Nothing To Worry About, Cavs Just Battling Some Depth Issues

The Cleveland Cavaliers have lost three of their last four games and some people are in panic mode. Did everyone really think this Cavs’ team was going to go 74-8 and have the greatest regular season in NBA history?

We didn’t. We would also feel differently about these past two weeks if A). the Cavs were being beaten soundly and B). they were completely healthy.

Let’s look at the second thing first. One reason for the wine and gold’s success this season is their depth, Kenny Atkinson plays 11 guys more than 10 minutes per game. When they have had individuals out for a game or two, that depth pays off because the other players fill in those minutes.

Over the past week or so, the Cavs have had three or four players out, forcing Jaylon Tyson, Craig Porter Jr., and Tristan Thompson to play significant minutes. Individually, when one of them has had to fill in, it has been done seamlessly but having to play all three of them out there, sometimes together, has taken a toll.

One of the four possible Cavaliers’ all-stars, Evan Mobley, missed four games in the last ten days, but the guy who is probably the fifth best player on the team, Caris LeVert, has also missed four contests, including the last three, all losses.

LeVert doesn’t get a lot of love from fans, who mostly look at scoring averages and three-point shooting. But he gives the Cavs some length in the backcourt and on the wing, can create his own shot, and is a solid defender. He’s a very important player, and that’s why we shake our head when we hear about possible deals for him.

Missing Dean Wade doesn’t help the cause either. He was already starting at the four for Mobley, and as soon as Mobley came back, Wade went down. We’ve talked about the lack of depth among the big men in the past and this injury highlights the problem.

Wade’s career high in games played is 63 back in 2020-21, his first full year with Cleveland, and since then, he consistently misses about a third of the regular season. His injury forces Thompson to play much more than we are sure Atkinson would prefer.

Losing the depth is a big issue. And it’s forcing the coaching staff to go deeper into the bench. That may pay dividends down the road, getting time for Tyson and Porter Jr., but in the short term, it has caused a problem.

However, it is not as though the wine and gold are getting blown out, despite the injuries. Two losses to the Rockets, who are 30-14, by one on the road and by four at home, is hardly anything to be upset about. The loss to an undermanned Sixers’ team wasn’t ideal, but that’s life in the NBA.

Look, the Cavs aren’t a perfect team and having several rotation pieces out of the lineup exposes some of their flaws. It also doesn’t mean they have hit the proverbial wall. They’ll be fine when they get these important players back.

It should also remind the front office to not stand pat at the trade deadline. Even a marginal improvement could be the difference between a conference finals appearance and an NBA Finals spot.

NBA Trade Deadline Coming, What Say You, Cavs?

In less than three weeks, the NBA trade deadline will be here. It actually arrives sooner than the Super Bowl, as it is on February 7th, whereas the NFL title game is the 9th.

Cavs’ fans and media alike were preaching continuity, letting the current roster play through the season and seeing what they could accomplish, after all the wine and gold have the league’s best record at 35-6.

That is until last Thursday’s blowout loss at the hands of the other roster dominating the NBA right now, the Oklahoma City Thunder, who sit with a 35-7 mark.

OKC led by 18 at the end of the first quarter, 26 at halftime, and 38 points at the end of three quarters in the rout. And suddenly, everyone said the Cavs needed to make a move on or before February 7th.

We will blow our own horn here for a second by saying this was always an issue for Kenny Atkinson’s squad, even coming into the season. If the Cavs have a weakness, it is they lack size throughout the roster.

Long, athletic teams have given them a problem all year (although not that much of an issue because they are 35-6). Boston handed them their first loss. Atlanta knocked them off in back-to-back games.

In last Thursday’s game, the Thunder were missing big men Chet Holmgren (7’1″) and Isaiah Hartenstein (7’0″), but a look at who plays the most minutes for them reads this way: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (6’6″), Jalen Williams (6’6″), Lu Dort (a rugged 6’4″), and Cason Wallace (6’4″) along with the two big men.

