Wine And Gold Bench Not Getting It Done

The Cleveland Cavaliers had a red-hot start to the season. After losing their opener to Toronto, they reeled off eight straight wins, several of them without All-Star guard Darius Garland, who was poked in the eye in the first game of the season.

Everything was clicking for J.B. Bickerstaff’s crew, Cedi Osman got off to a great start shooting the three ball, Dean Wade scored a career high 22 points in a comeback win over New York. And they beat Boston on the road in overtime with Donovan Mitchell and Caris LeVert both scoring 41 points.

But on the west coast trip, the Cavs were going for win #9 and led the Clippers in the fourth quarter, but lost, starting a five-game losing streak that ended Friday night in a double overtime win over Charlotte.

Sometimes it’s difficult to get a victory after a long losing streak, and hopefully now that the wine and gold got back in the win column, they can right the ship. But some holes did spring up during the losing skein.

Jarrett Allen missed a couple of games with an ankle problem, and that exposed a size problem. Allen and Evan Mobley are a big reason Cleveland succeeds defensively (they are still 4th in defensive efficiency), but they are the only rim protectors on the roster.

With Allen in there, Mobley can get out an defend on the perimeter where his length bothers smaller players, as it did at the end of the first overtime Friday night against Terry Rozier.

The only other experienced interior big man is Robin Lopez, signed in the off-season as a free agent. Lopez is a seven footer, but is slow, and not really a shot blocker. And quite frankly, we don’t think he can be out there for 25 minutes a game if something happened to Allen or Mobley and they couldn’t play for a stretch of games.

Since the winning streak ended, the bench hasn’t provided much, meaning Bickerstaff has a very top-heavy roster.

They have four all-star caliber players in Mitchell, Garland, Allen, and Mobley, and two solid veterans in Kevin Love, who could be out for a while with a hairline fracture of his thumb, and LeVert, meaning the depth folks thought the Cavaliers had is no longer there.

As noted earlier, Osman and Wade had great starts to the season, but the former hasn’t been good lately and Wade has been hurt but followed up the 22 point game with a scoreless one. No doubt, Bickerstaff needs both to step up and provide production each and every night.

After not getting much time early in the season, Lamar Stevens has taken advantage of the injuries and has started to get minutes again, getting at least 29 in last three contests, averaging 9.3 points in those games. He’s solid and deserves to keep getting minutes, probably at the expense of Isaac Okoro who is really struggling, especially on the offensive end.

Raul Neto got playing time while Garland was out, but since the Cavs went west, he’s been AWOL.

That leaves Bickerstaff with six solid players, guys he can depend on every night. That’s not enough, particularly for a time with playoff aspirations.

The first thing that needs to happen is someone, notably Osman and Wade, need to step up, but it doesn’t have to be one of those two, they are just the most likely candidates. It could be Okoro too, but he seems to have lost confidence in his offensive game right now.

Maybe it’s a slump for the bench crew, or perhaps we were all just fooled by the eight-game winning streak. But if this team wants to avoid the play in tournament, they need depth that Bickerstaff can rely on.

Time for some players to step up

Cavs’ Bench Needs To Shake The Doldrums

The Cleveland Cavaliers had a promising start to their trip to the west, winning in Detroit (yes, it’s west) without Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell and beating the Lakers.

They had fourth quarter leads in every other game, but lost the last three, and come home tonight to face Minnesota.

The Cavs have played eight of their first twelve games away from Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse, and now five of the next six are in town, which helps immensely as the wine and gold have won all four games held there.

An old NBA adage tells us bench players play better at home and that was certainly true for J.B. Bickerstaff’s squad on the trek, as really only Kevin Love gave him quality minutes consistently.

Of course, Love’s a veteran, a guy who has started most of his career, so it’s not surprising he plays well no matter where the game is, he’s averaging 12 points and 7.7 rebounds a game.

