Kevin Love - Miami Ground Machine

[Cassity14]

I think people are glossing over Cosmo's more nuanced point; that being, Kevin Love is giving up way way too much on defense. I totally agree with his point about Horford; he got dominated.

At some point in the season, David Blatt has to start coaching Kevin Love to at least try to defend opposing players. If this isn't possible, then we'll need to expend assets and resources (read: Dion Waiters) to get a rim protecting big to cover up Kevin's deficiencies.

While I agree with this notion that Kevin Love has been awful defensively, I don't think it's coming as a result of anything we didn't see coming.

The Cavs, as a team, have been awful defensively. Not only do they often lack effort, they still can be seen not understanding the scheme. Andy often switches for no reason, the guard at the top is often caught in no man's land when defending a PnR, the weak side wing is often not getting a proper close out, etc.

The argument for Kevin Love defensively was that he's an adequate positional defender. He doesn't surrender very good position on a regular 1v1 basis. No, he's not going to block shots, and no, we definitely don't ever want to see him as the last line of defense against a player with a head of steam. Unfortunately, schematic breakdowns have resulted in both of these situations happening a lot more than they should. Robin Lopez comes to mind.

Is he being scored on when in isolation? Sure, but at the same time, he's often being scored on from inefficient spots of the floor and/or by players who are simply going to score. Horford hit some very tough turnaround hook shots last night. Aldridge did the same when they were matched up. What's important to remember is that Kevin often matches these situations with his own offense in addition to the passing and spacing he provides without the ball.

When Kevin Love is playing defense on the fast break, he's awful. He commits too soon and often commits to a guy who's already drawn a defender - resulting in an easy dump off for another player to slam home an uncontested dunk. That may get better and it may not. However, the situation in which it happens, careless turnovers, will go down in frequency as the year goes on.

Kevin Love is NOT Chris Bosh, who can save a defensive breakdown because of his versatility; Kevin Love is the type who's going to get abused as a result of these breakdowns. I believe you and I were both on here in the summer laughing at the shit people were saying about Bosh. He looks pretty good now, eh?

Actually, Love's defensive deficiencies are something LeBron has to get used to as well. He's used to guys like Birdman, Bosh, etc. being able to cover up when he gets burned. That's not the case anymore. LeBron isn't able to jump into every passing lane with reckless abandon on this team; the bigs behind him don't possess the shot blocking ability or quickness (Thompson has the quickness to switch for periods of time) to constantly cover up lapses on the wing or at the top.

Tl;dr: Kevin Love is getting highlighted by teams breaking down the Cavs as a team because they haven't fully yet understood the scheme, how to properly run shooters off the line, etc. It'll look better in time. Hell, it looked a lot better against Atlanta, especially early on.

 

[clevelandrox23]

We started off 1-3 in rebounding (same as our record), we are 2-0-1 in the last 3 games (all wins). Kevin Love is 9th in the league in rebounding and is leading the league in defensive rebounding. Why are you worried about offensive rebound ranking from a guy playing the stretch 4 and who's teammate is leading the league in offensive rebounds/game.

High defensive rebounding numbers as a PF/C is not that much of an accomplishment in comparison to offensive rebounding. Take Love out of the game and I guarantee you that the Cavaliers overall team rebounding numbers would not be significantly lower. Fair point on the whole stretch 4 thing taking away some of his offensive rebounding opportunities. When the guy cost us two number overall picks (understanding 1 was Bennett), a 1st round pick, and eventually 20+mil in salary it is fair to be annoyed with the guy when he is shooting 37% from the field and hurts the team defensively.

then we'll need to expend assets and resources (read: Dion Waiters) to get a rim protecting big to cover up Kevin's deficiencies.

So the two number 1 overall picks, a 1st round pick and high salary weren't enough? Pretty large investment for Kevin Love. For argument sake we trade for a defensive minded big, now what? Love only plays on the court when that big is in the game?

 

[Cassity14]

High defensive rebounding numbers as a PF/C is not that much of an accomplishment in comparison to offensive rebounding. Take Love out of the game and I guarantee you that the Cavaliers overall team rebounding numbers would not be significantly lower. Fair point on the whole stretch 4 thing taking away some of his offensive rebounding opportunities. When the guy cost us two number overall picks, a 1st round pick, and eventually 20+mil in salary it is fair to be annoyed with the guy when he is shooting 37% from the field and hurts the team defensively.



