Let it all out. The Cavaliers Rant Thread

Could we get Cousins for Love, Smith and Mozgov?

letgocavs said:

Could we get Cousins for Love, Smith and Mozgov?

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I wish

letgocavs said:

Could we get Cousins for Love, Smith and Mozgov?

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And who starts at the 4? TT? Lebron needs a stretch four. Love, minus a few bad games, is having a very good season and continues to improve. And as a huge Cousins fan, what happens if his attitude doesn't fit? Then we end up with a Rondo-trade like the Mavs last year. Finally, our depth after that trade is awful.

Starters: Kyrie, Shump, Lebron, TT, Cousins
Bench: Delly, Mo (terrible at D), RJ (terrible at D), James Jones (terrible at most things), and Andy (who can only play fifteen minutes per night).

If we make a trade for a guy like Cousins, TT needs to be involved. And even then, I'm not sure if I'd do it.

It's like a Russian organized crime syndicate kidnapped a loved one of Timo and is holding them hostage while he shaves points.

I mean, most of the team sucked tonight, but he's been horrible all year.

If he's hurt he's hurt, but his mistakes don't look like those of a hurt guy, they're the mistakes of a 7'1 teenager found in some remote war torn country who just started playing 6 weeks ago at a prep school in New England after being spotted by an AAU scout on a Peace Corps mission kicking a soccer ball. He can't catch or make a layup or run in a straight line.

Even after tonight, the Cavs are on pace to win 59+ games with a team missing 2 of its' best 5 players. Only 2 teams in the league won 59 games last season: Atlanta and Golden State. Hell, only 4 teams won 56 or more.

Do the Cavs need to improve? Of course but expectations were way too high IMO. Injuries have caught up with them in some of their losses. When you don't have 2 of your top 5 guys, an off night or someone struggling (like Moz all season or Love tonight) is just multiplied exponentially. When you're short handed, it's much harder to overcome a poor individual performance because there is simply no one else to play.

This team still has enough talent to win games.

I'mWithDan said:

Even after tonight, the Cavs are on pace to win 59+ games with a team missing 2 of its' best 5 players. Only 2 teams in the league won 59 games last season: Atlanta and Golden State. Hell, only 4 teams won 56 or more.

Do the Cavs need to improve? Of course but expectations were way too high IMO. Injuries have caught up with them in some of their losses. When you don't have 2 of your top 5 guys, an off night or someone struggling (like Moz all season or Love tonight) is just multiplied exponentially. When you're short handed, it's much harder to overcome an off night because there is simply no one else to play.

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What is frustrating me is it looks like a lack of effort some nights. Something is clearly wrong with Moz, but outside of that, all of the other problems should be solved when Kyrie (Mo getting playing time, lacking someone other than LBJ who can create his own shot, TT getting double teamed during rebound opportunities, etc.) and Shump (perimeter D, missing JR's energy off the bench, missing the "defense" lineup of playoffs last year, missing the "five buddies" lineup of last season, etc.) return. If those two return most of the in-game problems (outside of somewhat poor rotations and Moz) will be solved.

But how do we fix the effort problem? Maybe it is moving Delly to the starting lineup until Kyrie returns? I doubt it is another team meeting, but who knows. Until that gets fixed we'll continue to look complacent for large stretches of games.

I'm fucking so disappointed. Man, it was our worst game since the trade from last year. TT looked today like a D-league average player, what a shame of performance he had. Mozgov looking like the shadow of himself. Looks lost from the start of the season, and the most worrying point is that he doesn't showing any positive progress sign. JR looked drunk today, Mo took 9 seconds to pass the half court, Blatt didn't had a good enough feel for this game with his rotations and with the too late time-outs, LBJ had 9 turnovers, RJ looked completely useless defensively as always, JJ didn't took the fucking shot when he was wide open, Love has missed all the layups he took..

But the worst thing today was our defense, WTF it was? how many easy layups the weak Wizards could get? how many easy open looks on the paint? where is the 82mil defense for god sake?

The players and the coaches should be embarrassed by themselves.

This team needs defense. We have the talent on the offensive end, but we only have one big who can play good defense and he's hurting right now. I don't care about metrics, when the game is on the line TT is shite on the defensive end and gets destroyed on the switch. It's sad that outside of a couple of blowout wins, we've looked weak. We say that the Warriors look beatable, but we look like we can get demolished at any time. Can't keep leads either. Fucking christ I'm tired of watching this type of basketball. Our roster without Kyrie and Shump is better than the 2009 team but we're nowhere near as good.

letgocavs said:

This team still has enough talent to win games.