Cedi Osman averaged 15.5 points per game on red hot shooting (52% from the floor, 9 of 19 from three) in the first four games. Since then, he’s made just 14 of 39 (36%) and just 8 of 26 three-point shots, scoring in double figures just once, the blowout win in the Motor City.

Dean Wade started while Garland was out with his eye injury and scored 22 points, a career high, in the win against the Knicks at home. He missed the last game of the trip, but in the four games he played, he scored 11 points, including a zero against Detroit.

And then there is Isaac Okoro, who’s confidence looks shattered right now, missing two-point blank layups against Golden State Friday night. He’s made just 9 of 32 shots from the floor, missing all 12 three point shots. He even put up a six trillion (playing six minutes without any other entry in the box score) vs. the Kings.

In the last four games of the roadie (he did have 9 points vs. the Pistons), he scored seven points on 1 of 8 shooting in 47 minutes, grabbing four rebounds and dishing out two assists.

When three of your four primary substitutes are playing like that, it’s difficult to win.

At what point does a concern become a problem though.

As we said earlier, five of Cleveland’s next six contests are at home, so the second unit has an opportunity to straighten out the issue. But if they don’t start playing well, what are the options?

One would seem to be putting Wade back in the starting lineup and bringing LeVert off the bench. Not that the latter has done anything wrong, it would simply be putting another scorer with that group. Doing this would also give the starters a bit more size.

As for Okoro, we don’t know what the solution is. Defensively, he is still excellent, contributing greatly to the win against New York with his effort on that end of the floor.

On offense, he appears lost right now. As mentioned earlier, he’s lost whatever confidence he ever had offensively. At times when he is passed the ball, it looks like he can’t get rid of it fast enough. Defenses are ignoring him, and it puts a burden on the offense when you are basically playing 4 on 5.

We’d also like to see more of a 10 man rotation to limit minutes on the starters, particularly Mitchell, who currently leads the NBA in that category. Raul Neto has done a solid job when used, so why not use him?

We understand it’s still early, but we are sure Bickerstaff hasn’t liked the last three games. Home cooking will help, but so will better effort by bench.

Who Plays Small Forward? Cavs Have To Have An Answer

The Cleveland Cavaliers have started training camp for the 2022-23 season and they know who four starters will be: Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell will be the guards, Evan Mobley will be the power forward, and Jarrett Allen be man the pivot.

The question is who will start at small forward or the #3 spot. Most fans have their favorite to play there, but really, there is more to it than just numbers.

The player that J.B. Bickerstaff chooses has to fit with the others. He has to be an offensive threat, otherwise the opponents will double team someone, which will limit the effectiveness of that player and possibly the entire offense.

And while he needs to be an offensive threat, he has to understand he will be the fifth option on that side of the court, knowing he needs to be a facilitator to get the ball to the others.

Lastly, Bickerstaff has to worry about the second unit too. He needs to create balance so when three bench players are on the floor, the Cavs aren’t worrying how they are going to score.

We believe the contenders are Isaac Okoro, Caris LeVert, Cedi Osman, Dean Wade, and Lamar Stevens

The favorite to land the spot is third year player Okoro, mostly because he was the 5th overall pick in the 2020 draft. Okoro improved his three point shooting from 29% as a rookie to 35% last season, but last season, opposing teams were leaving him open, and he still seemed hesitant to shoot.

For us, he needs to demonstrate he can knockdown shots without hesitation and make defenses pay attention to him. If he can do that, he might be the guy.

LeVert is the most accomplished scorer of the group, scoring at 14.6 points per game in his career. He’s a good passer and is certainly someone the defense would need to pay attention to. That’s probably why he’s a better fit with the second unit, using he and Kevin Love as the primary weapons among that group.

We are fans of Osman, so we are a little biased here. We think Osman has been miscast as spot up three-point shooter, and although he has a career mark of 35%, he’s inconsistent. He’s really a slasher/distributor, that’s what he does internationally, and is a solid defender.

