Game 37: Cleveland Cavaliers (19-17) @ Golden State Warriors (28-5) Friday, January 5th 10:30 PM EST

BimboColesHair said:

Well damn...and people are still taking shots at Grant after this? Appreciate it, I have no idea how I missed that. That's a game changer on a lot of stuff for me. Makes me wonder if these recent trades are a desperate ploy by Dan, putting Griffin in a desperate situation.

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It was still related to Val's agent playing games with the Cavs. I've heard the stuff about Gilbert preferring TT because he didn't want to risk Val not being available for an indeterminate amount of time. I get that you don't want owners micromanaging on personnel decisions, but I'm also not sure I want a guy here whose representation is actively trying to guide him somewhere else.

And, like I said... if Val has been better than TT in his 3 1/2 NBA seasons, it is marginal at best. He's always been more potential than production. And I have little doubt that the same people bitching about everything and everyone involved with the Cavs tonight would be tossing Val right under that bus if he were here.

JFT said:

Yep...10 pts/11 reb, 0-6 from 3, 5-12 from field for green. Love 17 pts/14 reb, 1-2 from 3, 6-11 from field. Gotta get me some of those green backs.

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Goes to show how misleading stat lines are. No one who watched the game would argue Love had a bigger impact on the game than Green regardless of what the box score reads.

Are we discussing past drafts right now. Fuck this.

BimboColesHair said:

Well damn...and people are still taking shots at Grant after this? Appreciate it, I have no idea how I missed that. That's a game changer on a lot of stuff for me. Makes me wonder if these recent trades are a desperate ploy by Dan, putting Griffin in a desperate situation.

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I'd bet on it.

But they've hit with the talent. Gotta be happy with what Mozilla and JR did out there today. We'll see about Shump.

My last post about this game:

Playing the Warriors really opened my eyes to what exactly the Cavs are missing and how far off they are from achieving the ultimate goal. The chemistry and the effort the Warriors displayed reminds a lot of the days with West, Mo, Lebron, AV, Big Ben, etc. Yes, the roster was not the best in the NBA, but the core players(starters and bench players) played like they had something to loss every night. There was intensity, accountability, and a chip on everyone's shoulder. No,they didnt win a championship, but that team was closer to a championship than the Cavs now are.

Watching the Warriors, Hawks, and Wizards play lately reminds of why I did not want the Cavs to build a Big Three. When teams learn,mature, and fail together as a solid unit it establishes trust and chemistry that can really propel a team. Patience wins rings in the NBA. The Cavs established as such does not breed many of the qualities it requires to achieve and sustain success in the NBA.

Best of luck to the Warriors and kudos to there team. I hope the Cavs can learn from them that effort and unselfishness produces wins.

Randolphkeys said:

I will say this and then I'm done with it... a handful of longtime RCF posters are trying to drop some good stuff in a game thread.

Fellas, you know who you are... valiant effort but the boo birds who post after a loss are never receptive to insight. Not worth the effort, let the cover close on this one.

We weren't seriously going after the win like it was a playoff game. ny new faces and injuries. It seems the coaches played the B squad and conceded the win. Hopefully we see these guys again in the finals.

You won't see a better opponent on their he floor play the Cavs this year. Warriors are straight balling right now.

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I love ya, Keys, but Kyrie played 41 minutes, JR played 42, and Love played 38. If that's playing the B team, I don't want to know what playing the A team is.

I think most reasonable people would have expected the Cavs to lose this going in. I sure as hell did. I was just hoping to see this team compete, play team basketball, and actually look like they give a damn. We're 4 games away from the midpoint of the season, and that hasn't happened. They've regressed. Yes, there have been injuries, but these were issues that were festering before the injuries started to hit.

One would expect to have these problems when the season starts, but we're now a month from the all-star break. It would not surprise me at all if this team was under .500 (or close to it) when we got to that point. We still see Kyrie break off the offense or go rogue on the PnR. We still see Love get thrown the ball on the low block with everyone else just standing in place. We'll see what happens with LeBron back, but he hasn't exactly been conducive to good ball movement this season.

