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Speaker 1: welcome to hops tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Wednesday, everybody.
Speaker 1: All of you guys are having a great week. Well.
Speaker 1: The Cleveland Cavaliers have been the biggest surprise of this
Speaker 1: NBA season so far, can continuing their undefeated streak with
Speaker 1: a win in Chicago. Very fascinating game. Found themselves down
Speaker 1: in the third quarter, but an all bench run without
Speaker 1: a center with a zone look brings them back into
Speaker 1: the game, and then the starters come in and finish
Speaker 1: off the Bulls and keep the undefeated streak alive. I
Speaker 1: can think of nobody better to do a deep dive
Speaker 1: on the Cleveland Cavaliers. I'll admit I'm just a little
Speaker 1: bit of a skeptic still, and I need Carter to
Speaker 1: help me understand this team on a deeper level. Help
Speaker 1: you guys understand this team on a deeper level and
Speaker 1: explain to us how they are kicking everybody's ass.
Speaker 2: First of all, Carter, how are you, man?
Speaker 3: I'm doing good. You know, obviously this is I was
Speaker 3: just telling your producer right before we started that we've
Speaker 3: officially hit the part of the Cavs season where my normy,
Speaker 3: non basketball obsessive friends are starting to text me and
Speaker 3: we're like, dude, you seeing this like it's been you know, obviously.
Speaker 3: You know, only eight teams in NBA history have started
Speaker 3: twelve and zero. They have a very very good chance
Speaker 3: with their upcoming schedule with a couple of rest advantage games,
Speaker 3: They're only rest advantage games of the first half of
Speaker 3: the season are happening this week to maybe extend that
Speaker 3: up to thirteen fourteen fifteen, going into a matchup in
Speaker 3: Boston that will be on national TV. So man, it's
Speaker 3: the good times have been rolling. That's for damn sure.
Speaker 1: How is it like cautious optimism or is it like
Speaker 1: reckless optimism?
Speaker 3: It's full more just celebration and fun. You know, I think,
Speaker 3: you know, these last two, I think it's actually moving
Speaker 3: into I think even maybe for the team, into like
Speaker 3: the weight of the streak definitely is starting to get
Speaker 3: real and like now, you know, you start seven and
Speaker 3: zero and you're like maybe a little up against it.
Speaker 3: In your eighth game you go whatever, you know, but
Speaker 3: now it's like, we got to beat the Nets, man,
Speaker 3: So it's actually I feel like splipping almost more to stress,
Speaker 3: you know, Dari know, Darius Garland drops an F bomb
Speaker 3: post game, like, man, that was a big effing win
Speaker 3: against the Nets, because it's like, I think the guys
Speaker 3: don't want to lose the streak either, you know, they're
Speaker 3: having so much fun. So I think it's actually gone
Speaker 3: from like like you know, cautious fun to unbridled celebration
Speaker 3: to like almost moving towards angst because you just want
Speaker 3: to keep it going. But but no, it's been I
Speaker 3: mean talk about a ten out of ten start of
Speaker 3: the year.
Speaker 1: Well, I I the one time I personally rooted for
Speaker 1: a team that was on a long win streak was
Speaker 1: the twenty thirteen Miami Heat. And it's funny, I literally
Speaker 1: was thinking about that this morning when I was watching
Speaker 1: the game. Where it's like you find out pretty quickly
Speaker 1: when you're on that kind of winning streak that like
Speaker 1: everyone's a little feisty, and you're getting everyone's best bet
Speaker 1: because they want to be their best shot, because they're
Speaker 1: the team that wants to knock you off. And like
Speaker 1: the NBA right now is in just even a more
Speaker 1: substantial tougher place than it was back in twenty thirteen.
Speaker 1: Like here's the thing, Like even in the Eastern Conference,
Speaker 1: there are they're they the middle tier, the bottom tier
Speaker 1: of the East is certainly not as strong as the West,
Speaker 1: but there are still feisty teams in there.
Speaker 2: Chicago's feisty. Brooklyn is feisty.
Speaker 1: Brooklyn has got a lot of athleticism, They got a
Speaker 1: lot of guys that can create their own shots. And
Speaker 1: so it's like even on a night in a night
Speaker 1: out basis, it's just tougher and like you could feel
Speaker 1: that pressure last night. But one of the things that
Speaker 1: I that I think has stood out to me the
Speaker 1: most about this team, and I noticed it last night
Speaker 1: when you just saw the energy that was coming off
Speaker 1: of the bench, when Ty Jerome and George's Kniang and
Speaker 1: Dean Wade and Karis Lavert and was a Merrill was
Speaker 1: the fifth and that guy that lineup that went on
Speaker 1: that run. There's an energy. There's this thing that happens
Speaker 1: when a team really starts to rack up wins where
Speaker 1: you can tell they get addicted to the feeling and
Speaker 1: then it almost permeates throughout the whole roster with this
Speaker 1: like unbelievable commitment to winning basketball because everyone's addicted to it,
Speaker 1: and like that is when you really start to get
Speaker 1: into that special territory. So, like, here's the thing I
Speaker 1: think the biggest story of this team. Obviously, there's so
Speaker 1: much more going on. There's a lot of different guys
Speaker 1: that are playing better than they did last year. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of like different dynamics at play. But to me,
Speaker 1: the story of this team is Kenny Atkinson optimizing the
Speaker 1: roster and getting another level of buying down the roster
Speaker 1: in terms of just the attention to detail in a
Speaker 1: possession by possession basis. So tell us about what the
Speaker 1: experience has been going from JB. Bickerstaff to Kenny Atkinson.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, I got a chance to have like
Speaker 3: a twenty to thirty minute sit down with with Kenny
Speaker 3: Atkinson at the start of the season, one on one, right,
Speaker 3: you know, at the end of camp, and you know,
Speaker 3: I was just so impressed by the guy. He was
Speaker 3: really you could tell that he had the right attitude,
Speaker 3: you know, in all of his kind of preseason availabilities.
Speaker 3: The guy spent so much time talking about all the
Speaker 3: stuff he'd learned from Steve Kerr, from Tylu and working
Speaker 3: on those staffs, and like, you know, I even said
Speaker 3: to him, was like, Kenny, like you're you're not like
Speaker 3: a new coach. Like normally, when when a coach is
Speaker 3: kind of moving into a new job, you know, gets
Speaker 3: a head coaching gig and they're talking about all their
Speaker 3: all their influences, all the people they've you know, been
Speaker 3: stealing ideas and learning from. It's normally like the kind
Speaker 3: of the thunder Keen that the new kid on the
Speaker 3: block coming in, Like, dude, you've been in the league
Speaker 3: like twenty twenty plus years at this point, Like what
Speaker 3: about like, you know, this kind of learning mentality has
Speaker 3: like why has that taken root? And like he just
Speaker 3: clearly has kind of he got fired in Brooklyn, you know,
Speaker 3: obviously a traumatic experience team and said like it was like,
Speaker 3: you know, I had like a bit of a y me,
Speaker 3: you know why I get Yeah, yeah, I mean I
Speaker 3: would certainly argue it was unfair, But instead of going
Speaker 3: into full victim mentality, he's like, what do I need
Speaker 3: to get better at as a as a coach and
Speaker 3: as a manager of personalities? And you know, going to
Speaker 3: Tyler and Steve Kerr, Like I cannot imagine two more
Speaker 3: different coaches on that spectrum, but two elite coaches in that,
Speaker 3: you know, in that in that various specific capacity, and
Speaker 3: like it just kind of feels like he came back
Speaker 3: a better coach than he was in Brooklyn. And I
Speaker 3: already thought he was a pretty darn good coach in Brooklyn,
Speaker 3: you know. And in terms of the ways he's impacting
Speaker 3: the team on the floor, they're running, man, they are
Speaker 3: second in transition points per possession and seventh and transition frequency.
Speaker 3: This is a team that we have been begging to
Speaker 3: kind of speed up over the last couple of years,
Speaker 3: you know, playing these two bigs. You know, this was
Speaker 3: a team that over the past couple of years have
Speaker 3: really let perfect be the enemy of good offensively. You
Speaker 3: know a lot of possessions where it's just swing, swing,
Speaker 3: and then they get a pretty good advantage and then
Speaker 3: they drive and kick again, and then and all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, there's three seconds left on the shot clock,
Speaker 3: and every now and again you'll still see that slip through.
