After Wednesday night’s Cavs/Mavs game what have we learned? To the average fan, maybe it was it that the Mavs are simply a much stronger team or that the Cavs have trouble sustaining energy when it plays back-to-back games. But if you’re Plain Dealer columnist Bud Shaw, maybe it was that LeBron James just doesn’t have the appropriate fear of failure?
Shaw in his most recent column used the loss to Dallas on Wednesday, as well as the loss in Charlotte, to dump on James’ supposed inability to finish off games. But with the silent recognition that he wasn’t exactly the first to write that flawed observation, Shaw put a different spin on it by playing pop psychologist. According to Shaw, what separates James and Dirk Nowitzki and hence, why one team is better than the other, centers around a fear of failure. Nowitzki, the heart and soul of his team, is more motivated to succeed because failure bothers him more than it does James.
The column by Shaw was so ridiculous it could have been written by Bill Livingston. All it needed was some obscure reference to Philadelphia and an out-of-context homage to the cheese steak sandwich. But the biggest flaw in Shaw’s thesis is the underlying premise: the reason people are driven to success is because they fear failure. Ironically, Shaw doesn’t seem similarly driven but that’s a different column for a different day.
There is, of course, any number of reasons why a person is driven to succeed and it doesn’t always derive from the fear of failing. Pride, for example, comes to mind as a powerful force. Being true to one’s self and the desire to give forth one’s best effort at all times isn’t always done because the individual fears the results. Rather, there is tremendous self-satisfaction in a job well done that is separate and apart from any concern over what result is ultimately achieved.
Similarly, the attainment of goals or the desire to achieve the intended results are just as much drivers for success than their first cousin, the fear of the bad result. But the concepts are distinctly different. Perhaps that really is the root of the difference between James and Nowitzki. Their drive to be the best takes a much different path. That isn’t necessarily meant to praise one at the expense of the other, it’s just to illustrate that motivation and drive are an intensely personal issue that varies, often widely, by individual.
In the case of James, the fact that he does not lose sleep over a missed shot or opportunity hardly relegates him to the loser pile. But this is essentially the argument that Shaw and others before him have advanced: James just doesn’t seem to care as much as, say, Michael Jordan or, now, Dirk Nowitzki. As silly as this seems, it is now serving as legitimate discourse in the columns of your local daily.
But beyond a flawed premise, Shaw’s column is frustrating for his rather selective use of examples. He notes James’ failure at the end of the Charlotte game and essentially implies that it did not push James into some sort of otherwordly performance against the Mavs. But that is a rather poor way to describe James’ unusual cold streak during the first three quarters of the game. Maybe his shot just wasn’t falling. It happens. Just ask the aforementioned Nowitzki, who is shooting 50% on the season but was only 9 of 24 Wednesday night.
Shaw also fails to mention that James essentially took over in the fourth quarter, scoring 17 of his 31 points. But for James’ performance during that period, the game would have ended in a blowout. But James can’t do it alone. The play of the bench Wednesday night was awful. At one point midway through the fourth quarter, the Cavs lineup featured three players (Marshall, Gibson and Varejao) who had yet to score. Talk about the key to the loss. But that telling statistic collides with Shaw’s premise so it was ignored.
Shaw also failed to mention the way in which James elevated his game and that of his teammates late in the third quarter and early in the fourth against Utah Saturday. Utah is a pretty fair team and seemed headed to a sloppy victory as the Cavs were seemingly sleepwalking again through another game. Then came a series of powerful, thunderous dunks from James that literally changed the face of the game and propelled the team to victory. But since no last second shot was needed for the victory, the game and James contribution to that victory doesn’t get mentioned in Shaw’s column, presumably because it collides with the premise.
There is no question that there have been missteps by James at key points in various games. In the first Dallas game, for example, James missed two relatively easy three-point shots that could have brought home a tough road win. But picking out these exceptions while simultaneously failing to note the other contributions paints a rather incomplete picture of one of the NBA’s best players. And as even Shaw should know, no matter what James personally accomplishes, until the Cavs have a roster that rivals that of Dallas, that picture will never be complete.
This is really one of the key takeaways from Wednesday’s night game. But there were plenty of others as well. The lack of team energy in the second of back-to-back games suggests that head coach Mike Brown still isn’t in full control of which buttons to push. Larry Hughes’ is mired in a miserable shooting slump of such proportions that he often seems loss. The Cavs bench is scary inconsistent and is likely to be their Achilles heel come playoff time. But if Shaw and anyone else ignores these and thinks instead that the key to the Cavs problems is teaching James to fear failure, then for them the wait for a NBA title in Cleveland just got that much longer.