Rimage said:

Are we discussing past drafts right now. Fuck this.

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Sure. They just got their asses handed to them by two guys they could have had instead of Kyrie.

It'll come up every time they play the Warriors.

Tristan vs JV will come up against the Raps.

And when Grant's getting rapped as one of the top 10 worst GM's of all time, the Dion over Drummond whiff will come up.

JFT said:

Yep...10 pts/11 reb, 0-6 from 3, 5-12 from field for green. Love 17 pts/14 reb, 1-2 from 3, 6-11 from field. Gotta get me some of those green backs.

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Completely ignoring the other side of the floor, which Draymond dominates compared to Love.

RedBlackAttack said:

It was still related to Val's agent playing games with the Cavs. I've heard the stuff about Gilbert preferring TT because he didn't want to risk Val not being available for an indeterminate amount of time. I get that you don't want owners micromanaging on personnel decisions, but I'm also not sure I want a guy here whose representation is actively trying to guide him somewhere else.

And, like I said... if Val has been better than TT in his 3 1/2 NBA seasons, it is marginal at best. He's always been more potential than production.

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I mean that post by Max doesn't change my opinion on the Tristan vs Val debate. There was too much smoke about Val and his agent not wanting to come over from Europe if he was drafted by Cleveland for me to think there wasn't something true there. I also agree on the latter part about potential over production, but that's for another place. But the Jack signing and the eventual trade to clear that mistake, the Bynum over Gasol situation, and the Bennett pick not traded essentially being controlled by Dan is pretty bad. Those were the 3 major things that got Grant canned IMO.

Unfortunately, there is not much we can do about past drafts at this point. Whats important though is that we look at teams like the Warriors, Bulls, etc. and realize the value that late first-round, early second-round players can have. Green or Butler might not have been the flashiest guys out of college, but they were smart players that did everything pretty well, and were hard workers. Those are the type of guys that every championship team can use.

With that said, I'm really excited to see what Shump can bring to this team. He is one of the guys that does just about everything well. We need to bring intensity and accept his role and I think we added a great kid.

Czvosec said:

Completely ignoring the other side of the floor, which Draymond dominates compared to Love.

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That happens alot in these parts for whatever reason when discussing Love.

Make a post about him playing no defense (giving up more points than he scores) and you see 10 posts with his awesome box scores.

I feel like people look at this team likes its fantasy basketball where you accumulate big stat guys to win rather than actual basketball where you have to stop the opponent from scoring more points than you do.

Birdy89 said:

That happens alot in these parts for whatever reason when discussing Love.

Make a post about him playing no defense (giving up more points than he scores) and you see 10 posts with his awesome box scores.

I feel like people look at this team likes its fantasy basketball where you accumulate big stat guys to win rather than actual basketball where you have to stop the opponent from scoring more points than you do.

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For the record, I can't believe I agree with this, but at the moment, I do.

Dude, you can't just look at 3 players. The ghost of James Jones was playing big minutes. This isn't the rotation in a playoff game.

I think coaches are trying to acclimate JR Smith as a primary focus, work in Mozgov slowly, and conserve a few bullets for the rest of the West Coast trip. Half of the rotation you will see in March were in suits.

KIisKing said:

Unfortunately, there is not much we can do about past drafts at this point. Whats important though is that we look at teams like the Warriors, Bulls, etc. and realize the value that late first-round, early second-round players can have. Green or Butler might not have been the flashiest guys out of college, but they were smart players that did everything pretty well, and were hard workers. Those are the type of guys that every championship team can use.

With that said, I'm really excited to see what Shump can bring to this team. He is one of the guys that does just about everything well. We need to bring intensity and accept his role and I think we added a great kid.

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Did they though? This was from Zach Lowe's article on the trade:

Shumpert’s ambitions for ball-dominant stardom rankled the Knicks, but he’s exactly the sort of 3-and-D player Cleveland sorely needs

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Lowe generally approved of the trade, but that line had all kinds of warning sirens going off in my head.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/n...valier-new-york-knicks-oklahoma-city-thunder/

Jeff and Campy are speaking the truth on this post game.