Speaker 3: But this is just a much more decisive offense. Like, yeah,
Speaker 3: they're running in transition, but they're also just getting shots
Speaker 3: up faster in the half they're getting they are you know,
Speaker 3: a lot more possessions where the SHOT's going up at
Speaker 3: thirteen or fourteen because they just took the first pretty
Speaker 3: good shot that was available to them. A stat that
Speaker 3: I would have thought was a maybe a negative indicator
Speaker 3: about how the offense was going, that I actually have
Speaker 3: completely flipped on is I don't know if you know this, Jason.
Speaker 3: They're twenty ninth in pastes per game right now. This
Speaker 3: is a team that you know, and when you think
Speaker 3: about a team going on this offensive explosion where they're
Speaker 3: second in the league in offensive raid and going into
Speaker 3: that Chicago game last night for cleaning the last you'd
Speaker 3: be like, oh, man, you know, is it Are they
Speaker 3: playing Iso ball? Is this Joe Johnson reincarnated? And it's
Speaker 3: not that they are moving the ball, but they are
Speaker 3: just playing so much more decisively. They're playing with so
Speaker 3: much better tempo and they're getting they're capitalizing on the
Speaker 3: mismatches that they're that their pace is creating for them,
Speaker 3: even though they're twenty ninth in passes per game, sixth
Speaker 3: in points created by assist per game. So you know,
Speaker 3: there is there is there's passing just a pass, and
Speaker 3: then there's passing with decisiveness. And I really think that
Speaker 3: is the biggest change in terms of the tempo of
Speaker 3: you know how they've been playing so far.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so let's zoom in on the transition piece for
Speaker 1: just a second, and I do want to talk about
Speaker 1: the half court piece, because you're right, it is. It
Speaker 1: is a decisiveness. It's a quick action at the beginning
Speaker 1: of a possession to get an initial advantage and then
Speaker 1: it's like bang, bang, get a shot up. Everyone's making
Speaker 1: Because again, I always think this is funny when teams
Speaker 1: don't look to be aggressive on that initial advantage because
Speaker 1: it's like, what did you run the action for? You
Speaker 1: ran the action to get that advantage so that you
Speaker 1: can get a shot up like instead of to your
Speaker 1: to your point, letting perfect be the enemy of good,
Speaker 1: and then you end up with something worse at the
Speaker 1: end of the clock as you run into more of
Speaker 1: those issues. But the transition piece is interesting to me
Speaker 1: because you look at this roster and it's like Darius
Speaker 1: Garland speed guard, Donovan Mitchell, you know, like literally S
Speaker 1: tier athlete.
Speaker 2: Evan Mobley is one of the most mobile bigs in
Speaker 2: the league.
Speaker 1: Jared Allens is a lot bigger than he was when
Speaker 1: he was in Brooklyn, but he is still a very
Speaker 1: mobile big. You've got a lot of speed, and you
Speaker 1: have this defensive personnel that was certainly capable of getting
Speaker 1: the stops that you needed to get out and run.
Speaker 2: Was JB.
Speaker 1: Bickerstaff just not emphasizing it enough. Do you think it
Speaker 1: comes down to them forcing more turnovers? As Kenny Atkinson
Speaker 1: has leaned more into switching, do you think it's just
Speaker 1: been a point of emphasis, like, hey, dudes, let's get
Speaker 1: up and down the floor. Like, what was it like
Speaker 1: under JB. Bickerstaff where he felt like that was being
Speaker 1: a missed opportunity.
Speaker 3: You know, it's hard to say, man, because you know,
Speaker 3: this is where like not being in the actual room
Speaker 3: it makes it so hard because all of the public
Speaker 3: facing information we had was that JB's coaching staff was
Speaker 3: asking them to run. He was asking them to get
Speaker 3: into their sets quicker. You know, you'd see, even anecdotally,
Speaker 3: you'd see them kind of walking the ball up after
Speaker 3: an inbound and he'd be clapping on the sideline like go,
Speaker 3: go go, Like so you know, who knows if it
Speaker 3: is the message, the message, the messenger, the personnel you know,
Speaker 3: you know, or or you know, how they were, how
Speaker 3: they were emphasizing it. That was the change, you know,
Speaker 3: I asked, you know, I asked Kenny in my one
Speaker 3: on one I'm like, hey, everyone talks about it in
Speaker 3: the pace of how do you actually do it? Like
Speaker 3: what what? Because you know, that's like the staple of
Speaker 3: every off season and you know, you see reporting that
Speaker 3: all through camp they were running with an eighteen second
Speaker 3: shot clock. Oh wow, you know, or at least during
Speaker 3: significant port parts of their scrimmage, you know, and like, so,
Speaker 3: I don't know if the message is the same or
Speaker 3: like Kenny just tweaked it in a way that the
Speaker 3: guys were able to hear it better, or if it
Speaker 3: was some of those things in practice where we're like, hey,
Speaker 3: you actually just don't get twenty four seconds during the scrimmage,
Speaker 3: you only get eighteen. You know, those are the kind
Speaker 3: of things that I think it's a big alchemical reaction
Speaker 3: in the end that like led to whatever got them
Speaker 3: up the mountain got them up the mountain. Like do
Speaker 3: I think think that it's definitely something Kenny values more
Speaker 3: than JB valued. Yes, But like I do kind of
Speaker 3: feel the instinct to defend JB a little bit. Who
Speaker 3: by the way, I think Pistons are playing really good
Speaker 3: basketball right now because a lot of a lot of
Speaker 3: Cavs fans kind of have the instantly aw see, all
Speaker 3: you had to do was ask him to run. I'm like, dude,
Speaker 3: he asked him, Like he definitely was asking him to
Speaker 3: go a little faster and get into their sets. But
Speaker 3: you know, I think it's I think it's you know,
Speaker 3: been a column A, been a column B, and the
Speaker 3: outcome is they're running.
Speaker 1: Well, you know how it goes sometimes like your your
Speaker 1: wife says something to you and you don't actually listen,
Speaker 1: but then someone else says it to you and then
Speaker 1: you do. Sometimes you just need to a different voice.
Speaker 3: I'm hearing this they had, They've been hearing the same
Speaker 3: guy for five years exact. A new guy comes in
Speaker 3: and says it five percent different. And I wouldn't be
Speaker 3: surprised if JB turned on Calves tape and was like,
Speaker 3: come on, I guart you curious. Is really shooting threes
Speaker 3: Darius is? Darius Is three point rate is up nine
Speaker 3: percent year over year, And literally after every game, JB
Speaker 3: would be like, yeah, you just got to shoot more threes.
Speaker 3: We were asking him to shoot more threes, and then
Speaker 3: all of a sudden he is. So you know, there's
Speaker 3: I'm sure there's a little bit of that play in
Speaker 3: the bigger staff household.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a difference between like, like, to me, as
Speaker 1: someone who's rooted for the Lakers over the last few years,
Speaker 1: going from Frank Vogel to Darvin Ham was like, we
Speaker 1: just need a different voice. It's different than like Darvin
Speaker 1: Ham to JJ, where it's like this guy's actually incompetent
Speaker 1: and we need to make a change like that is
Speaker 1: a very different type of transition. Like I literally literally
Speaker 1: just felt like the guys like were just done with Frank.
Speaker 1: Frank had been their coach for several years. They just
Speaker 1: needed to change, Like I think, I think that's kind
Speaker 1: of the way this can go. Sometimes you just need
Speaker 1: a different voice in there to make it feel reinvigorated,
Speaker 1: to make it feel different. And I mean the pace
Speaker 1: has been something that has transitioned into into the half
Speaker 1: court as well, And like you know, to me, George's
Speaker 1: kneeing is the classic example of this. His numbers are
Speaker 1: actually down year over year, but just the speed with
Speaker 1: which he's making decisions, the speed on his cuts, the
Speaker 1: speed that he's slipping out of screens, he's like getting
Speaker 1: drivele penetration, Like he's just everyone's just making so much
Speaker 1: more deliberate movement in the half court. The way they
Speaker 1: get up the floor and they run into their horn sets.
Speaker 1: They're not just beating around the bush so they could
Speaker 1: get to a Donovan Mitchell ball screen. They're running action
Speaker 1: for the purpose of getting shots early in the clock.
Speaker 1: Whether it's like oh, if we're running this horn set
Speaker 1: and the dude's open on the backscreen, throw it. If
Speaker 1: the skip passes open, throw it. If you have an
Speaker 1: opportunity to drive a close out, drive it. And then
Speaker 1: that's where the Evan Mobley part and obviously everyone's playing better.