Showing posts with label Cavs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cavs. Show all posts
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Monday, February 26, 2007
In Defense of LeBron
With all this kvetching about LeBron James, one would think that he’s averaging more turnovers than points these days. You can pretty much take your pick from the various sports web sites, chat boards or sports talk shows and you undoubtedly will stumble upon someone with an opinion on what’s supposedly wrong with LeBron, as if the premise itself is even valid.
There are two answers, take your pick. Here’s the first: nothing. Here’s the second: it’s that he’s LeBron, a victim of his own unparalleled success.
Perhaps the most pertinent antecedent to the questions about LeBron James was the questions about another amazing superstar, Tiger Woods in 2004. As most might recall, Tiger Woods was in a horrific slump, at least to those who thought Woods should win every week. He had fired his swing coach Butch Harmon, got engaged to a Swedish nanny and suddenly he was 0-10 in the major championships as he entered the 2005 season. Just as with LeBron and perhaps even more so, virtually every sports commentator with a microphone or a keyboard had a theory about what was wrong with Woods, even if the those commentators knew little about professional golf. This despite the fact that Woods had finished second in the World Golf Rankings in 2004 and was fourth on the money list with a mere $5.3 million in earnings.
Nevertheless, they branded Woods a fool for tinkering with one of the sweetest swings ever. They questioned his sanity when he fired Harmon and hired Hank Haney, even if they couldn’t tell Butch Harmon from Tommy Harmon or Hank Haney from Mr. Haney. They openly speculated that his off-course activities were interfering with his ability to prepare. And don’t even get anyone started about the Swedish nanny and what that was probably doing to his stamina. Tiger, for his part, said little other than he was working on “some things,” which only seemed to frustrate the peanut gallery even more.
Of course, the air went out of that story when Woods went on to win the Masters and the British Open in 2005 and then won the British again the next year as well as the PGA Championship. Suddenly he was a genius again and no one, positively no one, was talking about his swing coach or his marriage. In the end, Woods was never the problem. It was the self-proclaimed golfing experts and the casual golf fans whose outsized and unreal expectations had placed Woods on a pedestal that no one could ever reach.
That’s pretty much the territory LeBron finds himself in these days. There is no disputing, for example, that his numbers are down virtually across the board. But it’s not as if the current numbers are lousy. He’s still one of the five best players in the league by virtually any measure you can think of. He’s still number one on the CBS Sportsline power rankings. But for his detractors, this is hardly good enough.
One of the most scathing criticisms recently came from ESPN columnist Bill Simmons who gave LeBron a thumb down after the All Star game and said, suspiciously without attribution other than to some unknown “connected” NBA types:
To LeBron James, who coasted through the Skills Challenge on All-Star Saturday and played the All-Star Game with the uplifting, charismatic intensity of a female porn star trying to break one of those "most male partners in one afternoon" records. Could we end up putting him in the "Too Much, Too Soon" Pantheon some day? Will he become the basketball version of Eddie Murphy, Britney Spears, Michael Jackson and every other celeb who became famous too quickly and eventually burned out?
Before he becomes a global icon, maybe LeBron should work a little harder on his game.
Here's what I know. I had four conversations with connected NBA people over the weekend that centered around the same themes: LeBron isn't playing nearly as hard as he did last season; it looks like his only goal right now is to get his coach fired; he's regressing as a basketball player (especially his passing skills and his shot selection); he made a huge mistake firing his agent and turning his career over to his buddies back home (all of whom are in over their heads); he was a much bigger problem during the Olympics than anyone realized; he doesn't seem to be enjoying himself anymore; he has an overrated sense of his own worth and his own impact in the sports world (as witnessed by the ESPN interview last week when he answered the "What are your goals?" question with two words: "Global icon"); he's been protected by magazine fluff pieces and buddy-buddy TV interviews for far too long; he doesn't have the same relentless drive to keep dominating everyone like Wade and Kobe have; and basically, we're much closer to LeBron re-enacting the career arc of Martina Hingis, Eric Lindros and Junior Griffey than anyone realizes. This will evolve into THE dominant NBA story of the next two months. You watch.
If you take out the direct references to LeBron and the NBA, it sounds exactly like every criticism of Woods in 2004, right down to a controversial firing of one of his entourage and the off-court activities. Perhaps the most outrageous prediction Simmons makes is to say that, with barely three years in the league, LeBron is on his way to becoming more hype than substance.
What Simmons and the rest of the LeBron detractors forget, conveniently, is that no one outside of Tiger Woods ever entered his or her own sport with more hype and expectations (although Michelle Wie is starting to approach that territory), including the aforementioned Hingis, Lindors and Griffey, Jr. Yet, both Woods and LeBron have easily outpaced that hype by simply performing at levels of sustained greatness from virtually the first day they stepped on their respective fields of play. But these days, apparently, even that isn’t good enough.