That is where Cleveland’s smaller backcourt has a distinct disadvantage. Donovan Mitchell found it very tough sledding against Dort, shooting 6 of 31 in the two games against the Thunder. We also know that Atkinson will come up with some ways to get Mitchell freed up if the two teams meet in the NBA Finals.

We said going into both of the games that fans should not read too much into the pair of contests, that they would simply be a good measuring stick and as it was, the two teams split the games.

We simply found it interesting that everyone jumped to the same conclusion we had since the first game of the regular season. The Cavs need to add some height.

It was almost immediately reported after the loss last Thursday that the Cavs were interested in 6’8″ wing Cameron Johnson from Brooklyn. He would add some size along the perimeter and also shoots 42.6% from three.

We would definitely be someone the front office should have interest in.

They also need another solid big man. Evan Mobley missed the last two games with a calf injury, and outside of Jarrett Allen, Cleveland doesn’t have another big man you can trust putting on the floor for 20 minutes per night.

Tristan Thompson is a good locker room guy, but we would bet Atkinson doesn’t want him on the floor very long.

As for the locker room chemistry, if it is as strong as reported (and we have no doubt otherwise), there shouldn’t be an issue. The one thing Koby Altman has always prioritized is character, he has never brought a “knucklehead” into the locker room. We have no doubt it will be no different this year.

But the Cavs have been so good this season, the front office has to go for a title right now. This is the time. Taking steps is one thing, but when you have played halfway through the schedule and you are on a 70-win pace, the shiny gold Larry O’Brien Trophy should be on everyone’s mind.

There is less than three weeks to go for it.

In Praise Of Garland

We have been very critical of Darius Garland’s playoff performances each of the last two seasons. Opponents were physical with him, and he responded by not being very careful with the basketball.

In 2022-23 Garland averaged 21.6 points in the regular season with 7.8 assists and 2.9 turnovers. In the playoffs, his scoring was comparable at 20.6, but the assists were down to 5 per night while turning it over 3.6 times per game.

Last year, we knew Garland battled injuries all season long. His scoring dropped to 18 points per contest, and his assists were down to 6.5 and his turnovers up to 3.1.

In the series against Orlando and Boston, Garland’s scoring fell to just 15.7 points with 5.8 assists. His turnovers did improve to just 2.3 per game.

We have wondered if the Cavs can get to where they want to be, champions, with a smaller backcourt of Garland and Donovan Mitchell.

The way Garland has stepped up his play this season, we are now anxious the see this guard tandem in the post-season.

Since Garland has been with the Cavs for six seasons, it’s hard to realize he’s still only 25 years old. He concentrated on getting stronger and so far, the results are tremendous.

Like most of the Cavaliers, his minutes are down (33.5 for his career, just 30.2 this season), but his scoring is comparable to his best seasons of 2021-22 and 2022-23 when he averaged about 21 and a half per night. He’s at 20.9 this season.

His shooting has never been better, hitting a career best 49.8% from the floor and 42.9% from three, also his best mark as a pro. His assists are down from his highest mark of 8.6 per game in his third year in the league, but he’s still dishing out 6.7 helpers, while his turnovers are at a career low of 2.4.

Better shot selection for Garland, as well as his assist numbers being down are both the result of Kenny Atkinson’s offensive scheme with players and the ball moving quickly. And credit Garland for flourishing in the attack.

No doubt, the proof will come in the playoffs. The way the Cavs’ offense runs, they aren’t depending on just one player initiating it, sometimes it’s Garland, at times Mitchell, and we’ve even seen Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen being asked to do it.

That will likely mean the trapping Garland saw from the Knicks in the first-round loss won’t occur often in this playoff year.

We are sure teams will attack Garland on the defensive end of the floor, which isn’t a new strategy. Heck, the Cavs used it in the 2016 Finals when they repeatedly targeted Stephen Curry. Can the improved offense of Garland make that a strategy that doesn’t pay off the way opponents think it will.

Atkinson has challenged him in certain game, most notably the second match up vs. Boston when he told Garland he had to rise to the challenge of guarding Jayson Tatum.