Speaker 1: We were talking about Garland earlier, and we'll get to
Speaker 1: him in a second, But like the Evan Mobley on
Speaker 1: ball stuff, to me, is just another way for them
Speaker 1: to get that initial advantage so they can go bang
Speaker 1: bang shot, you know, like get that initial drive the
Speaker 1: clothes out kick easy catching foot three on the side,
Speaker 1: and it's like they're doing a lot of this, like
Speaker 1: spamming Marrol setting screens for MOBILEI right around the elbow
Speaker 1: and then just quick slipping out to the wing. And
Speaker 1: almost every time either Mobley's getting downhill and drawing multiple
Speaker 1: defenders for kickouts or Merrill's open on the slip and
Speaker 1: then it's hit shot for him or quick swing pass
Speaker 1: to the corner, or swing to the pass, swing to
Speaker 1: the corner, drive the baseline. There's another shot available, like
Speaker 1: they're just getting the defense in rotation with these simple actions.
Speaker 1: At at the beginning of possessions, everyone is moving quickly,
Speaker 1: everyone is decisive, and it's.
Speaker 2: Paying off.
Speaker 1: One of the biggest things that stood out to me
Speaker 1: is like it feels like Donovan Mitchell has been able
Speaker 1: to be more picky about when he has to really
Speaker 1: grab the reins on offense, because that was one of
Speaker 1: the big things that stood out to me last year
Speaker 1: with the Calves is it just felt like at times
Speaker 1: Donovan would read the room and be like, we don't
Speaker 1: have the juice right now, I gotta just spam pick
Speaker 1: and roll and take my step back the reason my
Speaker 1: little eurostep floaters and all that kind of stuff, and
Speaker 1: like now it just feels like there's so much more
Speaker 1: variety that he can be picky, which is leading to
Speaker 1: an increase in his efficiency.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean so on the Donovan front, you know,
Speaker 3: I think I mean really starting in my opinion, starting
Speaker 3: from February last year, because Darius had such a what
Speaker 3: I would call basically a lost season where you know,
Speaker 3: he just was not himself due to injury, due to
Speaker 3: personal whatever it might have been, he just wasn't himself.
Speaker 3: Donovan basically played point guard. They basically played Luka Doncic
Speaker 3: ball with Donovan in that role through the playoffs, and
Speaker 3: you know, Donovan really helped keep the offense afloat, but
Speaker 3: I always felt like that was a high floor, low
Speaker 3: ceiling outcome for this team's offense, and you know, if
Speaker 3: you're gonna play that kind of style, because that was
Speaker 3: you know, a lot of the discussion this offseason where
Speaker 3: you know, big contingencies of the fan base were like, oh,
Speaker 3: we got to trade Darius, we gotta let Donovan run
Speaker 3: the offense. And I was like, well, you know, if
Speaker 3: we are going to just keep Donovan at point guard,
Speaker 3: and then yeah, we probably because Darius is an over
Speaker 3: underqualified to be an off ball shooting guard and you know,
Speaker 3: and really needs to. If you're gonna have a guy
Speaker 3: like that, he needs to play a point guard. And
Speaker 3: it really bears out in the touches. Important to note
Speaker 3: huge minutes played disclaimer here because no one in the
Speaker 3: Cavs has been averaging thirty minutes a game right now,
Speaker 3: but last year Donovan was averaging around seventy nine touches
Speaker 3: a game, Darius averaged seventy five, and Evan averaged fifty one.
Speaker 3: This year, Darius is leading the team at fifty nine
Speaker 3: point four touches a game. Evan is second on the
Speaker 3: team in fife at fifty seven point four and Donovan
Speaker 3: is at fifty five point one. Like, I mean, if
Speaker 3: you would have told me in March of last year
Speaker 3: that Donovan would be third on the team in touches
Speaker 3: per game year over year, I would have fallen out
Speaker 3: of my chair. That's amazing stat I mean, this is
Speaker 3: a team where you know, every single action was being
Speaker 3: initiated by the guards generally without an advantage. You know,
Speaker 3: a lot of just high pick and roll and then
Speaker 3: let's see what we can do to a team that's
Speaker 3: their offense is just frankly much more democratized. There are
Speaker 3: a lot of guys starting plays, you know, they they
Speaker 3: had to play last night against the Bulls where Jared
Speaker 3: Allen gets the ball and takes it up or it
Speaker 3: takes it at the top of the arc, runs a
Speaker 3: handoff for Sam Merrill with Donovan just getting a flare
Speaker 3: screen on the weak side. Like like Donovan is like
Speaker 3: a secondary action. He's a decoy action almost for this team.
Speaker 3: So I don't think, and I think when you don't
Speaker 3: have a Luca or a Yokich level like ultra super
Speaker 3: dupersar talent, you need to democratize your offense. You need
Speaker 3: to have you need to have the defense kind of
Speaker 3: not know where they need to be set up on
Speaker 3: a possession of possession basis, And to your point, a
Speaker 3: lot of ways they're doing that is just letting guys
Speaker 3: like Evan just at the board and run. You know,
Speaker 3: they're they're not feeling the need to have Darius and
Speaker 3: Donovan walk the ball up court and initiate every set,
Speaker 3: and it's just made them really hard to guard.
Speaker 1: Dude, you're preaching right now. I would even argue that
Speaker 1: for the top tier guys, you need to democratize your offense.
Speaker 1: I would like I would, But you can get away
Speaker 1: with it easier when you have Biokich. You can make
Speaker 1: it further before it eventually crumbles. Like that's the crazy
Speaker 1: part to me, Like when I when I think back,
Speaker 1: like even like I would say, the closest person to
Speaker 1: being able to actually do Luka Doncic ball successfully to
Speaker 1: the latest levels was Lebron just because he had that
Speaker 1: incredible amount of stamina. But even then, it was like
Speaker 1: I remember, I remember on the twenty sixteen Calves, I
Speaker 1: used to be like, why is Kyrie having these possessions
Speaker 1: where he dribbles the ball up the floor like thirteen times?
Speaker 1: And dribbles the clock out and takes a contested mid
Speaker 1: range jump shot and literally there's not a single pass
Speaker 1: on the entire possession. Like remember those possessions with the Calves.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was like there's were the Lebron break possessions exactly.
Speaker 2: And then it dawned on me.
Speaker 1: I'm like, Lebron's standing twenty seven feet from the rim,
Speaker 1: just over on the wing with his hands on the six.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was like, I was like, it's so, it's so
Speaker 1: fascinating to you because you you absolutely have to have variety.
Speaker 1: I mean, even going back to Yokic, who was like
Speaker 1: the last super duper star to really get it done.
Speaker 1: With Jokic, it was like, oh, it's game one of
Speaker 1: the finals and Aaron Gordon has the matchup. Let's just
Speaker 1: throw the ball to Aaron Gordon six straight times on
Speaker 1: Gabe Vincent to start the game and we're going to
Speaker 1: build an initial lead.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: It's like that's the thing is like you never know
Speaker 1: how the matchups are gonna work as you go from
Speaker 1: team to team. You know, I look at this particular
Speaker 1: team for example, like you've got Donovan Mitchell, right, and
Speaker 1: Darius Garland. There are these speed guards that rely and
Speaker 1: pull up shooting, getting dribble penetration in ball screens and
Speaker 1: being able to spray out from there. When you play
Speaker 1: that style, inevitably you might run into a team that's
Speaker 1: got a couple of really really damn good guards that
Speaker 1: can guard the ball and that can stay attached on screens,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden it turns into a different
Speaker 1: type of game. And all of a sudden, having a
Speaker 1: guy like Mobley who can initiate offense at least to
Speaker 1: get the defense in rotation so that then Darius Garland
Speaker 1: and Donovan Mitchell are attacking closeouts, then you can use
Speaker 1: their advantages without having to have that great guard defender
Speaker 1: pressuring the hell out of him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, or just get the ball with advantage, you know,
Speaker 3: Like I've talked about that a lot of you know,
Speaker 3: my biggest gripe with how the offense I felt like
Speaker 3: kind of collapsed down the end of last year was
Speaker 3: that Darius was just having to start a play from scratch.
Speaker 3: And Darius is not a big guy. He is not
Speaker 3: a strong guy. He is not an explosive guy. That
Speaker 3: is not none of those things are playing to his strength.