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Sure but people expecting them to pace ahead of 59-23, with Kyrie and Shump out, are just not being realistic.

That would be a +6 win improvement from a season ago, on a team without 2 of their best 5 players from last season. It's crazy to think people are expecting more than that at this point.

I'mWithDan said:

Even after tonight, the Cavs are on pace to win 59+ games with a team missing 2 of its' best 5 players. Only 2 teams in the league won 59 games last season: Atlanta and Golden State. Hell, only 4 teams won 56 or more.

Do the Cavs need to improve? Of course but expectations were way too high IMO. Injuries have caught up with them in some of their losses. When you don't have 2 of your top 5 guys, an off night or someone struggling (like Moz all season or Love tonight) is just multiplied exponentially. When you're short handed, it's much harder to overcome a poor individual performance because there is simply no one else to play.

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Not sure Kyrie Irving really solves many of the issues I see right now. Shumpert might help more, but will it be enough?

Thought this team had everything it needed. Not so sure at the moment.

jking948 said:

What is frustrating me is it looks like a lack of effort some nights. Something is clearly wrong with Moz, but outside of that, all of the other problems should be solved when Kyrie (Mo getting playing time, lacking someone other than LBJ who can create his own shot, TT getting double teamed during rebound opportunities, etc.) and Shump (perimeter D, missing JR's energy off the bench, missing the "defense" lineup of playoffs last year, missing the "five buddies" lineup of last season, etc.) return. If those two return most of the in-game problems (outside of somewhat poor rotations and Moz) will be solved.

But how do we fix the effort problem? Maybe it is moving Delly to the starting lineup until Kyrie returns? I doubt it is another team meeting, but who knows. Until that gets fixed we'll continue to look complacent for large stretches of games.

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I think it's a mix of frustration, confidence and rotations to be honest with you.

Mozgov seems to be the gasoline on that fire. He's being pulled in games really early and it is starting to fuck up the minute distribution as well as time / score / situation in which players come in.

Trying to wring 30+ minutes out of Jefferson and Jones is just too much.....but it's a byproduct of Mozgov being so ineffective and LeBron, Jefferson and Jones having to absorb those minutes in various lineups. Over our last 10, LeBron has logged 38 minutes per game......that's just too much IMO.

I don't know that playing Delly more is the answer because with Moz doing zero on offense, we really need someone on the perimeter that can take on some of that scoring load. Mo has done that but with Moz playing 5 fewer minutes per game, the trickle down effect on the defense has been bad. It has caused TT to have to log more minutes against starting centers and the defense has been largely ineffective for stretches because of it.

The fix is to get a healthy roster back, which may unfortunately take more time. Until then, they just have to grit out wins and do the best they can over this next 10-15 game stretch.

Why cant we try out Sasha Kaun?

6kiss said:

Why cant we try out Sasha Kaun?

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Probably because he's bad.

I'mWithDan said:

I think it's a mix of frustration, confidence and rotations to be honest with you.

Mozgov seems to be the gasoline on that fire. He's being pulled in games really early and it is starting to fuck up the minute distribution as well as time / score / situation in which players come in.

Trying to wring 30+ minutes out of Jefferson and Jones is just too much.....but it's a byproduct of Mozgov being so ineffective and LeBron, Jefferson and Jones having to absorb those minutes in various lineups. Over our last 10, LeBron has logged 38 minutes per game......that's just too much IMO.

I don't know that playing Delly more is the answer because with Moz doing zero on offense, we really need someone on the perimeter that can take on some of that scoring load. Mo has done that but with Moz playing 5 fewer minutes per game, the trickle down effect on the defense has been bad. It has caused TT to have to log more minutes against starting centers and the defense has been largely ineffective for stretches because of it.

The fix is to get a healthy roster back, which may unfortunately take more time. Until then, they just have to grit out wins and do the best they can over this next 10-15 game stretch.

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Interesting. The only part of that I take issue with is the bolded. Right now, Mo and Delly are averaging about the same amount of minutes. What if starting Delly changes that minute load by about "3:00" per night? It provides us an avenue to starting games quicker because of no Mo "layup line". On top of that, I'd posit Mo will have more success as a sixth man.

I do agree with you, though. Rotations are a big part of the problem. Mo is a horrible defender, JR is above average, LBJ is world-class, Love is below average, and Moz, so far, has looked below-average-to-average. With Kyrie and Shumpert returning, that changes massively. Then we have Kyrie (average), Shump (well above average, or even near world class), LBJ, Love, and Moz. The perimeter defense is improved drastically. It even has an effect on the bench, where JR is a far better defender than RJ and James Jones.

Any ideas how to handle the Moz situation?