Good health, maturity, and a new offense have guided Darius Garland to his best season, without a doubt. Hopefully, it pays off in April, May, and hopefully June.

Cavs Giving Some Vibes Of “Miracle” Team

Think about it for a bit…29-4

The Cleveland Cavaliers started this season with a 15-game winning streak, but right now, they’ve won eight in a row, and started an always tough west coast swing the Friday after Christmas, and won handily against Denver, Golden State, and the Lakers.

One of the indicators of how good a basketball team is their margin of victory, which is second in the NBA at 11.88, just behind Oklahoma City’s 12.0. The only other team over ten points per game are the defending champion Celtics (10.73).

At this point of the season, the NBA is kind of lopsided. There are only six squads that sit 10 games over .500, while there are five teams that still have not reached the 10-win mark.

If you look at teams who have a legitimate chance to end the season by hoisting the Lawrence O’Brien Trophy, there is no doubt the Cavaliers are one of those teams. It is remarkable to think that it was just the 2018-19 campaign where the wine and gold won just 19 games, and they followed that with the same number of victories in the COVID shortened season.

The national media talks about Kenny Atkinson’s club, but they haven’t really been a huge story in the Association to date. One reason is the people who cover the NBA seem to have an agenda on what stories will be important before the season starts, and it is hard to break into that realm.

The other reason is playoff success. This iteration of the Cavs (Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen, and Evan Mobley) have only one a single playoff series, the seven-game victory over Orlando last season.

However, the darlings of the Western Conference, Oklahoma City have done the same. The only difference is the Thunder did not make the progression from also ran to the “play-in tournament” to losing in the first round, to winning in the first round like Cleveland.

And despite this tremendous start to the season, the reality is the real season for the Cavs starts in the playoffs.

These Cavs remind us a bit of the “Miracle at Richfield” team from 1975-76. That team had nine players who averaged over 15 minutes a game, whereas Atkinson plays ten players regularly and when injuries have occurred, other players have stepped in to take their place in the rotation.

We have talked about how Mitchell, the team’s star, is playing a career low 31.5 minutes a night. The ’75-’76 Cavaliers had a former All-Star in Nate Thurmond anchoring the second unit, and the star of the franchise’s early years, Austin Carr, also came off the bench.

Both teams could shoot from outside. The ’76 team, who got to the Eastern Conference Finals, had outside marksmen like Carr, Bingo Smith, Campy Russell, and Dick Snyder. This year’s squad lead the NBA in three-point shooting, making an absurd 40.7% as a TEAM!

The next best percentage is the 38.8% being made by the Knicks.

We have seen people saying nothing should be done by president of basketball operations Koby Altman at the trade deadline. However, we disagree.

Yes, this group has amazing chemistry, but they still need another post presence in case of an injury to Allen and/or Mobley. And we also think that could use another wing defender with some length.

This team has amazing depth, particularly at the wing position. With Max Strus’ return, Atkinson now has Strus, Caris LeVert, Isaac Okoro, Georges Niang, and Sam Merrill to play on the wing.

And we haven’t mentioned rookie Jaylon Tyson, who when pressed into service has done a solid job.

The one thing Altman has seemed to always prioritize is character. The Cavs haven’t really had a “knucklehead” or “diva” on their roster for a long time. So, we have no doubt if a deal is made, the addition will fit right into what is working right now.

In a week, the Cavs and Thunder get together in Cleveland. That just might be an NBA Finals preview.

Cavs Getting Threes From Good Shooters

It seems the NBA is going through a controversy about the three-point shot. Watching some games, it seems like all that is missing is the rack of balls used doing the contest on All-Star Saturday night.

One of the games’ best young players, Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards, is shooting over 10 threes per game (he’s making 42.4%), and Boston’s Jayson Tatum is doing the same. In all, five players are shooting that kind of volume.

Four of the guys ranking in the top ten in attempts are shooting less than 36% from distance. We know the analytics say making 33% of the threes is the same as shooting 50% from the field, but our numbers show a made two-point shot is better than a missed three-point shot.

