2014 - 2015 Eastern Conference

[Fuggles]

Right now, if that trade is made, we are looking at a bench of Delly, Miller, Thompson and garbage. That won't cut it if we're serious about winning a championship.

Bennett already looks like a different player this season. I doubt he has a repeat of last season's performance. And to totally disregard the value of the lockdown defense that Wiggins immediately brings us out of the gate at the 2 and 3 spot is to be equally as shortsighted. You cannot sit there and discount the contributions these two guys can make for us. There is a reason Flip is fighting hard to get this deal done with Wiggins included in the package.

Again, if the KLove trade is made, Griffin is creating some work for himself if he plans on putting a roster of players out there capable of competing for a championship this year.

For starters, you don't need a full bench of good players to win a championship. I agree that ours isn't good enough right now but if Delly and TT both improve this year it isn't going to take much more to add on top of it.

Second, no one considers the team done with the addition of Love. We will have the full-mle and haywood exception plus in theory we will look more appealing to ring chasers next year. On top of that we have too few players without playoff experience and new coach who hasn't coached one NBA game. With or without Love this was going to be an experiment and all about priming us to dominate in 2016. The only reason people are even calling us a championship caliber team right now is because of Lebron and that our path to the finals is weak and once you get that far who knows what can happen.

 

[TBomber_26]

For starters, you don't need a full bench of good players to win a championship. I agree that ours isn't good enough right now but if Delly and TT both improve this year it isn't going to take much more to add on top of it.

Second, no one considers the team done with the addition of Love. We will have the full-mle and haywood exception plus in theory we will look more appealing to ring chasers next year. On top of that we have too few players without playoff experience and new coach who hasn't coached one NBA game. With or without Love this was going to be an experiment and all about priming us to dominate in 2016. The only reason people are even calling us a championship caliber team right now is because of Lebron and that our path to the finals is weak and once you get that far who knows what can happen.

An experiment? ...2016?!?!? -- If that's the case, why do the trade in the first place? The whole reason being given that *we need to do this* is to compete now. If the goal is 2016, we might as well hang on to Wiggins and let him develop here. He should be coming into his own by then.

Not attacking you, by the way, Fuggles ...Just saying that if 2016 rolls around, Wiggins starts discovering his potential in Minnesot, and we still haven't won a championship, the natives will start to get a little restless.

 

[Pioneer10]

Projected Cavs rotation: AV, Love, Lebron, Waiters, Irving, TT, Delly, Miller, Jones
Projected Bulls rotation: Noah, Mirotic, Gibson, Gasol, Snell, Butler,McDermott, Rose

Just don't see how the Bulls are going to get passed us. They no longer have Deng who defended James well and basically James can rest on defense till the 4th. None of their bigs are going to really go off in terms of offense (figure AV and Thompson can handle Mirotic and McDermott, and an aging Gasol). They have to depend on Rose to create offense and we can pretty much nullify him with James to end games.

I don't really see a reason why the Cavs would even need to double team anybody . If Gasol has it going, I'd imagine they put AV on him. Lebron and Irving would have a field day if they try a Gasol/Mirotic frontcourt.

 

[Cavsfan161]

Pacers sure will stink this year.

 

[Futuredome]

The Pacers would be wise to tank and go for a top prospect in next years draft while George heals up.

 

[Bdawgs12]

Now that we know Love is a sure thing I keep trying to think of reasons why people are trying to argue the fact that this team isnt a lock to go to the finals barring anything unforseen injury wise.

For one, as we all know the east is terrible and our only true competition will be the Bulls, but the looking at both rosters, it looks to me like we are going to be a match up nightmare for them.

Cavs:

Kyrie / Dellie vs. Rose / Heinrich / Brooks
Waiters/ Jones / Harris vs Butler / Snell
Lebron / Marion (?) / Harris vs Dunleavy / McDermott
Love / TT vs Gasol / Gibson / Mirotic
Andy / Haywood vs Noah / No name guy

Looking at these lineups I see us going small majority of the time which would pull Noah out of paint and render gasol useless defensively with Bron playing the four. You would have a lineup of Kyrie, Shooter one (Allen or Dion), Miller, Lebron, and Love.