Speaker 3: So like, yeah, he can run a cold high pick
Speaker 3: and roll and get you a pretty solid possession out
Speaker 3: of it. But if he catches it coming off a
Speaker 3: pin down where the defenders worried about him shooting because
Speaker 3: he caught the ball with two three feet of space
Speaker 3: before he even goes into that secondary pick and roll
Speaker 3: or a dribble handoff where he gets where he's getting
Speaker 3: the ball with the running start. Now the things he
Speaker 3: is great at, which is the change of direction, the
Speaker 3: tempo kind of pushbowl where he you know, he goes
Speaker 3: from zero to max speed back to zero better than
Speaker 3: almost anyone, Like all the stuff he is great at.
Speaker 3: Now he gets to actually leverage with a defense that's
Speaker 3: already trying to catch up, like and that is the
Speaker 3: stuff that they're able to do right now. I mean,
Speaker 3: obviously the Evan stuff. And Evan has always been kind
Speaker 3: of the thing that enables that because he is an
Speaker 3: elite playmaker as a big in terms of his fuel
Speaker 3: for the game, in terms of his ability to pass,
Speaker 3: and the skill stuff has been catching up. You know,
Speaker 3: the handle is getting a little tighter every year, the
Speaker 3: touch is getting a little better every year. But his
Speaker 3: ability to read and kind of interpret what's going on
Speaker 3: that's always been there, and I feel like they're really
Speaker 3: leaning much harder into it.
Speaker 1: The three points shooting piece is important too, because it's
Speaker 1: helping him get drible penetration. I thought like Zach Levin
Speaker 1: went on a little run last night. As I was
Speaker 1: watching him, I was like, man, if he didn't make
Speaker 1: like one hundred million dollars and if I could trust
Speaker 1: his body to hold up, I think he'd be such
Speaker 1: an interesting trade target.
Speaker 3: Because he had a couple of nasty plays last.
Speaker 2: Yes he did.
Speaker 1: When I was watching him, I was like, man, he
Speaker 1: still got that little left shoulder fade he hit to
Speaker 1: tie the game.
Speaker 2: Was it at like one o six or something like that.
Speaker 2: I was like, man, like he's got them.
Speaker 3: It's just the play where he is streaking down the floor.
Speaker 3: He gets bumped on an outlet pass and he like
Speaker 3: high points the ball, taps it to himself and then
Speaker 3: gets hit again and hits the reverse layup and one.
Speaker 3: I'm like, my.
Speaker 1: God, an athlete, complete apex athlete, I know. But like
Speaker 1: during that run, like Darius Garland had two huge plays.
Speaker 1: One the the ball screen where the defender was like
Speaker 1: shading heavily on his right side and he ended up
Speaker 1: I think it was Levine and you know, up getting
Speaker 1: downhill and throwing that beautiful lob to Evan Mobley. And
Speaker 1: then the second one was just a dribble penetration off
Speaker 1: the top of the key and he got a little
Speaker 1: left handed layup and it's like he's getting downhill because
Speaker 1: of the threat of the three point shot like that.
Speaker 1: That is a that is a key element to it.
Speaker 1: If you can get baked in dribble penetration without having
Speaker 1: to leverage your athletic tools simply because of the threat
Speaker 1: of your shot, that is where you can bring real value.
Speaker 1: And again that's the other matchup piece where it's like
Speaker 1: he had the most favorable matchup in that situation. You know,
Speaker 1: like it's a lot easier for him to go to
Speaker 1: work against Zach Lavine than it is for Donovan Mitchell
Speaker 1: to go against ayatassum MoU whoever it is. That's on
Speaker 1: him in any given situation where he's drawing the high
Speaker 1: leverage perimeter defender and that that's where that variety comes in.
Speaker 1: That is where uh, that is where that like you
Speaker 1: just have more punches you can go to depending on
Speaker 1: the matchup. So I've a couple things I want to
Speaker 1: get to you real quick. So the depth, I did
Speaker 1: not even notice in my research that there's not a
Speaker 1: single cav playing over thirty minutes.
Speaker 3: Changed last night.
Speaker 2: But let's tell me a little.
Speaker 1: Bit about the bench and the specific guys have been
Speaker 1: popping to you. That third quarter run from Ti Dromelin,
Speaker 1: like his activity on the ball and his ability to
Speaker 1: get deflections to get them outa in transition, and he's
Speaker 1: kind of a sneaky little bucket getter too, So tell
Speaker 1: us a little bit about the bench.
Speaker 3: So before I started about the bench, I did want
Speaker 3: to hit on the fact that Kenny is just running
Speaker 3: really great rotations. And you know, it was really interesting because,
Speaker 3: you know, obviously, being so team focused as I am,
Speaker 3: you kind of forget how other coaches coach, if that
Speaker 3: makes sense, like because you know, we just had JB
Speaker 3: for five years and Bickerstaff is a guy who really
Speaker 3: prefers to run a tighter rotation. He really, you know,
Speaker 3: you can tell JB is at his happiest when he's
Speaker 3: playing eight, you know, and every now and again would
Speaker 3: extend to nine. But there were, you know, the five
Speaker 3: minutes last year where the team was fully healthy, he
Speaker 3: tried a ten man rotation, and it just felt like
Speaker 3: you know, you ever like you know, you ever at
Speaker 3: a buddy's house and you borrow like a hoodie or something,
Speaker 3: because it's called like this isn't quite mine, this doesn't comfortable,
Speaker 3: you know, like that's the way it felt with JB.
Speaker 3: It felt like he was trying on another coaches tactics
Speaker 3: when he had to go ten. And then you watch
Speaker 3: what Kenny's doing playing ten, and he he said before
Speaker 3: the season he might try play at eleven when the
Speaker 3: team's fully healthy. And like you can really see why it,
Speaker 3: you know, for someone who was like I was like, dude,
Speaker 3: they have four guys that need at least thirty two
Speaker 3: to thirty four minutes a game that gets really hard,
Speaker 3: really fast to you just run out of minutes and
Speaker 3: you're playing guys two minute shifts.
Speaker 2: It.
Speaker 3: He completely has changed my mind on this because of
Speaker 3: his blend of orthodoxy of like guys know when they're
Speaker 3: getting their run, they know when they're getting subbed out,
Speaker 3: and as a result, they're able to play very contained
Speaker 3: and you know, really put all their energy towards their run.
Speaker 3: You know, at the you know, seven minute mark of
Speaker 3: every first quarter, Sam Merril and George Nayan come in
Speaker 3: and normally by the two minute mark they're out. So
Speaker 3: those guys know, this is what this, this is the
Speaker 3: way I need to run and how I'm going to play.
Speaker 3: During the stretch, there's there's no ambiguity to it. But
Speaker 3: in the second half he's he kind of is able
Speaker 3: to read the room a little bit more. He's a
Speaker 3: lot more flexible and a little less orthodox. So you know, hey,
Speaker 3: we are starters look like they're dead. We've played the
Speaker 3: heaviest schedule than of the entire league so far. We're
Speaker 3: just gonna go with a five man bench lineup. So
Speaker 3: he's doing a really nice job of creating a structure
Speaker 3: where guys know where their minutes are coming from and
Speaker 3: giving himself the flexibility. So I feel like that is
Speaker 3: part one to this is the bench is playing better
Speaker 3: because everyone knows exactly what their job is and when
Speaker 3: their job needs to be executed. And then obviously the
Speaker 3: players are just playing great. You know. Sam Merril, you know,
Speaker 3: has been a real tool, as you mentioned, alongside Evan
Speaker 3: Mobley and like Dude Gie your Ome, Tie Jerome, he
Speaker 3: has been the best backup point guard in the league't
Speaker 3: I actually did did a little right before this, and
Speaker 3: he's it's pretty objectively true. Maybe TJ McConnell can can
Speaker 3: lay claim. Tijerome is averaging twenty two points, seven point
Speaker 3: six assists, four and a half boards, three point three
Speaker 3: steals per thirty six on sixty one fifty four eighty
Speaker 3: three percent.
Speaker 2: Splits its outrageous, like he is.