This brings us to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Many people have talked about their shooting this season, but they rank just 10th in the league in taking shots from beyond the arc, but they lead the NBA in percentage, knocking down 39.9%.

The teams who have taken the most threes are Boston (13th in percentage made), Chicago (9th), Charlotte (17th), Golden State (12th), and Minnesota (14th).

What we think that says about the wine and gold is they aren’t just shooting threes to shoot them, they are getting quality looks and having good shooters take those shots.

The Cavaliers who have taken the most threes are Donovan Mitchell (9.2), Darius Garland (6.8), Sam Merrill (5.5), Georges Niang (4.6), and Dean Wade (4.3). Two of those players, Merrill and Niang have reputations as snipers, meaning they are first and foremost long-distance shooters.

Mitchell is knocking down 40.4% from beyond the arc and Garland is at 41.8%. The two players with the reps are at 33.3% (Merrill) and 36.3% (Niang). Wade is shooting just 30.5%, and we wish he would not take as many shots from outside.

Wade is a career 36.4% three-point shooter, but if you take out his seven best three-shooting games (yes, we know he had them) in which he knocked down an unreal 38 of 57 shots, his career percentage drops to 33.4%.

What we are saying is that if his first couple long range shots don’t fall, he probably should get closer to the basket.

Other Cavs’ players have been super-efficient from long range. Isaac Okoro and Caris LeVert are both making around 49% from three, while Ty Jerome and Evan Mobley are both around 40% as well.

In our mind, the reason for all of the three-point shooting is the success Golden State had from 2015-2019 and the analytics group.

However, the reason for the Warriors’ success were both of their primary long-range shooters, Stephan Curry and Klay Thompson, both knocked down over 40% from behind the line.

People always talk about Trae Young’s range, but he’s 35.2% from three. LaMelo Ball likes to hoist them too, but he’s 37.2% for his career, and around 35.5% over the last two years.

It’s one thing to take three-point shots, it’s another to make them. Part of the Cavaliers’ early success is having good shooters taking good shots. Shooting them doesn’t make a team effective, making them does.

Cavs’ Recent Losses Indicate A Roster Weakness

While there shouldn’t be any real concern over the Cleveland Cavaliers first losing streak of the season, it can be true that some of the concerns we had about the roster showed up in the two straight losses to the Atlanta Hawks, a squad with a 9-11 record to date.

We have been pointing out for we guess a couple of years about the lack of height on Cleveland’s roster. We talked about it before the playoffs last year anticipating a match up with Boston.

While the wine and gold have two smaller guards in Donovan Mitchell (6’3″) and Darius Garland (6’2″), Boston goes with a pair of 6’4″ guards in Jrue Holiday and Derrick White.

The Cavs start 6’5″ Isaac Okoro at forward, while the Celts have 6’6″ Jaylen Brown and 6’8″ Jayson Tatum. And they have Kristaps Porzingis (7’2″) at center, meaning the Cavaliers have a size advantage at only one spot in Evan Mobley.

Atlanta is built similarly although they have Trae Young (6’1″) at the point. The rest of the starting five is 6’8″ Dyson Daniels, 6’8″ Zaccharie Risacher, 6’9″ Jalen Johnson, and 6’10” Clint Capela.

And they use 6’8″ De’Andre Hunter off the bench as well.

Coincidentally, the Celtics and Hawks have dealt Kenny Atkinson’s crew their only three defeats this season and of course, the Cavs and Celtics play tonight at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse.

It is difficult to point out weaknesses when a team is 15-0 or even 17-1 (still a little weird doing it at 17-3, frankly) but Cleveland needs more size and athleticism at the wing spots and definitely they need another inside player.

We liked the Ty Jerome signing a year ago because at 6’5″ he gives the backcourt more size. But Cleveland is still full of wings that go 6’5″ or 6’6″ when many teams in the league go 6’7″ or 6’8″ at those positions.

And getting Max Strus (6’5″) back doesn’t solve that issue.

Dean Wade is a valuable defender and is 6’9″, and he can defend on the perimeter. However, there are two problems with the fifth-year player out of Kansas State: He’s very streaky with his shot and he’s injury prone.