Just looking at it this way I dont see how in the world the Bulls have a prayer against us. Since today I have been thinking basketball non stop and with all these people saying how Bulls will still be threat makes me want to puke.

 

[Pioneer10]

Bulls fans are delusional. The Bulls forum's Kevin Love thread is full of Bulls saying that they're going to trounce us while the more sane ones say we're even. In a lot of their minds, we're not worrisome like the Heat because our defense is going to suck
They basically have brought into this:
-Rose is going to be back to full strength
-Mirotic AND McBuckets are going to be offensive stars (and while they're at it it's going to be this year0
Put together they figure our offense is great but Mirotic and McBuckets unlike Bulls team of the past will be able to score enough points and they can match up defensively like this:
-Noah/Gibson on Love
-Butler on James
-Rose on Irving.

More realistically:
They completely ignore on defense that we're able to put quality defenders on them: AV, Tristan being able to match up with Gasol, Noah, and Gibson and Marion/Love/Waiters switching to Rose
Plus their wings are joke: I just don't see how Butler/Snell/Dunleavy are going to match up with Lebron/Waiters/Marion/Miller. Waiters put up a better PER then any of their other wings even though he stunk the first half of the year. Lebron can basically play free safety on defense while they can't really rest any of their guys on defense as we can put in lineups where every single player is an offensive threat.

Only concern maybe stretch 4's in McDermott and Mirotic as AV/Tristan don't guard the 3 point line well. We basically fixed that with Lebron/Marion and even Love is a competent one on one defender (his issue is more rim protection as a help defender). As Bdawgs pointed out since Love is a competent post defender we should be able to go small without sacrificing post defense and only Gasol is the only real post threat they have anyway. Plus if we go small it forces the Bulls to depend on their weak wings even more. Only way we lose this series is if Lebron gets hurt or pulls a D Wade in the Finals

 

[MirORich]

Jimmy Butler is a promising young defensive player. The Bulls can put him on LeBron. It doesn't mean much other than say its may sound more re-assuring than putting Dunleavy on him. LeBron is going to do his thing regardless of who is on him. Especialyy with the pieces we have around him and the coach we have creating our offense.

Perhaps Noah/or Butler can play Love well inside. But when he takes them outside, who is left there to shut down drives or drive and kicks from LeBron, Kyrie, or Dion? That's the value of having even a decent stretch 4 or center like Hawes/prime Z. When you have the best stretch 4 in the league? Beautiful.

Also fail to see how McDermott or Mirotic will even see the floor in the final 6 minutes of a game as neither of them can play SF against us and neither of them are going to play crunch time minutes over Pau.

All that said, I have no doubt Chicago will be the toughest out come the playoffs. And it's way to early to say whether I see us taking it in 5,6, or 7. But I have little doubt this team is going to the Finals.

 

[amil99]

Bulls fans are delusional. The Bulls forum's Kevin Love thread is full of Bulls saying that they're going to trounce us while the more sane ones say we're even. In a lot of their minds, we're not worrisome like the Heat because our defense is going to suck
They basically have brought into this:
-Rose is going to be back to full strength
-Mirotic AND McBuckets are going to be offensive stars (and while they're at it it's going to be this year0
Put together they figure our offense is great but Mirotic and McBuckets unlike Bulls team of the past will be able to score enough points and they can match up defensively like this:
-Noah/Gibson on Love
-Butler on James
-Rose on Irving.

More realistically:
They completely ignore on defense that we're able to put quality defenders on them: AV, Tristan being able to match up with Gasol, Noah, and Gibson and Marion/Love/Waiters switching to Rose
Plus their wings are joke: I just don't see how Butler/Snell/Dunleavy are going to match up with Lebron/Waiters/Marion/Miller. Waiters put up a better PER then any of their other wings even though he stunk the first half of the year. Lebron can basically play free safety on defense while they can't really rest any of their guys on defense as we can put in lineups where every single player is an offensive threat.