Speaker 3: He was a guy I was really excited about the
Speaker 3: matting last year. He only plays two games. He has
Speaker 3: just a freak season ending ankle sprain that just never
Speaker 3: gets better. It's a high ankle sprain. At the beginning
Speaker 3: of the year, you go, ah, he might miss a
Speaker 3: month or a month and a half and then he'll
Speaker 3: be back. And he never got better. He ended up
Speaker 3: having to get surgery. It was a crazy thing. And
Speaker 3: you know, so he was a guy who was either
Speaker 3: out of sight, out of mind for the Cabs or
Speaker 3: for Cabs fans, not this Cabs fan, but for the
Speaker 3: general population. Or was a guy that like was kind
Speaker 3: of representative of like frustration with like, oh, this guy
Speaker 3: that we added didn't even play. You got to hang
Speaker 3: ankle Spring didn't even end up playing, like Vincent for
Speaker 3: the Lakers, is what you're saying. Absolutely, that's a great
Speaker 3: cop you know where you know it's not fair to
Speaker 3: the guy, but certain certain parts of the fan base
Speaker 3: just kind of treated him as like part of their
Speaker 3: frustration and uh, and he has just been he's taken
Speaker 3: this game up another level in the system. Remember he
Speaker 3: played for Kenny and Golden State when he when he
Speaker 3: was kind of the second slash third point guard depending
Speaker 3: on h depending on what part of the season you
Speaker 3: were in for the Warriors. And he had real moments
Speaker 3: there too. Absolutely had real moments against the Cabs. I
Speaker 3: think that's part of the reason they designed to be
Speaker 3: scored like twenty seven and a bench mob win in Cleveland.
Speaker 3: But you know, he he's got great size, six ' five,
Speaker 3: he's got a great stop and start game. The playmaking
Speaker 3: has been really good. And you know, here's the thing, man, Like,
Speaker 3: this team is not an inherently nasty team. You know,
Speaker 3: Evan and Jared they are so fundamental, so smart, but
Speaker 3: they aren't. They aren't, you know, the the kind of
Speaker 3: guys who are like digging elbows into people's sides. You know,
Speaker 3: neither is Darius, Neither is Donovan. You know, I would
Speaker 3: say we are the least grifty team in the league
Speaker 3: on that front, you know, like yeah, and the free
Speaker 3: throw late rates will U will confirm that. So it's
Speaker 3: nice having a guy who kind of plays like a dick,
Speaker 3: you know, like I mean, I think there's no other
Speaker 3: way to say it than a guy like Jerome is
Speaker 3: kind of doing the stop start, you know, clearing space
Speaker 3: with his elbows, and you know, he just plays different
Speaker 3: than all their other players, and so he has been unbelievable.
Speaker 3: I thought he was one of the guys that was
Speaker 3: primed or you know, most dangerous to lose his rotation
Speaker 3: spot when Max Strus returned, because, by the way, Maxtreus
Speaker 3: hasn't played a minute yet. Yeah, what about Max Trus
Speaker 3: exactly our starting small forward who was our best plus
Speaker 3: minus player last year.
Speaker 2: You start when he comes back, I think so.
Speaker 3: I think so I would be really really surprised if
Speaker 3: he doesn't.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 3: And you know, I think that we, you know, to
Speaker 3: do a quick detour. I think we've just now started
Speaker 3: to see them really miss start missing him. You know
Speaker 3: that Brooklyn game where they're having to you know, the
Speaker 3: bigs are not able to make an impact, you know,
Speaker 3: Brooklyn's playing super tough at the point of attack. We're
Speaker 3: playing Karris Lavert at power forward, and they won the
Speaker 3: game with that lineup, but that it was dodgy a
Speaker 3: few times on the glass and things like that, and
Speaker 3: they you know that would be Max Stru's playing those
Speaker 3: power forward minutes, and you know he can shoot on
Speaker 3: the move.
Speaker 1: He can shoot on the move too, which is a
Speaker 1: they're like he brings He's kind of like what Merrill does,
Speaker 1: but for.
Speaker 3: The starters, Yeah, he he kind of is an amalgamation
Speaker 3: of what Dean Wade, Isaacle Korro and Karris Lavert provide
Speaker 3: all individually. He kind of does all those things at
Speaker 3: like a B to B plus level. And I think
Speaker 3: I just think he's better than all those guys. If
Speaker 3: I'm being really like just a little reductive. He's just
Speaker 3: the best role player on the team in terms of
Speaker 3: what he actually brings to the core. So you know,
Speaker 3: they haven't had him. I thought Ty Jerome would be,
Speaker 3: you know, a guy that maybe might drop out of
Speaker 3: the rotation. I don't think you can. He's been that good,
Speaker 3: that consistent, and he's saved them a few times.
Speaker 1: And more often than not, you just have too many
Speaker 1: opportunities in the regular season to give guys minutes. It's
Speaker 1: it's like the thirteen man rotation in Golden State, which,
Speaker 1: by the way, I think this is where Kenny gets
Speaker 1: that idea from, which is basically like, we're gonna run
Speaker 1: like crazy, We're gonna play super hard, we're gonna play
Speaker 1: with a ton of pace in the half court. Everyone's
Speaker 1: minutes are going to be down, but we're gonna do
Speaker 1: these like just aggressively long rotations, but to your point, consistent,
Speaker 1: so the guys know what they can count on and
Speaker 1: they're not scared of getting pulled anytime they make a mistake.
Speaker 2: But like the I think.
Speaker 1: That that becomes that goes hand in hand with the scrappiness,
Speaker 1: that goes hand in hand with the forcing of turnovers.
Speaker 1: By the way, you mentioned the huge offensive rebound on
Speaker 1: Twitter this morning, the one where Ty got the rebound,
Speaker 1: missed the three, got another rebound, and then it ended
Speaker 1: up I think with Karris Lavert hitting three at the top.
Speaker 2: Of the key.
Speaker 1: He had another huge play down the stretch right before
Speaker 1: they took him out, right before they went to the closers,
Speaker 1: where it was one, one, o six, I think, and
Speaker 1: then he just picks zach Lavie and clean at half
Speaker 1: court and they go.
Speaker 3: He's had a lot of those, bro, He's had a
Speaker 3: ton of those kind of plays. It's been bananas. He uh.
Speaker 3: He is averaging three point three steals per thirty six
Speaker 3: right now. It's his previous career high and like almost
Speaker 3: no minutes in Phoenix was one point six. I mean
Speaker 3: he is, I mean, and these are consistent rips where
Speaker 3: he is like he's kind of doing the sprint of
Speaker 3: the ball handlers, they take it up half court and
Speaker 3: just you know, pick six of them. Like these are
Speaker 3: not like low impact, Oh the guy just happened to
Speaker 3: throw me the ball steals. These are I'm ripping the
Speaker 3: ball away from you steals, And like that's generally been
Speaker 3: a big emphasis from Kenny going into preseason, where he's like, hey,
Speaker 3: we've got this great defensive team, we're not a great
Speaker 3: turnover forcing team. Plays like that where they're really emphasizing
Speaker 3: ripping the ball. Even guys like the Yang have gotten
Speaker 3: a lot their hands on balls, a lot more in
Speaker 3: terms of getting rips and steals, like those kind of
Speaker 3: players are like are part of what it has made
Speaker 3: this team feel a little bit inevitable over the last
Speaker 3: couple of weeks where it's like, man, every time the
Speaker 3: other team's making them real push, someone like tied Jerums
Speaker 3: to rip them and it you know, it generates a
Speaker 3: wide open three, and it's like, that's so painful for
Speaker 3: the posision and yeah, he's been amazing, just makes.
Speaker 2: It play exactly.
Speaker 1: They're they're forcing seventeen turnovers per game, which is third
Speaker 1: in the NBA. Last year they were eighteenth. And the
Speaker 1: other big thing I've noticed in this I think also
Speaker 1: came from Golden State. It's like that textbook like not
Speaker 1: conceding switches just for the sake of conceding switches, but
Speaker 1: being more willing to switch and then like stunting and
Speaker 1: recovering rather than hard helping and doubling, which has caused
Speaker 1: defenders to be positioned in passing lanes more often and
Speaker 1: has caused offensive players that have the ball to be
Speaker 1: more indecisive. So then when they turn to make those
Speaker 1: kickout passes, there's people in the lanes and they're using
Speaker 1: that to then just further leverage their transition pushes. Like
Speaker 1: I mean the game against the Lakers, man, I think
Speaker 1: they had I think the Lakers had six spedovers. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was a complete beating. They had I think six
Speaker 1: turnovers in the first quarter, and I'm pretty sure they
Speaker 1: scored on every single one of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they had.
Speaker 1: I think they hit five threes in the laps. They
Speaker 1: did like seventeen points on six turnovers in one quarter.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, and you know what's funny, the defense
Speaker 3: is actually underperforming what I think they should be doing.
