Cleveland Cavaliers Blog

  Replacing NBA production with G-Leaguers is never going to be smooth, you absolutely have to give up something in the process. So what do these new guys bring and what are they lacking? Luke Kornet:   Actual NBA skill: Shot blocking.  Jarrett Allen blocks 2.5 shots per 100 for his career against 2.8 fouls.  Luke Kornet has blocked 2.8 against 3.4 in his 2,000 NBA minutes.  As a gangly 7 footer he does a decent job of maintaining position and contesting without fouling.   Limiting factor keeping him out of the NBA:  Rebounding.  His 15% Dreb% is woefully inadequate for a 7 ft center in the NBA, well behind (average positional rebounder) Lauri Markkanen’s 22%, and Lauri has spent most of his career at the 4, not the 5.  This extends to his time in the G-League where he only managed a 19% Dreb rate.   Potential NBA skill:  Stretch Big.  On 400+ 3pt attempts he is shooting a hair under 33% in the NBA.  This is...

  Three weeks ago I wouldn’t have bothered with a Rockets preview, it would have been too short ‘Rockets stink, if the Cavs show up they win’.  Winners of 8 out of 10 since then, including against Brooklyn, Chicago and Charlotte they deserve more attention than that.  The big shift that everyone and their mother has noted is that the wins started on day one without Jalen Green and have continued to an extent (3-2) without KPJ.  So is Jalen Green that bad?  Has he been holding back an otherwise talented squad?   Sort off.  The Rocket’s +/- skyrockets to +7.8 in 1400 possessions without Jalen Green on the court and is still a solid +3.9 per 100 over almost 1000 possessions without either Green or Porter, but there is a ton of unsustain in this group.  First the games which Green has missed dominate these mins and those games include matchups against OKC (2x), Orlando and NOP, and 7 of the 10 have been at home, and they traveled twice (to OKC an...

  Looking back:  After the previous win over Miami I wrote this ‘The 8- man rotation of Darius, Rubio, Okoro, Cedi, Lauri, Love, Mobley and Allen has played 500 possessions together and is +13.3 in that stretch (all stats here per Cleaningtheglass.com).’ That rotation is now almost 1000 possessions together and is at +13.  Also ‘The opposition is going to be fairly weak for these possessions because of how injuries have fallen but that is a dominant number, and their 9 man rotations with Windler, Stevens or Wade are +14.8,  +11.7, +6.2, in 592, 592 and 821 possessions respectively’ Those 9 man rotations are +13.8 (1090, Windler), +12.7 (1140, Stevens), +8.3 (1330, Wade).  Or any of those +8.9 (1690).  So over increasingly large samples we have results that are screaming top 4 seed as long as the Cavs aren’t missing 2 or more crucial rotation pieces, and top 2 seed if they are only missing Sexton.  Functionally the only thing that the Cavs are missing t...

Note: The numbers here were from before the SAC game, but they didn't shift in any meaningful way. I have a rough draft of a post about how the Cavs should approach the future.  I put some thoughts down more than a month ago and it is currently entirely wrong and won’t be relevant unless they start struggling at least a little.   The Cavs are off the development curve right now.  Their strength of schedule adjusted +/- is the best in the East at 4.41.  Part of being at the top of the East right now is the general struggles (including missed time) for Milwaukee, Philadelphia and Brooklyn, but a net rating of +4.4 would give an expected win total for a full season of over 50, in the 51-53 range.  That on its own should be enough to start some internal discussions of ‘can we make a big move, what would it look like, what would it cost?’.  Where the rubber really meets the road is their 8 man* rotation that they have been running.  For some context ...

  The Cavs are what the Timberwolves hoped to be, a talented but young core being supplemented with a veteran or two who could grow into a perennial playoff team.  Karl-Anthony Towns turned 26 years old last month and is the oldest player in their top 7 in terms of minutes played, and within that group they have three players who have not yet hit their 23rd birthday.  If they could turn this group of talent into a functional team they would have a long stretch to figure out how to turn that team into a contender.  This is not that team. For every good thing this group does there is something they do terribly on the other end.  3rd in offensive rebound rate for the season and this understates how good they have been since Vanderbilt’s role increased.  With KAT and JV on the court their oreb% is in the 100th percentile, the absolute top of the NBA with a 38.2% rate.  Ok, now I will give you one guess as to which team is dead last in the NBA at defensive ...

  Lamar Stevens has crept into the fringes of the Cavs regular rotation since Dean Wade’s injury, so let’s take a deeper look at him. Lamar is a positionless player, but not the good kind of positionless like Lebron who can play any position, but the bad kind of positionless player where you aren’t sure what to do with them.  A lot of this stems from his wingspan, a 6’9 span is nothing to sneeze at for a 6’6 player (6’5.75 at the combine without shoes) but it is on the short side, but his build and game play are more reminiscent of power forwards in the current NBA.  This puts him at a significant disadvantage at that position.  The shorter players in the league who play PF, PJ Tucker, PJ Washington etc, tend to have wingspans of at least 6’11, with Demar Derozen who is an anomaly and playing PF as a stylistic, not defensive, choice, is the only other one who comes in below 6’10 that I could find.  Lauri Markkanen’s 6’11 wingspan limits him as a PF as well....

  The #1 offense is coming to town, bringing with it the #10 defense and the 2nd best net rating at +9.7 so far this year to smash up against the rocks of the Cavs #3 overall defense, 21st overall offense and 8th overall net rating of +2.8.  9.7 is >> 2.8 so pretty much the Jazz have this thing covered and only a cold shooting night can give the Cavs a hope at winning.   Well no, not really.  The Cavs are on their 3rd real iteration of a team this season while the Jazz have played one way all year.  Injuries highlight the difference, through 22 games the Jazz have 5 rotation players who have yet to miss a contest while the Cavs have one, the Jazz have 8 rotation pieces that have missed two or fewer games and the Cavs have two.  In fact the Cavs only have 4 players who have in total missed fewer games than the top 8 for the Jazz have missed combined (5!).  Utah has also been feasting on a cake schedule.  I didn’t say cupcake schedule, th...

  Three in a row, what do we know?  Not a lot from any individual game, Orlando is a bottom feeder, Dallas has been up and down all year and Miami was missing their top two, and the Cavs had some really significant 3pt shooting variance go their way.  However, even regressing the 3pt shooting with some guesses at oreb rates, the Cavs still come out ahead by ~6.2 pp/100, and I could easily justify nudging that up a bit higher for the Cavs having better 3pt shooters than their opposition over that stretch.  So they have looked good against bad opponents which is a good sign.  Other good signs include The 8- man rotation of Darius, Rubio, Okoro, Cedi, Lauri, Love, Mobley and Allen has played 500 possessions together and is +13.3 in that stretch (all stats here per Cleaningtheglass.com).  The opposition is going to be fairly weak for these possessions because of how injuries have fallen but that is a dominant number, and their 9 man rotations with Windler, Stev...