Kyrie Irving

shoes22 said:

He was on Reghi's show...as a fan.

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A fan of Reghi? Triple dumbass?

Canadian doctors... You get what you pay for...

Why the hell is Kyrie practicing and working out? You would think they would want Kyrie off his legs much as possible... Just keep him off his legs for a week or so and then let him start getting shots up again and conditioning...

They know what's going on in the knee and how severe it is. If it was a severe case, Dr. Andrews would've ordered a second MRI on Kyrie's knee before leaving Florida. He didn't.

Part of the problem before now was apparently Kyrie's sprained foot. It was hampering his knee's ability to recover but that allegedly has healed now and so Andrews gave him a new treatment plan.

It's not out of the question for Kyrie to be close to 100% by the time the NBA finals begin and we get past Atlanta without him.

Just suit Kyrie up, have him on the bench. If it looks like we need him, play him, if not, sit him out.

Now that Korver is out, I give Atlanta no chance winning in Cleveland. I know Korver is a role player, but everything on Atlanta is actually predicated off him.

He spaces the floor, he runs in transition to get open 3s. He's the guy everyone fears, and defensive schemes are soley centered around. Korver is just a spot up shooter, but a devastating one that opens up the entire floor for everyone else.

Without him, Atlanta is toast. They will be even easier to defend.

I am not sure Atlanta can even score 90 points in either one of these games coming up.

Kyrie's offense won't be needed likely.

Rob said:

Well yeah, Kyrie has been on one leg for most of the playoffs going against the opponent's starters.

How much he plays/when he plays should be determined by how healthy he is. If he's near 100% for The Finals, he'll certainly be back to his normal role of starting and playing big minutes...as he should.

If he's hobbling around like he was in Game 1, he shouldn't be playing at all. As you mentioned, our defense with Delly has been too good to warrant Kyrie with one leg playing over him.

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There might not be a perfect solution since we'll be a heavy, heavy underdog either way to the GSW should we and they meet in the finals. It's going to be an uphill climb no matter which way we go. But Kyrie's defensive struggles have been apparent even before the playoffs, just not to this extent. 168 minutes is nothing to sneeze at; in those 168 minutes without Kyrie, this is an all-time type of defense; with him, we are a bottom ten of 2015 defense. During the regular season, after the Jan. 15 trades, we did well with almost all lineups, and our starting lineup was a +20 per 100 possessions historic one, but our two best lineups, two of the best in the NBA, included Delly and not Kyrie. Take a look at these lineups, identical with Kyrie and Delly swapped:

Kyrie/Shump/James/Love/Moz 100 DRtg,
Delly/Shump/James/Love/Moz 78.4 DRtg

Kyrie/Shump/JR/James/Moz 113 DRtg
Delly/Shump/JR/James/Moz 87 DRtg

Now, Kyrie is still the starter in just about everyone's eyes, but a less than 100% Kyrie...will he be as effective as the players in our defensive lineups?

BEST CASE SCENARIO: Kyrie is completely healthy and can score super efficiently, make plays, and play decent defense. There was a one month period right after our trades in which Kyrie was a plus defender for the first time in his career. A plus defender with elite offense at the PG position leads to wins as really it's only Paul and Curry who can say they are both. Wall and Lowry are also very good defenders who are also impact offensive players but not elite on offense.

Even when healthy, Kyrie was often a defensive liability even though he improved so much this year on that end. One thing that's especially worrisome is his closeout defense on three-point shots.

During the regular season, opponents he defended at the three point line shot 34.9% against all defenders. Against Kyrie, they shot 37.6%.

Lebron: 32.5% allowed, 1.8% lower than against all other defenders, 11.3% lower in the playoffs

Shump: 27.8% allowed, 6.8% lower, 9.6% lower in the playoffs.

JR: 32.6% allowed, 3.7% lower, 12.3% lower in the playoffs

Delly: 29.5% allowed, 3.4 % lower, 1.8% higher in the playoffs

Kyrie was our worst defender at the three-point line among our regular rotational players.

Our elite defense against the three point shot has propelled ur defense. If you don't close out on threes against the Warriors, you will get murdered, watch them dance all over the place on every play as if they won the Super Bowl, and stare at Curry chew on that goddamn mouthpiece

Now, will he be completely healthy in these playoffs? I don't know and at this point, it seems doubtful.