Doing those things, he might be a great fit with Mitchell, Garland, Allen, and Mobley. He is willing to shoot though, and has size too, at 6’7″ (compared to Okoro at 6’5″ and LeVert at 6’6″).

Wade is 6’9″, so he would fit more into Bickerstaff’s love of size, and he’s a good shooter (36% from three), but he seems hesitant to shoot at times and thus far in his career, it feels like he goes through stretches where he disappears on the floor. It’s hard to justify increased minutes if that happens.

Stevens would be a good choice too. He gives you the same defense as Okoro but with a better offensive game. We often think Stevens would get more time than Okoro if the latter wasn’t the fifth overall pick.

What we like about Stevens is he knows his game, and he can be effective in the mid-range game, so defenses have to respect that.

The performance of these five players is something to watch when the exhibition games commence. But don’t just look at their numbers, look at what the play on the court looks like with the other starters.

Watching Summer League Through A Real Lens

The NBA decided this year to award championship rings for the winner of their Summer League, which is akin to giving out a trophy for winning the Cactus League for Major League Baseball.

On one hand, for some of these players, this is the closest they will get to playing in the NBA. And if they win the title, we guess there is a sense of accomplishment and as we always say, winning is better than losing.

But is it really a competition when several teams aren’t even trying to win? The Orlando Magic had the top player taken in this past draft, Paolo Banchero, play two games in Las Vegas, and then decided they had seen enough of the player they hope will be the backbone of their squad the next time they advance to the post-season.

In terms of the Cavaliers, it is great that Ochai Agbaji has played well in the three games the wine and gold’s entry in the league has played. The first-round pick from Kansas scored 24 points last night, hitting 4 of 8 three-point shots.

However, he is likely the only player on this team that will make a meaningful contribution to the 2022-23 edition of the Cavs.

Cleveland’s highest second round pick, Khalifa Diop isn’t playing in the league and supposedly will not be reporting to training camp in the fall. Isaiah Mobley was signed as a two-way player, so he will likely be toiling a lot for the Cleveland Charge, and the last pick, Luke Travers, will be playing in Australia.

We have read some ardent Cavs’ fans touting another two-way player, R.J. Nembhard Jr., who is playing in Vegas, as someone who may be able to contribute to the club this season.

A few weeks ago, we wrote about how the Cavs needed to upgrade the bottom of their roster so they weren’t reliant on guys like Lamar Stevens, Dylan Windler, and Dean Wade to succeed. If we feel that way about those three players, you can understand why we are skeptical about Nembhard Jr.’s prospects of making an impact.

The best players in the league are the first round picks this year coming into the league and the second-year guys who were in the NBA last season, and most of the top rookies from last season aren’t playing in summer.

So, if a player like Agbaji isn’t playing well against this competition, it’s more of a red flag than a great feeling if he plays well. He should be doing good things. He was heralded as someone who could shoot the ball, particularly from distance, and he’s done that.

We haven’t seen anything that wasn’t expected. And that’s a good thing.

In watching the games, we haven’t seen anyone else who can make an impact for a team who should be in a position to make the playoffs next season. In fact, the next best player we’ve seen is Travers, and he’s a developmental player.

While it’s fun to watch and gives hoops junkies actual games to see, the NBA Summer League is a bunch of glorified exhibition games with most of the players being guys you will never hear from again.

Look at it that way, and you won’t fool yourself into overhyping someone.

Comparing These Cavs To The “Miracle” Team

Since the calendar flipped to 2022, the Cleveland Cavaliers have taken it to another level, winning eight out of nine, and currently sit in third place in the Eastern Conference, just two games out of the top spot.

However, the East is so competitive this season that the Cavs are also just 2-1/2 games ahead of the current 7th seed and finishing seventh through tenth gets you a spot in the (ridiculous) play in tournament.

Although Darius Garland and Jarrett Allen are getting all star buzz, J.B. Bickerstaff and GM Koby Altman have put together a “team”, and we have discussed before how important it is that any addition made to the roster has to be done with an eye on the incredible chemistry and togetherness this group has.