Only concern maybe stretch 4's in McDermott and Mirotic as AV/Tristan don't guard the 3 point line well. We basically fixed that with Lebron/Marion and even Love is a competent one on one defender (his issue is more rim protection as a help defender). As Bdawgs pointed out since Love is a competent post defender we should be able to go small without sacrificing post defense and only Gasol is the only real post threat they have anyway. Plus if we go small it forces the Bulls to depend on their weak wings even more. Only way we lose this series is if Lebron gets hurt or pulls a D Wade in the Finals

Yea the Bulls fans on realgm are real clowns. Even going as far as saying Taj Gibson is better than Kyrie

 

[KilgoreTrout]

I think we have to factor in the annual Varejao injury. Dude hasn't played a full season in aeons. I wouldn't expect him to start now.

 

[Cavsfan161]

Bulls get overrated every year, nothing new really. They will be a threat but only if Rose returns to 2011 form.

 

[Bdawgs12]

Then lets factor in the Rose annual injury too. I know everyone is saying how good Rose looks right now, but lets be honest last season when he was supposedly healthy and playing he looked pretty average.

The cavs are going to be just too deep. People are underestimating Dion as well. If Butler is a supposed rising star then what is Dion?

 

[Kizzle]

Bulls fans are delusional. The Bulls forum's Kevin Love thread is full of Bulls saying that they're going to trounce us while the more sane ones say we're even. In a lot of their minds, we're not worrisome like the Heat because our defense is going to suck
They basically have brought into this:
-Rose is going to be back to full strength
-Mirotic AND McBuckets are going to be offensive stars (and while they're at it it's going to be this year0
Put together they figure our offense is great but Mirotic and McBuckets unlike Bulls team of the past will be able to score enough points and they can match up defensively like this:
-Noah/Gibson on Love
-Butler on James
-Rose on Irving.

More realistically:
They completely ignore on defense that we're able to put quality defenders on them: AV, Tristan being able to match up with Gasol, Noah, and Gibson and Marion/Love/Waiters switching to Rose
Plus their wings are joke: I just don't see how Butler/Snell/Dunleavy are going to match up with Lebron/Waiters/Marion/Miller. Waiters put up a better PER then any of their other wings even though he stunk the first half of the year. Lebron can basically play free safety on defense while they can't really rest any of their guys on defense as we can put in lineups where every single player is an offensive threat.

Only concern maybe stretch 4's in McDermott and Mirotic as AV/Tristan don't guard the 3 point line well. We basically fixed that with Lebron/Marion and even Love is a competent one on one defender (his issue is more rim protection as a help defender). As Bdawgs pointed out since Love is a competent post defender we should be able to go small without sacrificing post defense and only Gasol is the only real post threat they have anyway. Plus if we go small it forces the Bulls to depend on their weak wings even more. Only way we lose this series is if Lebron gets hurt or pulls a D Wade in the Finals

I got my troll on there yesterday lol

But yeah they were getting on Love's defense saying Gasol would drop 30 a game on him. Like if it came down to that we'd just double Gasol with Lebron and force rose to shoot 40+ % from 3 all series.


They got all on Our teams defense but outside their starting 5 they have the same exact problems we do. They are a prime example of a good coaching scheme masking bad and average 1 on 1 defenders. I asked why our good coach couldn't do a similar scheme that helps his bad defenders and they got mad and told me DJ Augustin was a great one on one defender and didn't need Thibbs. Smh

 

[Cavsengland]

I got my troll on there yesterday lol

But yeah they were getting on Love's defense saying Gasol would drop 30 a game on him. Like if it came down to that we'd just double Gasol with Lebron and force rose to shoot 40+ % from 3 all series.


They got all on Our teams defense but outside their starting 5 they have the same exact problems we do. They are a prime example of a good coaching scheme masking bad and average 1 on 1 defenders. I asked why our good coach couldn't do a similar scheme that helps his bad defenders and they got mad and told me DJ Augustin was a great one on one defender and didn't need Thibbs. Smh

:chuckles:

tbh I always try and avoid going on real gm when I look for other teams forums. I always try and find an independent fan forum like this one. (Realcavsfans) Because they usually talk a lot more sense. And Saying the bulls are going to win it all and the cavs aren't that good is the hip thing to do right now. I'm sure deep down everyone saying it don't actually believe the nonsense they write.

And if you want a better bulls forum. chi city sport forum is a lot better than the real gm. Trust me they talk a lot more sense.

 

[Kizzle]

I skimmed those boards and it's funny. Every board is the same. There's dudes over there hating every move Chicago made just like here