So, the question to me becomes this: which is more replicable--Kyrie shooting really efficiently and creating offense against an elite defense while playing decent enough defense against an elite offense while probably not 100% -OR- Delly and others continuing to play defense at an elite level (especially at the three point line) against an elite offense while knocking down open shots as their offense and then bring Kyrie off the bench for offensive punch against a player that is NOT Curry? Both seem difficult enough to get to 4 wins against the GSW, but the latter does seem more replicable to me since a lot of it is based on effort and energy (things more replicable from game to game) and not on individual offfensive talent which seems more prone to greater variance from game to game.

My internal struggle is very real. Two very opposite schools of thought on this one.

The rational part of me wants to rest Irving and move forward hoping he bounces back for the Finals.

The shell shocked Cleveland fan in me wants to do everything we can to not fuck this series up, play him, ensure we advance, and say fuck it. Roll with the punches.

I really don't know.

^^^

Good post, right now the Cavs ironically are better without Kyrie, well the Kyrie we've seen anyways thus far.

I am not saying Delly overall makes us better than Kyrie. Look, unless Kyrie has a miraculous turn of events, he probably is not going to be healthy at 100 percent for these next two games. Let's say he's 60% which is good, but still limits his movements.

The only chance, only one at all for Atlanta to have any hope is Jeff Teague. If he can dominate offensively, Atlanta isn't completely out of it(I still don't think they're winning the series if that happens, but they could extend it, which wouldn't be ideal at all for us).

Kyrie has trouble guarding him when healthy, but like this? He got murdered against him in game one. There's no doubt Kyrie is better offensively than Delly, even when injured.

Is it worth having Kyrie play, and giving us say 15 points, when he's likely to give up 25-30 points against Teague? I don't think it is.

I can live with Delly just scoring say 6-8 points, if he's keeping Teague at 15 points though.

Atlanta is likely going to go with Dennis Schroeder in place of Korver, that's a lot of speed in the back court. Our current lineup works very well against Atlanta's, but if Kyrie plays, those two are going at him every time, and our suddenly elite defense becomes very vulnerable again.

Playing him to me doesn't make any sense right now. I mean, he should dress up, if you play him, just use him as a reserve. If things look ugly, then that's different, play him.

Right now this lineup we have is red hot, why mess up a good thing, until otherwise?

Kyrie needs to be protected from himself. He is a very young guy and he really wants to play. David Blatt needs to take control here and force him to sit and Blatt can be the bad guy in this scenario. Kyrie can be mad about it, but oh well. We have very little chance of beating Golden State if Kyrie isn't REALLY close to 100%. As mediocre as Delly is offensively, we seem to be a better team when Delly is on the floor atm. If that's not enough evidence to rest Kyrie in a series we have all but wrapped up, I don't what is.

Please be 100% by the time a potential Finals series rolls around, Kyrie. Though I guess we have to worry about finishing off the Hawks first.

They showed Kyrie shooting jumpers in practice with a knee brace on during the pregame show tonight. I would assume the knee brace came from Dr Andrews. Is it reasonable to think the knee brace could allow him to play while protecting him from tweaking his knee? The repeated tweaking has been the main problem.

The fact that several numbers guy posters show that kyrie us a heavy liability and is only getting less healthy while playing, we own atl, and gs is next and people still can't make the right call is hilarious

Binkster said:

My internal struggle is very real. Two very opposite schools of thought on this one.

The rational part of me wants to rest Irving and move forward hoping he bounces back for the Finals.

The shell shocked Cleveland fan in me wants to do everything we can to not fuck this series up, play him, ensure we advance, and say fuck it. Roll with the punches.

I really don't know.

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Also, I see all the numbers.. I just can't wrap my brain around the Cavs being better without kyrie even when healthy..

Someone help out

The Cavs can play differently depending on Kyrie. It seems pretty damn simple to me. We can win with or without him. Our flexibility to win multiple different ways means it truly does not matter. I hope we rest Kyrie until the finals. I feel we need all the guys for the finals. Why the hell is it better to have one less player as some in here are saying? It's always best to have one more player available, especially if that player is an all star. Have some of you lost your friggin minds?

A point guard is a very deep position right now, so that being the case, the main scorers and facilitators of most teams are the point guards. So if Kyrie averages 20 points a game but gives up 25 points to the opposite point guard (especially if it's a elite point guard) it would be better to play Delly who will score 10 points but will give up only 10 points. I think that's the logic.