount at 34 years old.

We would think very seriously about doing that. Not because Mitchell doesn’t deserve it, he’s arguably the second-best player ever to wear a Cleveland uniform. However, you have to wonder what kind of player he’s going to be in the last two seasons of that deal.

In our opinion, bigger players age better than smaller ones. Yes, we know about Stephen Curry and James Harden is still put up a bunch of points. Should the Cavs explore trades for Mitchell this off-season?

We know where the Cavs are in the NBA hierarchy, they were one of the last four teams standing this year, so moving on from Mitchell would be a step back in all likelihood. But it just might be the right way to go. Take a step back and not bottom out for another run at a title in a couple of years.

Another direction is what many talk about, going all in by dealing for someone like Giannis Antetokounmpo, dealing say Evan Mobley (as people have discussed), thus making Mitchell the second-best player on the team. That probably gives you a two-year window for a championship, and after you get it, you likely would have to rebuild.

Even doing that, the front office has other work to do. They need more versatile, longer players. They also need more depth at power forward and center.

Jaylon Tyson needs a bigger role. He seemed to get lost after the trade that brought James Harden to Cleveland. We also believe another young player who got lost in the last two months, Nae’Qwan Tomlin can be a contributor next season.

He’s 6’8″ and should fit in as a wing, especially if he can improve his shooting. And it doesn’t have to be three-point shooting, which frankly, we’d be fine if he never took another one of those. He’ll be 26 next season, and we believe he can be a wild card for Kenny Atkinson.

But the big decision is Mitchell. Most people believe it’s a no brainer. We think the front office should take a good long look.

Running It Back? Not A Good Idea For Cavs.

When Cavaliers’ president of basketball operations Koby Altman had his most season press conference, he didn’t give any indication about off-season moves, and that’s not a surprise. Since then, it has been reported the Cavs are going to run it back with pretty much the current roster in 2026-27, and if that is Altman’s intention, it’s a big mistake.

We have gone on ad nauseum about the team’s lack of size, both on the wings and up front. While people talk about the starting big men, Jarrett Allen and Evan Mobley, there has been little behind them over the past few seasons.

And we aren’t just talking height either. Both Allen and Mobley are slender big men, the Cavs have no one with bulk. Over the past few years, the backup bigs have guys like Thomas Bryant. Tristan Thompson, Damian Jones, and Robin Lopez, players who really can’t be counted on in a playoff situation.

Remember, the Cavs did have Isaiah Hartenstein in the 2021 season and after he scored 8.3 points and grabbed six rebounds in 16 games, they let him walk via free agency. They didn’t recognize that he can play.

We have also talked about the lack of size on the wing. Most of the NBA have players who are in the 6’7″ or 6’8″ range who can create their own shot, but the wine and gold’s tallest wing that can do that is 6’6″ Jaylon Tyson. The rest seem to be one-dimensional three-point shooters (Max Strus, Sam Merrill) or defensive minded (Dean Wade).

When Caris LeVert was here, fans didn’t like him, most because he was not a good three-point shooter, which unfortunately is becoming the way players are evaluated these days. However, we liked that LeVert could create his own shot. And when you are late in the shot clock, that is a valuable thing.

On the current roster, Donovan Mitchell, James Harden and Dennis Schroder are the only players who can accomplish this and two of those players are under 6’3″. It can be done through quickness or brute strength. Cleveland has no one in the latter category.

Players who stand in one spot or only hang out on the perimeter are easier to guard because the defender/opponent kind of knows where they will be.

Somebody floated Zion Williamson as a possible Cavs’ target. Forgetting about his availability concerns (70 games are the most he’s played in a season), he would be a good get. If he gets the ball 15-20 feet away from the basket, you know he’s probably attacking the basket. He’s not shooting a three.

People talk about the “3 and D” players around the league, but to us, Altman has several three OR D players. Strus and Merrill are good from long distance but lack the size and quickness to defend bigger wings, like Mikal Bridges. The one replay where a lob pass from Bridges just gets over Merrill’s outstretched arms is a vision we cannot unsee.

And of course, Dean Wade has the size and ability to play on the defensive end, but he refuses (or is told to refuse?) to play on the offensive end of the floor.

Altman may want to run it back; that’s the ego of people in his position. The reality is the NBA is always changing and what succeeded three years ago is passe today.

In the game of basketball, more often than not, going big is a good way to go. Let’s see if the Cavaliers learned that lesson in the last four series they were eliminated in.