Speaker 3: I want to say there, I didn't. I didn't update
Speaker 3: the stat after the Bulls game, but they're twenty fifth
Speaker 3: and opposing three point percentage. Like teams are hitting at
Speaker 3: a very very high rate. They had two games in
Speaker 3: a row where aj Green and Jose Alvarado combined to
Speaker 3: go like fourteen to fifteen from three against them, Like
Speaker 3: you know, they they've had guys go just bananas against
Speaker 3: them from three despite so like I think their ninth
Speaker 3: in defensive rating. That might have changed after last night.
Speaker 3: But like they are generally underperforming their metrics. But to
Speaker 3: your point, I think their fundamentals are really really strong
Speaker 3: when they're switching, especially when they switch a big at
Speaker 3: the point of attack they're doing. I really would recommend
Speaker 3: anyone watching the team to not look at the ball
Speaker 3: on those plays and look at the tag out that
Speaker 3: happens on the back end where you know Darius Garland.
Speaker 3: They'll run. The opposing team will run a pick and
Speaker 3: roll at Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. Evan will take
Speaker 3: the switch. Darius will switch onto the opposing team's power forward.
Speaker 3: In no time at all, Jared Allen will have swapped
Speaker 3: in tag Darius to a lower threat player. You know,
Speaker 3: And that was a team, you know. I've always credited
Speaker 3: the Boston Celtics for this. They're the best tagout team
Speaker 3: in the league and have been for like six years.
Speaker 3: The Cavs are starting to learn how to do that
Speaker 3: at a much better rate. And then, frankly, dude, they're
Speaker 3: just playing better at the point of attack. Darius Garland
Speaker 3: when he gets switched onto an APEX scorer, isn't getting cooked.
Speaker 3: Sam Merrill is holding his ground, He's not killing it.
Speaker 3: But when you have Evan or Jared on the back line,
Speaker 3: your margin for air as a defender is pretty high.
Speaker 3: You just can't get absolutely torched. So even if you
Speaker 3: get beaten, but like make it a little harder for them,
Speaker 3: you're still probably going to give up a less than
Speaker 3: ideal shot for the offense. So like, again, their margin
Speaker 3: forer air is great, their attention to detail at the
Speaker 3: point of attack is great. Steph no on Twitter just
Speaker 3: this morning posted a clip of Donovan denying Zacly being
Speaker 3: down the stretch where he has scored three or four
Speaker 3: possessions in a row and basically Donnie faceguards him for
Speaker 3: an entire possession to keep him away from the ball.
Speaker 3: Like they have the top end talent on the back
Speaker 3: line and then they just have the attention to detail
Speaker 3: at the point of attack. And it's and again, I
Speaker 3: think this is the ninth overall team in defense right now.
Speaker 3: I really think they'll end the season around, you know,
Speaker 3: in the top five. So even if their offense drops
Speaker 3: off a little, they have margin ferrer on the other end.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it goes back to the thing I said at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the show, which is like, once you
Speaker 1: start to win to a certain degree, it becomes infectious
Speaker 1: and then you actually start It's kind of like I
Speaker 1: was talking about with george' niang, like guys even that
Speaker 1: haven't been great defenders in the past are just more
Speaker 1: locked in because it's like, hey, we're doing this together.
Speaker 1: Guys like we're all in this together. There's a there's
Speaker 1: like almost like a community feel from the defensive end,
Speaker 1: and like you, it's I think this is one of
Speaker 1: the coolest things that happens in sports when you kind
Speaker 1: of catch this like flash in a pan winning type
Speaker 1: of environment, because you can literally see it build on itself.
Speaker 1: You can literally see it gain momentum. But we have
Speaker 1: to go negative now, Carter. So if I asked you,
Speaker 1: if I asked you to nitpick this team and to
Speaker 1: come up with the reason why you are just I'm
Speaker 1: not even saying a reason why they would fail, just
Speaker 1: say what you are concerned about. Is there anything that
Speaker 1: when you watch them when things do go off the rails,
Speaker 1: when teams do go on run, like, oh, Chicago's up
Speaker 1: seven in the third quarter, what's happening? What are the
Speaker 1: things that you're seeing? If you had to nitpick this team.
Speaker 3: Well, it really hasn't been much. So this these will
Speaker 3: be the definition of nippicks. You know, I've noticed that
Speaker 3: there there are some possessions. I think in the last
Speaker 3: two games we've seen it more than any other where
Speaker 3: there's been a little bit of a backslide where, uh,
Speaker 3: you know, they're doing the swing swing into a swing
Speaker 3: swing into a swing swing, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: Donovan has to shoot a grenade because there's two seconds left.
Speaker 3: You know, they there's been a little bit of a
Speaker 3: backslide there, or Darius doesn't take the open three when
Speaker 3: the defender goes under. So those are some of the
Speaker 3: habit things I think in terms of the comfort level,
Speaker 3: you know, I've you know, we talked about this earlier
Speaker 3: in the pod, but I think Donovan Mitchell has had
Speaker 3: the biggest degree of an adjustment to make of anyone
Speaker 3: on the team. And I think there are some a
Speaker 3: few possessions this year where if you're really watching closely,
Speaker 3: where he is breaking the offense to just go get
Speaker 3: to go, take a get a bucket, and he's amazing
Speaker 3: at that. But it is noteworthy that he's I feel
Speaker 3: like Donovan is still finding himself in the Kenny offense
Speaker 3: more than anyone else, which is funny because all of
Speaker 3: his percent all of his efficiency numbers are are high,
Speaker 3: but you can still see a few cracks where it's like,
Speaker 3: all right, Donovan, me like you you can't hijack that possession.
Speaker 3: You know, everything's running super smooth. But to his credit again,
Speaker 3: I know this is the nitpicking section, but even when
Speaker 3: he does that, he doesn't he hasn't been stubborn. You know,
Speaker 3: the next game down the stretch that that game is tight,
Speaker 3: there in the middle of a huge comeback, uh you know,
Speaker 3: being spurred by Darius, being spurred by Evan and Donovan
Speaker 3: comes down basically doesn't pass an entire posision, takes a
Speaker 3: contested seventeen footer and misses. You know, all every Cabs
Speaker 3: fan and are Discord is furious at the shot. And
Speaker 3: then the next like four possessions that goes Darius.
Speaker 2: You you you go run.
Speaker 3: You're cooking right now. So you know, I think he
Speaker 3: is still kind of figuring out where he is supposed
Speaker 3: to press and push. You know, they needed him to
Speaker 3: do that last night against the Bulls with heavy legs,
Speaker 3: and you know, he ends up scoring I think it
Speaker 3: was thirty six. You know, there have been games where
Speaker 3: he has needed to let Darius kind of run the
Speaker 3: offense down the stretch. So that's one little thing. I
Speaker 3: think generally the three point percentage is just too high.
Speaker 3: They're not all going to keep shooting this well. You know,
Speaker 3: Carris is well over forty percent for Karris Lebert is
Speaker 3: at forty seven percent from three this season. You know,
Speaker 3: I don't I don't expect.
Speaker 2: That to hold.
Speaker 1: There is a lot of guys around the entire league
Speaker 1: that are shooting outrageously good. It's kind of a weird
Speaker 1: start to the year. Have you noticed that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's just been I don't know if
Speaker 3: it's if it's just fresh legs. Defenses are a little behind.
Speaker 3: But you know, Donovan's at forty one, Darius is at
Speaker 3: forty six, Carris is at forty seven, Isaac Okoro is
Speaker 3: at forty eight, ty Jerome is at fifty four. Like
Speaker 3: the these things are great and fun, but you do
Speaker 3: expect some drop offs. So I think those are the
Speaker 3: things that I'm kind of keeping my eye on, and
Speaker 3: I'm just going to keep keeping my eye on the
Speaker 3: clutch stuff.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: Are they going to start slowing down again when their
Speaker 3: legs are tired late later in the year, reverting with
Speaker 3: those bad habits, or are they going to continually run
Speaker 3: offense get good looks which they have been through the stretch.
Speaker 3: You know, I think those are the big things. You know,
Speaker 3: there there's some knits to pick on the back line,
Speaker 3: you know, you know if if Niang is you know,
Speaker 3: they don't have a lot of big man depth. Like
Speaker 3: it's funny because everyone talks about them as this big,
Speaker 3: big team, but you know they really only have two
Speaker 3: centers on the roster, and one of them starts for
Speaker 3: them at Power Forward, you know, because Tristan Thompson is
Speaker 3: much more of a veteran leader than a guy that
Speaker 3: you really want to be playing twenty minutes a game.
