Vmart wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Think about the fire power the Cavs have-- they will take GS this year and it will be something like 4-1. They have their own dream team and its balanced offense and defense.

Good to have you back man. It’s a long season and shyt happens. Gotta play it out honestly I think some of the players break down happen. Including LeBron he has a lot of mileage. I don’t expect Wade to make it to the finals.

I gotcha--but think about this--they get to add Isaiah Thomas to this This is a rough team--physical athletic powerful and pretty good chemistry.

Would you ever think a team could have I Thomas Lebron Wade Love Rose with first rate role players all over the place? They will be scary.

Also I think in the future--I think the Knicks should steer clear of players with thin body types and stick with more physical builds. Yes Durant etc.. but these Cavs are imposing physically.

The one differentiator is that 3 point line which the Warriors rule the league at

TripleThreat wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:Think about the fire power the Cavs have-- they will take GS this year and it will be something like 4-1. They have their own dream team and its balanced offense and defense.

It's an aging team with "names" in a gutted East.

LeIdiot aka LeGM is going to do his typical "LeCoast" through the first half. Once he clears his PEDS tests, he'll juice up, and try to push hard into the 2nd half to get the marketing/ratings/buzz into the playoffs. A veteran team can carry the first half for him.

An older team is more prone to injuries and needs a deeper rotation to shade minutes/usage.

This is an ugly defensive team. The benefit of "name" players is they will get more calls in their favor. That Nike spends gobs of money everywhere around the NBA means the Cavs will get a ton of ref calls in their favor.

This is a "contender" relative to the East, but not to the West. To the West, this team is one Nike lifetime contract away from being geriatric cannon fodder.

Briggs, let me welcome you back by saying you are wrong. Again.

I'll give you credit for this much, always, I know you love this team. All the way to the f**king bone. That's way more than some of the other mouthbreathers here.

But its good to have things back to normal. You say something that's clearly not accurate about the NBA, then I tell you you are wrong exhaustively.

I dont know man--this team is DEEEEP. Any given night 2-3 of these guys will go off when the others dont and LBJ always gets 24-8-8. So the offense will be there the rebounding will be there--and defense is good enough. Theyll be able to rotate and keep guys fresh all year. Maybe trade deadline--they may be a team that might get interested in Kyle Oquinn.

BigDaddyG wrote:Cleveland still looks soft inside and their is crap. I don't see this team overtaking GSW.

Some of the lineups Lue put out there were clumsy....I would use Rose, Wade and Lebron together in small doses...When that unit was on the floor, last years Cavs spread-offense was MIA. Wade or Rose would catch the ball in the corner and instead of a shooting the 3 as Irving would, or JR or even Korver; Wade is pump faking and driving into traffic.

Lue has to mix and match and find the right balance between shooters, defenders and drivers...

Uptown wrote:

BigDaddyG wrote:Cleveland still looks soft inside and their is crap. I don't see this team overtaking GSW.

Some of the lineups Lue put out there were clumsy....I would use Rose, Wade and Lebron together in small doses...When that unit was on the floor, last years Cavs spread-offense was MIA. Wade or Rose would catch the ball in the corner and instead of a shooting the 3 as Irving would, or JR or even Korver; Wade is pump faking and driving into traffic.

Lue has to mix and match and find the right balance between shooters, defenders and drivers...

It will take a bit of time to get the whole chemistry thing down. But this is a deep team with a lot of weapons and thats not including I Thomas.

Boston is going to be ok.

TripleThreat wrote:

BRIGGS wrote:I dont know man--this team is DEEEEP. Any given night 2-3 of these guys will go off when the others dont and LBJ always gets 24-8-8. So the offense will be there the rebounding will be there--and defense is good enough. Theyll be able to rotate and keep guys fresh all year. Maybe trade deadline--they may be a team that might get interested in Kyle Oquinn.

The team has a lot of experience. Granted.

The base problem comes down to three core things

1) They can't consistently defend the rim. That's just not going to cut it deep in the playoffs

2) Jae Crowder is going to get driven into the ground being the primary wing defender. It's unrealistic to put that much defensive burden on one player. If he's running with Wade, Rose and Love, ( or IT2) it's just not enough. The Cavs can't neutralize Thompson, Durant, Green and Curry, and if Nick Young gets going, and gets daylight, there just isn't enough wing defense ( Shumper and JR Smith don't offer enough balance, Korver, Calderon, Rose and Wade are just putrid defensively)

3) Nothing they have actually matches up with the Warriors. At all. Love and Thompson have shown that the Warriors will literally crush them in small unit matchups. Can they batter a weakened and gutted East? Yes, but the Warriors SECOND UNIT ( Iggy, Livingston, Bell, McCaw, Young, Casspi, McGee) would be a playoff team in the East as starters.

O'Quinn is not a starter. They need a starter. Nothing in his makeup indicates he can handle starter usage and minutes and production. He's a nice bench player and he's solid and hard working for his role, but he's not going to push the Cavs over the top. They need "position-less" wings who can defend.