Wade has only played more than 60 games once in his career in 2020-21, and since his high was 54 games last season. Availability is an ability.

Besides even if Wade is available, the Cavs still need another big man. If something would happen to Mobley and Allen long term, who picks up the slack? If there is a move to be made at the trade deadline, it should be to get a veteran big man who can defend the rim.

And yes, we know Tristan Thompson is on the roster, but he’s there for his veteran leadership and knowledge. If he has to start playing 20 minutes per night, it’s a problem for Atkinson.

Look, the Cavs weren’t going to go 82-0 or even 81-1 this season. They were going to lose some games. Also, they aren’t a perfectly constructed NBA team, there isn’t one, not even the defending champion Celtics.

They came into the season with some flaws on the roster, but the shooting and execution of the players covered some of that up.

We aren’t concerned by the two losses this past week, but watching how Atlanta plays should give everyone, including Atkinson and the coaching staff, an idea of why they are a tough match up.

That’s just the nature of the sport.

Being Thankful…for Kenny Atkinson

Happy Thanksgiving to all of the readers and followers of Cleveland Sports Perspective! Hope you enjoy the most overlooked (in our opinion) of the major holidays.

We have sports thankfulness for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who besides playing outstanding basketball to start the season, also keep sports fans in the area from obsessing on the terrible season the Browns are having.

The 17-2 start is a total surprise of us, and we still think the true test for this basketball team will be the playoffs. We hate saying that because it seems like we are downplaying an amazing first month of hoops, but we know the Cavs are a strong regular season team, will their new style and new coaching pay off next spring.

We liked Kenny Atkinson as a head coach when we had the Brooklyn Nets overachieving during his time there, and when he was dismissed there, he did what basketball lifers do, learning more about the game as an assistant under two men who won NBA titles in Steve Kerr and Ty Lue.

The prevailing thought around the NBA media folks was the wine and gold needed to trade either Jarrett Allen or Evan Mobley, because their view of the game is skewed by how most teams in the NBA play today, with one big man inside and four shooters around the perimeter.

And neither Allen nor Mobley are particularly prolific three-point shooters.

Since basketball is a sport where height matters, we always felt the two big man lineup could succeed, and with the offense described above, you have a lot of players standing around, ready to shoot, while another player tries to get dribble penetration and force the defense to help.

Atkinson figured having Allen and Mobley moving and not being stationary would be a device to make it work.

Mobley is actually making less three pointers than a year ago by percentage (35.3% compared to last year’s 37.3%) and is only taking less than one more shot per contest. He also has the ball in his hands more, and his scoring is up two points per game.

An overlooked reason is his free throw percentage which is up to 82.4% from last year’s career high of 71.9%.

We love how Atkinson isn’t afraid to talk basketball philosophy after games. J.B. Bickerstaff used to talk more about effort, and “the grit” of the players, but Atkinson talks about how the players move on the court, who influences the game without scoring, etc.

Another subtle thing occurred Sunday night. After rookie Jaylon Tyson, usually not in the rotation had to play against New Orleans because of injuries and had a big game, the coach made sure he got minutes in the next contest.

Players need rewards for playing well.

There is also an old hoops adage that says if you don’t play your bench, you will never have one. Last season, the Cavs had five players who averaged more than 30 minutes per night and generally played eight or nine most games.

This season, only three players play 30 minutes, led by Donovan Mitchell’s 31.5 (he played more than 35 last season) and they play 10 or 11 most games.

That develops depth.

Look, Bickerstaff inherited a mess when he took over the job and he restored order, leaning on defense to give the younger Cavs an identity.

He’s doing the same thing in Detroit, where he has the Pistons sitting at 8-11 after winning just 14 games all of last year.

But Kenny Atkinson seems to be putting the finishing touches on this group. They’ve embraced the defensive concepts the former coach taught but now have a more diverse offense to go with it.

That is a reason to be thankful.

Do Browns Get The Most Coverage Because There Is More To Complain About?