Speaker 3: What happens to this team if Evan Mobley misses three
Speaker 3: weeks due to injury, or Jared Allen is having a
Speaker 3: series where he just can't hang for whatever. You know,
Speaker 3: he's having a bad series and you want him closer
Speaker 3: to twenty minutes a game, not not you know, thirty two,
Speaker 3: thirty four, Like that's the one like roster piece where
Speaker 3: I go, This feels a little shallow.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: I feel pretty good about them at the guard I
Speaker 3: feel pretty good about them at the wing. But the bigs,
Speaker 3: you know, like you know a guy, you know, a
Speaker 3: guy that you know Mike co hosts Justin, I've talked
Speaker 3: about a loies man. How nice would a Larry Nanceby
Speaker 3: on a team like this? So you know a guy
Speaker 3: who can play a little four or five because they
Speaker 3: just don't have any four or fives on the roster
Speaker 3: other than Evan, And like, ultimately you do want him
Speaker 3: playing a lot of minutes at the power forward because
Speaker 3: that's a big part of your team's identity. So those
Speaker 3: are my knits to pick. But man, do they feel
Speaker 3: nitpicky right now?
Speaker 1: I thought there was a quality nitpicking a jockey from
Speaker 1: Ucarter for an undefeated team.
Speaker 2: It's a hard job. I thought you did good.
Speaker 1: You know, the Donovan Mitchell thing with it's kind of
Speaker 1: delicate because I have overwhelmingly been positive about it because
Speaker 1: I've seen so many examples this year where he's willing
Speaker 1: to stand on the side un lets somebody go to work,
Speaker 1: which has been a huge moment of growth him. And
Speaker 1: but at the same time, like staying mobile and moving
Speaker 1: around and doing his job and doing something like, uh
Speaker 1: has been bad. He's been our best player. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: nitpickiest things, but yeah, even on the bad possessions too.
Speaker 1: Like I always like, I always have a little bit
Speaker 1: of grace for that sort of thing, and you take
Speaker 1: that away from him. Yeah, And like, also there is
Speaker 1: something to be said about a score, like wanting to
Speaker 1: feel the basketball a little bit, like they're like it's
Speaker 1: like it's like, for instance, like I've always hated the
Speaker 1: right shoulder fade from Lebron in the post, Like I
Speaker 1: feel like he's never made it more than thirty two
Speaker 1: thirty three percent of the time. I feel like he
Speaker 1: settles for it way too often. But I have always
Speaker 1: just been okay with Lebron taking three or four kind
Speaker 1: of BS shots a game where he's just kind of
Speaker 1: feeling out his like kind of like creative shot making,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Because then again, I want
Speaker 1: him to feel a little bit more comfortable when it
Speaker 1: if he does end up in a late clock situation
Speaker 1: at the end of a game and and he's created
Speaker 1: a shot. So like there's always a delicate balance between
Speaker 1: letting a score field the ball and like, Okay, you're
Speaker 1: starting to co opt too many possessions. We need to
Speaker 1: get back into our flow. And so it's always complicated.
Speaker 1: But I do think Donovan has done a good job
Speaker 1: for our last topic today. I'm just gonna I'm just
Speaker 1: going to take the Devil's advocate stance, and I do
Speaker 1: kind of feel this way, but it's just way too
Speaker 1: early in the season. I just want to see a
Speaker 1: lot more basketball. But let's say I'm like, Okay, I
Speaker 1: think Boston's way better than Cleveland.
Speaker 2: And here's why. I think that. Inevitably they can.
Speaker 1: Do their you know, killer whale hunt the matchup game
Speaker 1: and consistently get to situations where they can attack Garland
Speaker 1: and space to get the defense in rotation, pull Jared
Speaker 1: Allen and Evan Mobley further away from the rim. They
Speaker 1: have the ability on defense to do a lot more switching.
Speaker 1: They have connectivity there too. We know that they're going
Speaker 1: to do something like put Jason Tatum or put Jason
Speaker 1: Tatum on Jared Allen like they did last year, and
Speaker 1: probably put Porzingis on Evan Mobley and have him just
Speaker 1: sit around the basket. We know that there's like a
Speaker 1: formula here for Boston. What is Can you make a
Speaker 1: case for our viewers why you think Cleveland should be
Speaker 1: on Boston's tier or if you don't think that they
Speaker 1: should be explained how close you think they are?
Speaker 3: Okay, So I do think Boston is just far and
Speaker 3: away the best team in the league. I'm not I'm not.
Speaker 3: I don't got my blinders on that hard. You are
Speaker 3: giving me the opportunity to eric grievance though. That's fun,
Speaker 3: which is that I don't know why everyone's acting like
Speaker 3: the Indiana Pacers were the best challenge Boston got all
Speaker 3: last year when they swept them and we ran Boston
Speaker 3: off their home floor.
Speaker 2: Ye give me.
Speaker 3: Absolutely destroyed them in that game and then played the
Speaker 3: rest of the series less healthy than any Boston opponent.
Speaker 3: We had the best offense against Boston in the playoffs
Speaker 3: last year. We're the only team that consistently scored on them,
Speaker 3: even with no Donovan Mitchell for the back half the series,
Speaker 3: even with no Jared Allen the entire series. Like I
Speaker 3: feel like I'm taking crazy pills here, you know, Like
Speaker 3: we didn't have Darius Garland in Game five. We literally
Speaker 3: were running kros We have Caroselaburton game five like, like
Speaker 3: this team actually made Boston work really really hard for
Speaker 3: that series win, despite being more depleted than just about anyone.
Speaker 3: I think that the Two Bigs is the ultimate kind
Speaker 3: of panacea for Boston ball, like as far as one
Speaker 3: it can be found, because they you know the big
Speaker 3: thing about Boston is they get rim pressure, They suck
Speaker 3: you in, They kick it out for three, and the
Speaker 3: best way to do that is to keep to not
Speaker 3: have to go three, you know, two on the ball.
Speaker 3: And the Calves do a great job between switching and tagouts,
Speaker 3: between just literally being able to cover ground where Evan
Speaker 3: can stunt in to stop rim pressure and get out
Speaker 3: and contest a three point shot. Don great at that too, Yes,
Speaker 3: Jarrett can do that at a high level. You know,
Speaker 3: I think Boston's has levers to pull. It's not like
Speaker 3: the Calves don't have. You know, I think Boston would
Speaker 3: absolutely be favored in a series because you know, they
Speaker 3: can work to get switches where you know, Darius or
Speaker 3: Donovan or guarding Jalen or Jason. But like, if I'm
Speaker 3: any team in the league, I'd rather die to Tatum
Speaker 3: Iso mid range pull ups than to any other thing
Speaker 3: that Boston does, you know, And I think the Calves
Speaker 3: are best suited to bait Boston into their worst habits
Speaker 3: and that might not get you through a series. But
Speaker 3: like compared to all these other teams who like Boston
Speaker 3: can take away the best stuff they do, I don't
Speaker 3: think that's the case for for Cleveland. You know, I
Speaker 3: think they're their size in the front court. They're actually
Speaker 3: the only team that's bigger whose size can really affect
Speaker 3: Boston in the front court because they don't just have
Speaker 3: the one big that they can throw Porzingis on. They've
Speaker 3: got Evan and like, Evan's gonna make Jason Tatum guard him. Yeah,
Speaker 3: you know they can. They can attack the offensive glass.
Speaker 3: They have tools in their toolkit and frankly, as great
Speaker 3: as Drew holiday uh And and Derek White are at
Speaker 3: the point of attack. I got to say, going from
Speaker 3: the Orlando series where they had Jalen Suggs, that insane
Speaker 3: bulldog guarding them, Boston felt easier. They are easier to
Speaker 3: attack from the perimeter than a team like Orlando. And
Speaker 3: that's you know, Drew is just Drew does his best
Speaker 3: against the bulky, strong guys, you know, like the change.
Speaker 3: You know, Donovan was able to get to the rim
Speaker 3: at will until he got hurt in that series. Darius
Speaker 3: wasn't because Darius was like a shell of himself through
Speaker 3: the back half of the year. But I think that,
Speaker 3: you know, it's actually not a bad matchup for them,
Speaker 3: even though you look at their offense comes from the
Speaker 3: two great guards. Boston has two great defenders I think
Speaker 3: the things that make Derek White and Drew great. You know,
Speaker 3: they're they're good defender. You know, they're ninetieth percentile defenders
Speaker 3: on Darius and Donovan, but they're not one hundredths percentile defenders.