It's got a lot of names, but I'd be leery how well it all fits together. It's an old team, with injury history, and the floor spacing is going to be suspect. LBJ needs shooters around him offensively and Rose and Wade and Thompson don't help him there.

LBJ is not the defender he used to be. While that's still a very good defender compared to everyone else, he's not the same defender he was in previous years. They need more PJ Tuckers and Luc Mbah a Moutes and Tony Allens than they needed Wades and Korvers and Roses.

The Cavs are much deeper in Depth n experience than u are mentioning for a 82 game season, plus no telling who the Cavs may pick up before the trading deadline.

This is the first time in NBA history a small-ball perimeter shooting team lead the league in wins plus win a championship game .. taking the hand checking out of the game does give perimeter shooters more room, that's why its hard to say if the 1990's GSW Big-3 TMC (plus rookie Sprewell) were/are better than today GSW who have a 4 position star player Green on the court for over 30 minute per game.

The Knicks would have had 10 or more wins if O'Quinn were their Starter n Finisher PF the past two seasons.
Lopez n Quinn or Noah n Quinn should have been the Knicks tandem frontcourt big men starter lineup.
Example .. the only way a team could win consistently having PF-Love or PF-TT at the center are to have a 5 position Super-Star Lebron James on the court for over 30 minute per game. Without Lebron or Green the Cavs n GSW are a first round playoff team.

Swishfm3 wrote:I dont know who watched the Bos/Cle game but Brown and Tatum looked GREAT!

Boston is going to be ok.

With Tatum and Brown--its almost like they never needed Hayward--they also have Marcus Morris.
What Boston needs is Avery Bradley back and some size.

TripleThreat wrote:

Uptown wrote:Some of the lineups Lue put out there were clumsy....

Let's look at "Le-GM's" Greatest Hits

- Trading Andrew Wiggins ( cost controlled wing) for Kevin Love, then immediately give Love a massive extension then immediately try to trade Love over and over again, showing open resentment for being exactly the player he's always been, and not the player the Cavs need. They needed a guy who could actually defend the rim and play some defense, instead they got yet another powerforward in a league where PFs have the lowest positional value in the game

- Dumping Dion Waiters and others for nothing, to clear cap room for giving LBJ the max. Wasteful use of assets. Not saying Waiters was going to be elite or massive trade bait, but short sighted long term.

- Giving Anderson Varaejo a buddy buddy contract despite being at the end of his career

- Signing Mike Miller, a LBJ buddy, AGAIN

- Paying two first round picks for Mozgov, while helpful short term, cost the Cavs a lot of future flexibility

- Paying Tristan Thompson an unreal amount of money to be an "energy guy" who can't work the low post, can't defend the rim, and can't space the floor with the three ball. But he's a Rich Paul client, so Klutch Sports could get their 10 percent, the Cavs got a player who choked out their cap and gave them yet another overpaid power forward

- Paying two 2nd rounders to dump Richard Jefferson.

- Signing non traction guys like Jeff Green, Jose Calderon, Wade, Rose etc, guys who have more name than useful role for an actual team

- Giving JR Smith and Korver contracts because the Cavs backed themselves into a corner by being cap and asset locked

This team would be so much different if Wiggins was not traded, Love never showed up, Thompson was let walk and assets were used patiently and diligently with LBJ taking a paycut in the process. ( He has a lifetime Nike contract, was X million worth losing over and over again in the Finals when he can make money hand over fist everywhere else?)

Le-GM runs down every roster he touches into the ground. This is the SECOND TIME in Cleveland he's run the roster into the ground. He did his best to drive Miami into hell as well.

Ever notice it's everyone elses fault and not LBJ's for running these teams into the ground?

Real use of his "power" would have been LBJ walking back into Cleveland on a pay cut, then telling Gilbert, offer Morey more money than God, let him run the team and do whatever he wants. LBJ would be sitting on multiple rings now on top of his Miami rings instead of having one gifted to him by Nike.

You can't ask Lue to make steak out of hot dogs. But that's what he's being asked to do. Then again, Lue only has the job in the first place because LBJ is uncoachable. He needs a coach who will let him do what he wants. At one point, Spolestra had to make a deal with him, do what I want defensively and you and Wade can do whatever you want on offense on your own. This compromise is part of why Miami lost to both Dallas and the Spurs.

Unless Nike and the refs work overtime on this, there is no legit way this Cavs unit will ever beat the Warriors in the Finals.

Congratulations! This is one of the dumbest basketball related posts of all time. Hate makes people stupid. It all makes sense now.

BRIGGS wrote:Not going to work with A Davis and Cousins--no way no how.

Miluakee would be a good trade partner IMO with pieces that could work for both teams.

A combo of Monroe, Parker or Middleton & Maker or Wilson. Cousins is a better fit next to Freak than Davis.