So the two number 1 overall picks, a 1st round pick and high salary weren't enough? Pretty large investment for Kevin Love. For argument sake we trade for a defensive minded big, now what? Love only plays on the court when that big is in the game?

I'm not sure you've carefully watched his impact on the glass OR the disgusting amount of offensive rebounds this team has given up over the last four years, but Kevin Love has a bigger impact on a team's defensive rebounding than any player in today's NBA. In a league where teams are shooting more 3s than ever, and as a result, extra possessions become even more valuable, limiting those is HUGE. Kevin Love makes that happen. He often comes down with rebounds despite having two offensive rebounders on either side of him.

How do you think a lot of these transition opportunities start? When you have a guy as good as Kevin Love on the defensive glass, all of a sudden your guards and small forward get to leak out more and more to generate easier offense. Not to mention, Kevin Love is able to throw a pass 80 feet to those same players who wouldn't even be in position to receive it if he wasn't on the floor.

 

[clevelandrox23]

I'm not sure you've carefully watched his impact on the glass OR the disgusting amount of offensive rebounds this team has given up over the last four years, but Kevin Love has a bigger impact on a team's defensive rebounding than any player in today's NBA. In a league where teams are shooting more 3s than ever, and as a result, extra possessions become even more valuable, limiting those is HUGE. Kevin Love makes that happen. He often comes down with rebounds despite having two offensive rebounders on either side of him.

How do you think a lot of these transition opportunities start? When you have a guy as good as Kevin Love on the defensive glass, all of a sudden your guards and small forward get to leak out more and more to generate easier offense. Not to mention, Kevin Love is able to throw a pass 80 feet to those same players who wouldn't even be in position to receive it if he wasn't on the floor.

What numbers are you looking at or are you basing your argument off of what the mainstream sports media says, watching games, and what this forum wants to believe? I was playing around with the opponents offensive rebounds per game, overall rebounds per game, defensive rebounds per game, and Love's impact is not as pronounced on his teams as you may think. The 2013-2014 Cavs for instance were 5th in the league in lowest opponents offensive rebounds per game, thus far this year we are 13th.

 

[CavsFan005]

I don't understand this we couldn't have signed deng/hawes argument? We cleared out a ton of cap space to sign Lebron, couldn't we have just told those guys to wait a few weeks and we can re-sign you by going over the cap? Inform me.

 

[Captain S]

I think we are primed for an explosion of love... Kyrie and Lebron are getting such open looks that one team is going to start focusing in on them, and he is going to go get himself 50 and 15

He has been getting clean looks but I still think we aren't quite feeding him where he needs to get the ball, especially in the post. It looks as forced as some of the stuff we ran for Bynum last year. We should start by establishing him rather than Andy one of these days, and I just think teams won't know what hit them once the rest of the battalion rolls through with Bron and Kyrie.

He is just getting started, and will punish one of these teams very, very soon.

40 percent of his shots are within 10 feet , 45 percent of his other shots are 3's

I think that's an ok balance

 

[CosmoKramer]

I don't understand this we couldn't have signed deng/hawes argument? We cleared out a ton of cap space to sign Lebron, couldn't we have just told those guys to wait a few weeks and we can re-sign you by going over the cap? Inform me.

We had to renounce the rights to Deng and Hawes to even sign LeBron, which means we lost their Bird Rights- the ability to go over the cap when re-signing a player. Not to mention we also had to trade a 1st rounder to unload the salaries of Zeller, Jack, and Karasev to fit in LeBron's max contract as well.

 

[MalTalm]

I don't understand this we couldn't have signed deng/hawes argument? We cleared out a ton of cap space to sign Lebron, couldn't we have just told those guys to wait a few weeks and we can re-sign you by going over the cap? Inform me.

http://www.cbafaq.com/salarycap.htm#Q35

Read from 35 to 42, it covers the relevant ins and outs of "Bird rights" and free agency signings.

 

[gourimoko]

You can't do that

 

[cavsfever]

I may be missing something here, but I expected K-Love to look better inside on post up opportunities. He is shooting under 40 percent from 2 point range and he just seems to get swallowed up inside by larger players. Looking at videos of past offensive highlights it seemed like he had an effective hook shot and inside post moves and I'm just not seeing it now. He looks like he's a little too small/slow and can't elevate enough to really get it off when he is guarded. Part of this is maybe that we lack other players who are inside threats so the biggest guys on the other team can focus on Love.

