David Blatt is a former NBA coach

[NasstyNate]

The play we ran where AV and Love set screens on each others guys along the baseline, with Love leaking to the 3 point line and receiving the pass from AV was beautiful, beautiful basketball. Misdirection and constant movement leading to an open 3. That was a straight up Spurs-like play.

 

[Jack Brickman]

Blatt is amazing, his press conference last night was fantastic. He's a top level coach for sure. Kerr's offense is the only one more efficient than ours in the preseason though. The man is no slouch.

Golden State has the added bonus of basically no roster turnover, though. That counts for a lot.

 

[blommen]

Golden State has the added bonus of basically no roster turnover, though. That counts for a lot.

And we haven't played with Kyrie the past two games and we didn't play LeBron last night either.

 

[LBJVirus]

Golden State has the added bonus of basically no roster turnover, though. That counts for a lot.

Not to mention they also had an amazing offense without Kerr. I mean Mark Jackson was like Mike Brown. All ISO and pick and roll with strong team defense that takes years to fully gel.

 

[Zen]

Yep, Blatt is everything we thought we were getting and much, much more. As a lot of you have said this guy just has that je ne sais quoi where you look at him and just know he belongs. Astounding that he wasn't snagged earlier in his career to me.

I could listen to the guy talk for hours.

 

[FlatulenciaRoar]

The offense looks really good so far but this is preseason. It'll be interesting to see how other teams adjust in the regular season, and how the Cavs counter those adjustments.

 

[Henry Tuttle]

Would've liked to have seen the starters go longer tonight and make an actual attempt to win. We had some momentum there in the second half for a bit and then things kinda just went by the wayside. I understand where the coaching staff is coming from, wanting to preserve players and it's only preseason, but I saw too many bad habits last year that are better off broken sooner than later. They're going to have to figure it out sooner or later, might as well start now.

 

[stick]

Loved Blatt's post-game conference after the Dallas match. You could tell he doesn't like losing, but he still has a good nature and humor about him. I wonder what his post-loss conferences will be like in the regular season/post-season? Even though it would be after a loss... I'm curious to see what he says and how he says it. Hopefully that rarely happens!

http://www.nba.com/cavaliers/postgame-coach-blatt-vs.-dallas-oct.-17.

"Well, I guess we're not going 90 and 0 this year. That's what Griff told me, he was right."

"When coach Carlisle came in he played the old European zone against the old European coach and I didn't do a very good job preparing us for it."

"I think what got us, in all honesty, was the 22 turnovers. We turned the ball over more like the unforced errors in tennis then a real legitimate steal or a great defensive play. We just threw the ball all over the place."

"...You know what people, I don't want to sit here and tell you all these real smart things. We just didn't have it. We came out flat. We were a little tired. Dallas is an excellent team. Dallas came off of three great days of practice, I'm sure. We're on a third game in four nights. We didn't do the things we should have done to take care of the ball, and you know, that's the result. There's no secret. I don't want to sit here and write you a symphony, but the fact of the matter is, we just kinda played poorly. And they took full advantage of it.
-another question-
You mean there's more questions after that? You really want me to say something bad, don't you?"

"I wasn't raving about our 4-0 beginning and I'm not gonna start crying over this one, it's not worth it."

"(On Kyrie's game)
I thought he looked great. I appreciate that question, so I can finish this on a positive note. And I'm really needing that right now, cause I'm a bad loser... Even though I told you this doesn't mean anything."

 

[KingDavidBlatt]

So regarding the zone...
Have no fear, Blatt has some tricks up his sleeves on how to beat the zone. I'm sure, as he said, they just hadn't the time to work on it.
One of his signature plays, for example, is to put a man on the elbow, not the FT line. This collapses the defense in an abnormal way and can allow for a multiple selection of plays, even without the ball actually reaching that elbow.
I'd say that 'going European' vs Blatt can maybe work against his team in the preseason, but as the season advances, it's going to be a bad idea

 

[PriceFan14]

One of the best quotes from Blatt:

-I'm a bad loser

 

[Kizzle]

Blatt tells it like it is man. I said it in the game thread but god help the next team that tries this zone lol

 

[blazenmp]

I just love how he coaches in game.. Even in this one, he was obviously coaching during the game, something we're just so not used to seeing!

 

[cavsfever]

I thought the most interesting thing about his post-Dallas press conference was how he responded to the question about Dion having the most shot attempts on the team (in all of our preaseason games!). His answer really showed the balance he tries to strike as a coach. He basically said (paraphrasing) 'I don't think Dion should be taking the most shots on our team..on the other hand, I don't really care, so long as we're taking good shots and making them'. Since he had also said in response to an earlier question that he thought Dion was missing some shots because they weren't coming in the flow of the team's offense, there's an obvious implication. But his answer to me shows how he doesn't want to ever make it about personalities or about what individual does what, but about playing good basketball on the team level. That perspective really infuses everything he says.

 

[Simmy]

Today's patented 'David Blatt Quote of the Day' goes to:

When asked about advanced statistics: "Honestly, if you look at society, everybody's going through it - in every walk of life. You know, we're all now just inundated with these tremendous amounts of information, you know? And it's not that you can't get the information, it's figuring out what to do with it once you have it. And how to incorporate it in a way that makes what you're doing easier or better or more efficient. So, you know, I don't think we're unlike most of what people in society are going through right now [pause for new question]. That was really philosophical by the way."

 

[dirtywax]

My man-crush continues on David. I watched his post game interview last night and dude hates to lose. In a good way.