With the Cleveland Browns going through another difficult season (and that’s putting it mildly), it brings to mind how sports are covered in northeast Ohio.

The best part of the Browns’ organization is probably the public relations department and whoever makes the decision on the broadcast rights. There are two sports talk stations in the city and the team decided to partner up with both of them, so both the AM and FM entities can claim to be “Home of the Browns”!

It is difficult to find a radio station on a Sunday morning that doesn’t have some sort of football programming on air. And because both stations are tied to the team, they dedicate airtime every day to the Browns, at least when Kevin Stefanski conducts his daily press conferences, in which he says pretty much nothing.

The question is why does the franchise with the least success in the area get talked about the most?

The Cleveland sports fan hasn’t had a lot of reason to puff out their collective chests over the last 60 years. The 2016 Cavaliers have the only league championship since the Browns won in 1964.

That’s a long time without a title parade in downtown Cleveland.

Because the basketball team had the best player in the sport in this century, the Cavs have played for the league championship five times in the last 18 seasons. They lost in the conference finals twice more, meaning they’ve been in their sports’ final four seven times since 2006-07.

And after James left, the organization has rebuilt and put themselves in a position to compete for another shot at a title in a relatively short amount of time.

As for baseball, the Indians/Guardians have been to three World Series in the last 30 years, getting to a seventh game twice in 1997 and 2016.

In a sport that is the toughest to get to the post-season (12 of 30 teams make the playoffs in MLB-40%, compared to 44% in the NFL and depending if you count the “play-in round”, two-thirds of NBA teams make it), the team on the corner of Carnegie and Ontario has made it to the playoffs 14 times since 1995.

They’ve reached the post-season six times in the last nine seasons.

As for the Browns, we understand the attachment for the team because it was ripped away from the city in 1995, but the team has never played in the Super Bowl, one of four teams that have never been there, and two of them (Jacksonville and Houston) weren’t in existence 30 years ago.

The other franchise, the Detroit Lions, may reduce that number to three after this season.

The Browns haven’t played for an NFL championship since before the merger in 1970, and that occurred in 1965. Since their three AFC title appearances in four years (1986-89), they’ve won two playoff games.

However, those two playoff wins are more games that they won in the 2016 and 2017 seasons combined, when they famously went 1-31 and 4-44 over a three year period.

Someone asked me once if it is easier to write about a team when it is winning or losing. Without a doubt it’s a losing team. More things to complain about.

Perhaps that’s why the Browns dominate the sports media in northeast Ohio. Based on the recent past, there are umpteen things to be dissatisfied with.

Don’t Overlook LeVert In Cavs’ Winning Streak.

The streak continues. The Cleveland Cavaliers still have not lost under new coach Kenny Atkinson, running their record to 14-0 on the year with another win over Chicago Friday night.

Cleveland goes for #15 tonight against Charlotte at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse.

Atkinson’s squad has captured the fans of northeast Ohio much like the Indians’ 22-game winning streak did in 2017. Fans were chanting “14-0” behind the desk of the Cavaliers’ post-game show after the win against the Bulls.

The wine and gold lead the league in field goal percentage, three-point field goal percentage, and points scored. And despite all of the offensive numbers, they still rank 6th in defensive efficiency.

It’s a team effort too. Ten players average over 10 minutes per game with only four being on the floor for 30 minutes, and none of those getting more than Donovan Mitchell’s 31.1.

The Cavs have won close games and blowouts. They’ve led wire-to-wire and made come from behind victories.

They are winning, and as usual, that’s a good thing.

Have they taken advantage of a soft Eastern Conference? Yes, there only two other teams in the East above .500 and the Cavs play one of them Tuesday in the defending champion Celtics.

Cleveland beat the other team over the breakeven mark, Orlando, early in the season. However, they have also knocked off the 10-2 Warriors and the 8-4 Lakers in this early season run.

You can only play who is one your schedule.

Ty Jerome has received a lot of love from fans and basketball folks around the league, but another unsung player has been Caris LeVert.