Rebounding-wise he is a tremendous craftsman in there, positions himself fantastically well, but again doesn't seem to be able to physically dominate the way you need to to clean up on the offensive glass...has not been as impressive there as I expected. This may be related to being stuck out on the three point line a lot too.

He does so many things well that he's a good contributor even if his post game and offensive rebounding are not very impressive but given our other flaws we need more from him if we are to seriously compete for a championship...this may well be a broader issue of how Coach Blatt integrates him into the offense though. If he was positioned and set up properly inside then it might be possible to address both problems.

 

[Kizzle]

I may be missing something here, but I expected K-Love to look better inside on post up opportunities. He is shooting under 40 percent from 2 point range and he just seems to get swallowed up inside by larger players. Looking at videos of past offensive highlights it seemed like he had an effective hook shot and inside post moves and I'm just not seeing it now. He looks like he's a little too small/slow and can't elevate enough to really get it off when he is guarded. Part of this is maybe that we lack other players who are inside threats so the biggest guys on the other team can focus on Love.

Rebounding-wise he is a tremendous craftsman in there, positions himself fantastically well, but again doesn't seem to be able to physically dominate the way you need to to clean up on the offensive glass...has not been as impressive there as I expected. This may be related to being stuck out on the three point line a lot too.

He does so many things well that he's a good contributor even if his post game and offensive rebounding are not very impressive but given our other flaws we need more from him if we are to seriously compete for a championship...this may well be a broader issue of how Coach Blatt integrates him into the offense though. If he was positioned and set up properly inside then it might be possible to address both problems.

I don't think its this deep.


He's just gotta hit more shots



He's very unselfish, I think he should get himself in rythhmn faster

 

[Jordan]

Two points:

1) I wouldn't worry about Love on offense yet. His role is entirely different than what he did in Minny and UCLA. Right now Love is being left to stand outside the 3pt line and when he gets the ball either shoot or barrel past his defender into a post-up. The big issue here has been he is missing the 3pt shots. I'm willing to bet, as he gets more accustomed to his role, he'll have a greater understand of when the ball is arriving and start shooting better.

2) Defense is obviously the bigger concern. This is what everyone should have expected, tho. Love is slow and relatively unathletic. He does try on defense but is, well, bad at it. I think as we get better at team defense this won't be as much of a problem. Nonetheless, it will be a huge weakness if we can't get a rim protecting/athletic big opposite Love.

 

[iamacavalier]

Where's that coming from? I didn't say anything remotely close to that, I'd lay off using personal insults if you can't even correctly interpret someone's post.



That's to be expected, and I said as much in my post.

I'm worried about the very fact he's put forth solid effort so far, yet his physical limitations have kept him as a below-average defender. I've gone over examples from all our previous games before, if you want more proof go back and re-watch the Hawks game from last night. In his 19 minutes Al Horford scored on Love in a variety of ways; a face up jumper, a post up into a right hook, and a catch-and-shoot jumper from 18 feet out when after Love crashed into the paint. Love looked like he was trying on these plays, but it didn't even look like it mattered. That's what worries me.

We need our bigs to be shot blockers because it's impossible to win a title without some semblance of rim protection. Andy is a solid defensive player overall, but our best shot blockers might be our starting wings in Marion/LeBron, and that's a problem.

Your right. I did not mean the max contract reply to you. I took that out of my original post. My bad.

 

[Gimme Some Mo]

Gotta be honest, I don't like what I have seen from Love... even if his shots were falling. I feel like he has to put up 30 and 15 to break even with the awful defense he plays. I swear I have seen the guy put his hand up to contest a shot only 2-3 times the entire season. He is REALLY bad on defense. I expected him to be bad, but it is REALLY bad. It has me very concerned.

I know he makes up for a lot of it with his passing and ability to stretch the floor and open things up for LeBron and Kyrie, but damn, I am just nervous about his defense coming playoff time.

 

[Lee]

ah but this insinuates someone outside of the white race has created the name, making it less white.

face it, its impossible.

you know the last 'the menace"? fackin this guy

I apologize for derailing. I am done.

Challenge accepted.


Kevin "Uncle Cracker" Love
or
Kevin "white Loves cant jump"

Done