Speaker 3: I do think that matters in a series where the
Speaker 3: margins are as thin as they are in the playoffs.
Speaker 1: Orlando is a defensive monster. I'm glad you brought that up.
Speaker 2: That is there.
Speaker 1: They ran some of the ugliest offense in that series
Speaker 1: that I've ever seen, and there are times where I'm like,
Speaker 1: what are you guys doing?
Speaker 2: But their defense, there's no denying that they're they're.
Speaker 3: Physically just as the best guard defender in the league
Speaker 3: agree with.
Speaker 1: You, one hundred percent agree with you. They've got size, strength,
Speaker 1: they're great at rebounding, they can switch, they do all
Speaker 1: this kind of stuff. The case you made against I
Speaker 1: think makes a lot of sense in the sense that
Speaker 1: like Kenny Atkinson's kind of the perfect guy for the
Speaker 1: job in terms of switching, containing scramming out of mismatches
Speaker 1: on the back end, and just basically trying to bait
Speaker 1: them into pull up jump shots. And like I do
Speaker 1: think Donovan Mitchell is capable of out executing Jason Tatum
Speaker 1: in a seven game series in the clutch. But I
Speaker 1: think you're right. I think Boston would deserve to be favored.
Speaker 1: It's just that Cleveland is encroaching on that tier in
Speaker 1: a major way. Interestingly enough, I was pulling up, but
Speaker 1: I had to read a Draft Kings ad yesterday and
Speaker 1: they had the Calves as the second favorite to win
Speaker 1: the NBA Cup. So I was like, huh, I want
Speaker 1: to back into the hell yeah mans. So I wanted
Speaker 1: to look at the title odds and they actually have
Speaker 1: him tied for seventh right now with the Suns. I'm
Speaker 1: surprised by that. So they have the Thunder and Celtics
Speaker 1: ahead of them to be expected, the Knicks are ahead
Speaker 1: of them, the Nuggets are ahead of them, the MAVs
Speaker 1: ahead of them, and the Timberwolves.
Speaker 2: Like, here's the thing.
Speaker 1: I'm a huge Anthony Edwards fan. I don't know, I
Speaker 1: don't know what you could have seen this year to
Speaker 1: make you think the Timberwolves are a bigger title threat
Speaker 1: than Cleveland compared to the way Cleveland's been playing.
Speaker 3: Listen, man, you get I think, ultimately, here's what it
Speaker 3: comes down to. You and I you know, I am
Speaker 3: low on my grievance quote compared to the rest of
Speaker 3: the fan base on this because the reality is, they
Speaker 3: got embarrassed in a playoff series, and even though that
Speaker 3: was two years ago, even though they won a playoff series,
Speaker 3: they haven't had that, no doubt, ask kicking of a
Speaker 3: playoff series yet, you know, because Orlando. And again I
Speaker 3: picked Cabs in seven against Orlando because I think Orlando
Speaker 3: is awesome. But the reality is if they had beaten
Speaker 3: Orlando in five, I'll bet those odds are different, you know.
Speaker 3: But they we have not seen this Cabs team go
Speaker 3: up a level in the postseason yet. In fact, we've
Speaker 3: really only seen them under especially on their offense. We've
Speaker 3: only seen their offense go down in the postseason. And
Speaker 3: I understand that especially for a team that's not going
Speaker 3: to be a public team like the Cap. You know,
Speaker 3: we're not in a glamour market like you kind of
Speaker 3: have to go take it. You have to go take
Speaker 3: that that perception win, you know. So I think there
Speaker 3: will remain skepticism about the ceiling of this team until
Speaker 3: we see more consistent dominance, you know. And like this
Speaker 3: is what I was talking on our last podcast about
Speaker 3: this where I feel like my expectations for this team
Speaker 3: in the most literal sense have not changed since the start,
Speaker 3: which is that I think that they they really should
Speaker 3: be a top two or three seed in the East,
Speaker 3: and I think they should really try to make a
Speaker 3: push towards the conference finals. That would be a successful
Speaker 3: season for me. That's still the same, except how I
Speaker 3: think each series should go on the road to that
Speaker 3: outcome those That's where I've changed. Where it's like instead
Speaker 3: of you know, if you pull Philly in the first round,
Speaker 3: if you lock up the one or the two seed
Speaker 3: and you pull Philly in the first round, maybe at
Speaker 3: the beginning of the year like just happy to win,
Speaker 3: where I'm like now, like that's a wounded team and
Speaker 3: I think they're a tier better than them. They need
Speaker 3: to win to kick their butt. Yep, yeah, they should
Speaker 3: kick butt. They should beat these you know tier. You know,
Speaker 3: if if we're gonna pretend, if we're going to say
Speaker 3: the Cabs are kind of in a tier of their
Speaker 3: own right now, at least in the where the season
Speaker 3: is right now, they certainly are, then they should be
Speaker 3: dominant of the teams and the tiers below them. Uh,
Speaker 3: they if they get to a conference finals show down
Speaker 3: with Boston, just hanging shouldn't be enough. You should make
Speaker 3: them sweat. Yeah, you should see six or seven game series.
Speaker 3: Yeah you need you need to have them really have
Speaker 3: to be great to beat you like that. So, like
Speaker 3: it's even though the literal outcome isn't different, like I do,
Speaker 3: think expectations have changed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's it's fascinating because coming into the season,
Speaker 1: I had Boston, New York, Milwaukee, Philly as like this tier,
Speaker 1: and then I had Cleveland, Orlando and Indiana as like
Speaker 1: this tier. And that's completely jumbled for me to start
Speaker 1: the year. Like to me, I think the Calves are
Speaker 1: clearly better basketball teams than Philly and Milwaukee, like I,
Speaker 1: like you said, I think they're just on a completely
Speaker 1: different tier. The Knicks, I'm always like, brand new basketball team.
Speaker 1: Give them a lot of time.
Speaker 2: You know, weird.
Speaker 3: They're a weird team that has to figure out who.
Speaker 1: They are exactly, So like, who the heck knows what's
Speaker 1: going on with them in the long run. But I
Speaker 1: think there's like a legitimate case to like definitively stay
Speaker 1: Cleveland's the second best team in the East behind Boston,
Speaker 1: and that just was not how I felt going into
Speaker 1: the season. And if anything, it almost feels like a
Speaker 1: different tier at this point. It feels like Boston and
Speaker 1: Cleveland and then there's the rest of the East and
Speaker 1: so and even though it's been somewhat of a small
Speaker 1: sample size, it's been there's been enough big wins. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think the Lakers are as good as Golden
Speaker 1: State to start this year, but I think Golden State
Speaker 1: and LA are two pretty good teams that didn't just
Speaker 1: go into Cleveland and get beat. They went into Cleveland
Speaker 1: and got humiliated.
Speaker 2: Like that is that is like.
Speaker 1: It's there's something special going on there. But Carter, I
Speaker 1: think you did an absolutely fat dealous job of educating
Speaker 1: our listeners on what it's been like being on this
Speaker 1: ride to start this year. Before we get out of here,
Speaker 1: why don't you tell everybody about the Chase Down Pod
Speaker 1: where they can find it and some of the stuff
Speaker 1: you and Justin have been working on.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so, you know, pretty simple Chase Down pod on Twitter.
Speaker 3: We are you know, we're on the Cavs YouTube channel.
Speaker 3: We go live about twice a week on there, and
Speaker 3: you can obviously find us on whatever your preferred podcast platform.
Speaker 3: As yeah, we go twice week during the season and
Speaker 3: do a lot of immediate postgame reactions which is really fun.
Speaker 3: And yeah, it's it's been a lot of fun so
Speaker 3: far this year.
Speaker 2: Dude. That was awesome.
Speaker 1: Everybody head over to the Caves YouTube channel and subscribe
Speaker 1: to you guys can watch the Chase Down podcast.
Speaker 2: That is all we have for today.
Speaker 1: We're going to be back tomorrow morning with just a
Speaker 1: couple of game breakdowns from the Wednesday night slate, as
Speaker 1: well as another episode of Temp's tape. As always, we
Speaker 1: sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting the show.
Speaker 2: We will see you then.
Speaker 3: The volume. What's up guys.
Speaker 1: As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting
Speaker 1: Hoops tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us
Speaker 1: if you guys would take a second and leave a
Speaker 1: rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys
Speaker 1: supporting us, but if you could take a minute to
Speaker 1: do that, I'd really appreciate it.