Cavs vs Maccabi Tel Aviv - Sunday, Oct. 5, 6:00pm (FSO and NBA TV)

[Cavsengland]

I Didn't get to watch the game because I couldn't find a stream. But I've dealt with this for 3 years so meh. I'll be watching the highlights tomorrow on YouTube.

 

[RDriesen]

I really love our depth. Our bench has a little bit of everything and is going to help us in a lot of games this year. When teams are some how able to stay with our starters, we should have an advantage with our bench. It is amazing to think a guy like Dion is our 4th option .

 

[Lee]

Harris will be an important player for us after miller/marion/jones are gone

Jones looks awful outside of his shooting. Harris looked like the more complete player. That said, he is out of the rotation if all healthy, but I can see him getting minutes if any of our wings ahead of him are injured.

 

[Andrew]

It was fun to watch this team versus a decently established opponent. I am going to go outside the norm and talk about rebounds. I could sit here and talk about the points, but we all know this team is stacked on the offensive end so much that its a given they will pretty much outscore everyone.

I know it wasn't against an NBA team but 64 boards? Really? Is anyone else impressed by that number? It's like if someone misses a shot, it's almost a given there will be a second attempt. The rebounds were spread out too amongst the bigs; Love with 11, Thompson with 13 and Andy with 15 and I believe 10 in the 3rd quarter alone.

Coming from James' last team who continously was out rebounded and had to distribute the ball to make up for it, this is a new concept for me. I am quite liking it.

 

[CosmoKramer]

Already noticing the excuses for Waiters

Let your game do the talking

This is a grown man game

Excuses? Where? I didn't even think Dion played poor enough to have to defend. His shot has looked great, he's unselfishly moving the ball, and his defensive effort was great for what's essentially a meaningless game.

 

[Pioneer10]

The team has a ton of talent and it didn't look like Lebron in particular really tried too hard

That being said, I'll play devil's advocate:
Starters appeared tentative on offense. Tons of passing talent and you can see they were trying to figure out when to shoot because unlike last year you pass the ball and you likely are going to get a better shot. Not too concerned about this: too much talent and it's early in the season.

More concerning: Maccabi had good success by putting Kyrie and any non Andy 5 into pick and rolls. Thompson had nice block but he's not someone whose feared by a guy like Pargo and he took it the rack if he had a step on Kyrie. Haywood was just too slow to do much against the pick and roll. I think it's much safer to keep your best pick and roll defender in Andy with Irving and then protect Haywood/Thompson by pairing them with Delly

 

[Cavsfan161]

The D needs work but that was to be expected at this stage. Offense looks great.

 

[MD13]

One of the most encouraging things for me today was how little the ball stuck in any one player's hands. Kyrie and Dion have received a lot of criticism in the past for holding onto the ball and dribbling possessions to death, but here guys were actually hesitant to take their man off the dribble when they had the chance to. Once they watch some tape and see how wide open the paint is, we'll probably see guys start to get more aggressive taking it to the rack.

 

[Benedict_Boozer]

Rebounding was fantastic, ball movement for the most part as well was great. Offensively the potential is just great.

But I think in both the scrimmage and this Maccabi game, would have been nice to see Kevin Love more involved in the offensive flow. He was very effective in the post-up looks he got, either scoring or drawing fouls. To his credit the guy is just a machine on the glass, but like to see him with the ball a bit more on the block.

Defensively I concur with Pioneer - the pick and roll D left alot to be desired especially early in the game when Maccabi was still putting up a fight. Also seemed like we were giving up alot of dribble penetration. I wouldn't overreact to it given how early in preseason we are and given the fact Lebron was clearly coasting on defense big time in terms of his help-D.

 

[Benedict_Boozer]

One other quick comment was Marion - I thought he quietly looked solid out there. Great on the boards, very active on D, he will be a nice piece in the rotation.

 

[Cavsfan161]

Loves that block from Marion. Loved that energy.

 

[Mr. Blonde]

Already noticing the excuses for Waiters


Let your game do the talking



This is a grown man game

Lol and your excuses. When waiters went on his his run you called maccabi a hs level team.

 

[#21]

Watching the game now. New floor looks sick.

 

[stowfan]

Here's the box score from the game.
http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=400583899

 

[Ruken]

The team has a ton of talent and it didn't look like Lebron in particular really tried too hard

That being said, I'll play devil's advocate:
Starters appeared tentative on offense. Tons of passing talent and you can see they were trying to figure out when to shoot because unlike last year you pass the ball and you likely are going to get a better shot. Not too concerned about this: too much talent and it's early in the season.

More concerning: Maccabi had good success by putting Kyrie and any non Andy 5 into pick and rolls. Thompson had nice block but he's not someone whose feared by a guy like Pargo and he took it the rack if he had a step on Kyrie. Haywood was just too slow to do much against the pick and roll. I think it's much safer to keep your best pick and roll defender in Andy with Irving and then protect Haywood/Thompson by pairing them with Delly

It'll be interesting to see how much Haywood's footspeed improves the further removed from that injury he is