That togetherness reminds us of the first Cavalier team to make the post-season, the 1975-76 Miracle of Richfield group. That team had nine players who averaged 16 minutes per game.

Out of the 11 players who have played 30 games this season for Cleveland, 10 of them have averaged 15 minutes per game. Now a couple of those guys (Dean Wade and Lamar Stevens) have done that because they move into the starting lineup because Bickerstaff doesn’t want to mess with the bench minutes.

The ’76 team was led in minutes per game by Jim Brewer, who averaged 35.5, while this year’s group is paced by Garland’s 34.7 a contest. So, playing time is spaced out among nine or ten players.

Both groups have veterans who were stars in the NBA embracing a reserve role.

Nate Thurmond was a 7-time all-star and started for Chicago the year before coming to the Cavs early in the 75-76 season. Coach Bill Fitch asked Thurmond to come off the bench and be the anchor of the second unit defensively. Fitch felt the veteran would have a huge impact as a shot blocker and rebounder playing 15-20 minutes per night.

This year’s group has Kevin Love, a key part of the 2016 championship team here. Love spent the post-LeBron James’ years being an undersized center, and the pounding of playing against bigger bodies took its toll on him.

With Allen, rookie Evan Mobley, and even Lauri Markkanen, Love can do what he still does very well. Shoot the three ball, score, and rebound. And as with Fitch in ’76, Bickerstaff has limited Love to just 21.6 minutes a game.

Love is hitting 40% from three and is third on the wine and gold in rebounds at 7.2.

Both squads made their bones on the defensive end of the floor. Fitch’s team was 4th in defensive rating, Bickerstaff’s team is 3rd.

There are differences though. The ’75-’76 team missed the playoffs by one game the previous season, the current edition came out of nowhere. These Cavs have the probable rookie of the year in Evan Mobley, while those Cavaliers were largely a young veteran core, many players with two to four years experience.

One problem Altman and Bickerstaff won’t have to worry about is the dispersal draft, which really hurt the Cavs. The NBA and ABA merged following the ’76 season, and not only the college draft, but the players from ABA teams not absorbed into the NBA were drafted in reverse order of their records, meaning Cleveland could not improve its roster.

Players like Artis Gilmore (Chicago), Maurice Lucas (Portland) and Moses Malone (Portland, but traded to Buffalo and then to Houston) went in that selection process.

By the way, Portland won the title the following season.

What strikes us as the most similar thing about the two teams is the togetherness, the unselfishness of the two squads. They are about winning, and that’s refreshing. They want each other to succeed.

That ’76 team went to the Eastern Conference finals, where they took Boston to six games. They did it despite losing starting center Jim Chones to a broken foot, meaning Thurmond had to start and did a tremendous job in the series.

Hopefully, these Cavs can stay healthy so we can see how far they can go this spring.

Oh, and one other similarity. Both teams are incredibly fun to watch.

Where, Oh Where Is The Cavs’ Front Office?

It is kind of a tradition for the point man for professional sports teams to be the general manager, and normally that person speaks to the media when a major event happens or when the season ends.

That’s why it is peculiar at best that Cavs’ GM Koby Altman has not been neither seen or heard from since he completed the Jarrett Allen trade on January 13th.

Look, we get it. It’s not a pleasant task to discuss what went wrong after a losing season, especially one that ended as dismally as the Cavaliers did, losing 13 of their last 14 contests.

On the other hand, as we tell our children, would you like a list of things we have to do that are part of our job that we don’t particularly care for? It’s part of the gig to stand up and talk to the media about both the good things and bad things that occurred during the season, and to answer questions about the future.

The underlying question must be is Dan Gilbert contemplating a restructuring of the front office. Will Altman emerge from the restructuring with his job or just a new boss? That has to be the only option, because otherwise not having availability with the media after the season concludes is either a bad look, or just plain fear.