Because LeVert has not been a great three-point shooter in his career (34.4%), he sometimes draws the ire of the look only at the scoring column fans. We remember some poor shooting nights last year and the reaction on social media being that he’s not a good player.

But LeVert is what the basketball world calls “a player”. He plays and usually make a positive impact on the game no matter what his numbers say.

If his shot isn’t falling, he plays solid defense, gets some steals and rebounds. And at 6’6″, he can play either guard spot because he’s a good passer and has the size to play small forward as well.

So far this season, he’s fifth on the team in scoring at 12.4 per game, second in assists at 4.7, while shooting 55% from the floor, and an incredible 48.9% from three. Now we don’t expect the long-range shooting to continue at that pace, but his attempts are down, so perhaps the quality of the shots are much better.

He’s also a player who can create his own shot, which under the old regime was a needed skill, as only two other players (Mitchell and Darius Garland) had that skill, so if the shot clock was running down, he was a player to look for.

It is funny to us that Jerome and LeVert have played so well, because we have been saying Cleveland needed size in the backcourt for some time now, and both of them are exactly that, with Jerome being 6’5″.

The Cavs’ four best players get a lot of credit for how well they have played this season, but don’t overlook the play of Caris LeVert. He does a bit of everything and that is something coaches love.

Right Now, A Total Buy In For Cavs’ Players

As the Cleveland Cavaliers continue their tremendous start, we heard a comment about the off-season that seems to make a lot of sense.

The organization didn’t do a lot in terms of roster reconstruction over the summer, but they did take care of some potential free agents.

The biggest one of course was signing Donovan Mitchell, a perennial all-star to an extension taking him through the 2027-27 season. Although many in the national media had Mitchell declining the player option he had after next season, the five-time all-star decided to stay with the Cavs.

Team president Koby Altman also signed Evan Mobley through 2029-30 and Jarrett Allen through 2028-29. Darius Garland, the other member of what the organization calls “The Core Four”, was already under contract until 2027-28.

As these signings were announced, we thought it was odd to make a commitment to a group that hasn’t been to the conference finals as of yet.

On the other hand, none of the Cavs’ best players are worrying about getting big contracts anymore. And that makes for a more cohesive basketball team.

We aren’t saying any of these guys were ever selfish on the floor, but there is certainly a thought for most players of making a good reputation in the league, showing they can put up numbers, because if they do, a big deal will be coming their way.

Mitchell is the team’s leader and his buy in to what new coach Kenny Atkinson wants to do probably puts everything in place, but you have to wonder if the contract had an effect.

In his first two seasons with the Cavaliers, Mitchell averaged 28.3 and 26.6 points per game playing around 35 minutes per night. He also took about 20 shots per contest.

We know it’s early, way early, but this year, the former 2nd team all-NBA selection is scoring just 22.5 points per game in 30 minutes, taking two less shots per game.

Look, winning makes everyone happy, and because Cleveland has started 10-0, pretty much everything Atkinson has touched has been golden.

Coincidentally, the organization has long felt that for the team to take another step forward, Evan Mobley needed to be more a part of the offense. Mobley is averaging two more shots per game this year, and his scoring average has risen from 15.7 last year to 18.4 in 2024-25.

Mitchell has always expressed a desire to play for championships. Most players feel the same way, but it’s not that they don’t want to win, it’s they don’t know how to do it. Sometimes it’s as simple as trusting your teammates more.

We aren’t saying the difference is because he got his life changing contract, but rather, he feels more comfortable because he got his deal, and is a better player.

And we aren’t just pointing out Mitchell here, we are saying getting everyone on long term deals has fostered more of an emphasis on the team. Right now, every player is sacrificing playing time, as no one is playing more than Mitchell’s 30.3 minutes a game.

If Atkinson can keep the minutes down for his star players, it could and should pay dividends later in the regular season and the playoffs.

Also, the increased time for the reserves mean if they are called upon later in the season, they will be ready. No one gets better by sitting and watching.

Right now, the only agenda for the Cavaliers is winning. Hopefully, that’s the way it stays because team basketball is beautiful to watch.