We have said before we believe someone else needs to be involved in the future planning of this basketball team and that person cannot and should not have the last name of Gilbert. It needs to be someone who has played or coached in the league, and should be someone not that far removed from doing those things.

And in our opinion, it needs to be someone from outside the organization, meaning someone with a fresh viewpoint on the players on the team. For example, the Cavs have put a lot of stock in Collin Sexton, but what do others not in the Cleveland organization think of him? Who does that person think should be the building blocks of the next winning team wearing wine and gold?

We understand Sexton is a lightning rod among Cavs’ followers, so we can pick out another example. Can Dean Wade be a key piece for a playoff team? He averaged 6 points and 3.4 rebounds playing 19 minutes per game, playing in 63 of them. He’s a stretch four, shooting almost 37% from beyond the arc in 2020-21.

However, to us, he’s a 10th-12th man on a good team. We watch the NBA playoffs and we can’t see him getting meaningful minutes. We don’t think he’s a good enough defender to play at that level.

We think it’s time for a second set of eyes at this point. Perhaps someone new will come in and think Altman is 100% correct with his assessment of things, and if that happens, it will still give another basketball person a chance to evaluate players.

But if that person thinks the future of the franchise is best served by going in another direction, say, building around Jarrett Allen, then that should be the course taken going forward.

We maintain the problem isn’t talent, nor is it coaching, it’s fit. And we are right, then Dan Gilbert and his family have to do the right thing.

People have always taught us that the smartest people know what they don’t know.

Cavs: Exciting At Times, Frustrating At Others

The Cleveland Cavaliers have hit the stage in their development where they are a very frustrating team to watch at times.

After a stretch against a brutal schedule that saw them lose 10 games in a row, the last being an embarrassing defeat at the hands of equally mediocre Oklahoma City, coach J.B. Bickerstaff made a lineup change to bring Dean Wade, a shooter (stretch four) in the starting lineup and the team reeled off four straight wins.

In the last game before the All Star break, Cleveland was going for its fifth consecutive win and had a 19 point lead in the third quarter, blowing it after Darius Garland went down with a groin strain. Garland missed Friday night’s contest too, a 34 point blow out at the hands of the New Orleans Pelicans (16-22), another team on par record wise with the Cavs.

Yes, Garland was out, and Larry Nance and Kevin Love, both of whom has been out for awhile played, so some adjustments were needed. However, the wine and gold were trailing by just six in the second quarter before the roof caved in.

Bickerstaff and his staff have some guy who can play in this league, this isn’t a roster devoid of talent, so losing by 34 on the road to a team that really isn’t much better than the Cavs is very frustrating.

It has to be maddening for the coaching staff too, because it seems like he has to constantly challenge them to compete. Too often they revert to bad habits, ones which go away from team play. And when the Cavaliers are playing well, they very much play together, moving the ball, etc.

Cleveland had 13 assists in Friday’s game. Some of that has to do with the team shooting 34% from the floor, and 22% from three point range. Newcomer Quinn Cook hit three of four from behind the line, meaning the rest of the team went a dreadful 4 for 28 (14%).

Moving the ball has been stressed since day one of training camp by Bickerstaff and the coaches, but without Garland out there, they come up with just 13 helpers. And that has to fall on to the player who has his hands on the ball most, Collin Sexton.

We go back and forth on the third year player out of Alabama. There is plenty of good in his game. He can score, there is no question about that. He shoots 48% from the floor and 39% from behind the arc. He dishes out 4.3 assists per game, second most on the team.

But when things aren’t going well, instead of trusting the other players on the floor, he tries to do everything himself. And that’s a difficult thing for a player to learn. Michael Jordan had to learn it as well, and we are not comparing Sexton to Jordan.

When Garland is not playing, the Cavs need Sexton to be a playmaker. If he can’t do that, then the organization has to ask a difficult question, can an NBA team win with a 6’2″ #2 guard? We know Toronto won with a small backcourt, but they had one of the five best players in the league in Kawhi Leonard.

Right now, the Cavaliers don’t have a player like that on the roster.

At this point, the basketball IQ on this team isn’t very high. And that’s not just on Sexton. For example, Cedi Osman (or someone else is telling him) think he’s a three point shooter. He’s not. He takes the most threes on the roster, and he’s hitting just 32%.

At this point, Sexton is much like the team he plays for. It is alternately enjoying and frustrated watching he and the Cavaliers play.

Yes, they are a young team, but they do have some veterans to guide the way like Nance, JaVale McGee, and Love, and Taurean Prince has been around as well.

This squad can make a playoff push in the mediocre Eastern Conference. But they can’t have many more games like their first one after the break. It’s time for the young players to play much smarter and tougher.

Cavs Making Moves, Hopefully More To Come.

The Cleveland Cavaliers made a couple of roster moves in the past couple of days, converting Dean Wade’s two way contract to a multi-year deal and adding free agent Jordan Bell on a two year deal.

Both players have some size, Wade is 6’9″ and Bell 6’8″, so that’s a good thing, and they didn’t have to give anything else to sign him, and that’s another good thing.

It was also announced Ante Zizic will play in Europe next season, and that’s a loss of a big body.

Really, none of these moves are significant.

It’s hard to get excited by Wade, who is really a stretch four, but at 24 next season, maybe he’s a player who gets better and finds his niche in the NBA later in his career, but it’s tough to see him having a significant role for the wine and gold in the 2020-21 season.

Bell has been with three teams in four years, and was regarded as a hot commodity when Golden State purchased his draft rights from the Bulls. He did play 14 minutes a night in his rookie year, which is his high water mark.

Our thought is he is a victim of the idea that everything the Warriors touched turned to gold a couple of years ago, so if they wanted him, he must really be good. He played in 29 games this past season, averaging 3.2 points and 2.8 rebounds in nine minutes.

Can he develop his game and become a solid player? Of course, but for now, we can’t think too much of this move.

As for Zizic, while we would have liked him to get more of an opportunity we understand the move. He averaged 7.8 points and 5.4 boards a game when he got regular playing time in ’18-’19, getting 18 minutes per game (59 games).

However, here’s our thought on most NBA players. They can all score if given touches, but what determines playing time is how you play defense, and if you can’t guard someone, then you sit.

Again, he’s just 23, and he wouldn’t be the first big man to go overseas, gain some experience, and come back to the NBA a better player. Perhaps he can learn to make up for a seeming lack of lateral quickness with anticipation and positioning.

There have been multiple rumors of the Cavs looking for young, athletic wings in free agency, and two names that have been reported are Derrick Jones Jr., currently with Miami and Josh Jackson, with Memphis.

Jones is just 23 years old, and is averaging 8.9 points and 4.2 caroms for the Heat, the best marks of his career. And he comes from a good culture, playing for Erik Spoelstra in Miami.

Jackson, also 23, is the former 4th overall pick in the draft in 2018, but was traded to Memphis at the draft last summer, and played most of this year in the G-League. He did score 10.4 points in 18 games with the Grizzlies.

While we definitely see a need for wings, here’s hoping the organization doesn’t ignore big folks either. Losing Zizic and perhaps Tristan Thompson will leave a hole in this area too.

We were encouraged to hear of interest in Harry Giles, a 6’11” player out of Duke that has battled injuries since leaving high school. In 96 NBA games with Sacramento, 17 of them starts, Giles has scored seven points with four rebounds per game.

In the 10 games after the All Star Game, he upped those figures to 10.8 and 6.2. Hopefully, the rumors are true about Cleveland’s interest in Giles, he could wind up being a very good option here if the Kings do not pick up his option.

So, while the most recent moves don’t really get us excited, the young, athletic wings make us intrigued. Unfortunately, we will have to wait until the playoffs are over for real moves to be made.