This bashing of LeBron is fascinating stuff and speaks more to outlandish expectations than rationale discourse. At this point, Lebron’s a veteran, but he’s still a very young veteran, barely 22 years of age. Dwayne Wade, by comparison is 24. That may not seem like much, but look back on your own life. If you weren’t much more mature at 24 than 22 then it’s time to grow up, Peter Pan. And while many talk about Wade’s continued ascension, keep that in context as well. Simply put, put Shaquille O’Neal on the Cavs and you could probably substitute Wade’s name in Simmons’ column.
For another comparison, look at Carmelo Anthony, about seven months older than LeBron. Anthony is still incredibly immature for his age and while a huge offensive talent and an elite player in the league, Anthony played in his first All Star game just this year and it took a David Stern holding his nose and looking the other way to accomplish that. And it wasn’t because Anthony didn’t have the numbers. It was because his relative lack of maturity and discipline resulted in a meltdown and an ensuing 15-game suspension. This isn’t to bash Anthony at the expense of LeBron. It’s merely to present the complete picture. In the end, ask yourself, would you trade LeBron even up for Carmelo? Didn’t think so.
If you still aren’t satisfied with these answers, consider another: his teammates and/or his coach. There are times, many times, when his teammates have the same outsized expectations of his talent. As a result, they spend too much time simply standing around on the offensive end waiting for LeBron to do something. That tends to keep the ball in LeBron’s hands even when he’d rather pass to someone heading toward the basket. With the shot clock inevitably winding down, LeBron then settles for still another jumper while his teammates stand idly by.
But whether you place this on LeBron’s teammates or his coach is your prerogative. They’re both probably to blame in equal measure. The least culpable is LeBron himself. Since he was in high school, LeBron has been the kind of player who takes his craft very seriously. He revels in getting others involved. He knows he’ll get his points so he often looks to pass first and shoot second. But either head coach Mike Brown and/or LeBron’s teammates just can’t seem to fathom how to utilize that kind of talent to its fullest and instead ask LeBron to do everything but sell slurpees at halftime. Talk about being in a can’t win situation.
The Cavs may be the most consistently inconsistent team in the league, but it is ridiculous to lay that on LeBron’s already overburdened back and shoulders. The truth is, the Cavs need better players and without them, even exceeding his own lofty accomplishments to date is not going to suddenly make the Cavs an odds-on favorite to with the NBA championship.
There are two answers, take your pick. Here’s the first: nothing. Here’s the second: it’s that he’s LeBron, a victim of his own unparalleled success.
Perhaps the most pertinent antecedent to the questions about LeBron James was the questions about another amazing superstar, Tiger Woods in 2004. As most might recall, Tiger Woods was in a horrific slump, at least to those who thought Woods should win every week. He had fired his swing coach Butch Harmon, got engaged to a Swedish nanny and suddenly he was 0-10 in the major championships as he entered the 2005 season. Just as with LeBron and perhaps even more so, virtually every sports commentator with a microphone or a keyboard had a theory about what was wrong with Woods, even if the those commentators knew little about professional golf. This despite the fact that Woods had finished second in the World Golf Rankings in 2004 and was fourth on the money list with a mere $5.3 million in earnings.
Nevertheless, they branded Woods a fool for tinkering with one of the sweetest swings ever. They questioned his sanity when he fired Harmon and hired Hank Haney, even if they couldn’t tell Butch Harmon from Tommy Harmon or Hank Haney from Mr. Haney. They openly speculated that his off-course activities were interfering with his ability to prepare. And don’t even get anyone started about the Swedish nanny and what that was probably doing to his stamina. Tiger, for his part, said little other than he was working on “some things,” which only seemed to frustrate the peanut gallery even more.
Of course, the air went out of that story when Woods went on to win the Masters and the British Open in 2005 and then won the British again the next year as well as the PGA Championship. Suddenly he was a genius again and no one, positively no one, was talking about his swing coach or his marriage. In the end, Woods was never the problem. It was the self-proclaimed golfing experts and the casual golf fans whose outsized and unreal expectations had placed Woods on a pedestal that no one could ever reach.
That’s pretty much the territory LeBron finds himself in these days. There is no disputing, for example, that his numbers are down virtually across the board. But it’s not as if the current numbers are lousy. He’s still one of the five best players in the league by virtually any measure you can think of. He’s still number one on the CBS Sportsline power rankings. But for his detractors, this is hardly good enough.
One of the most scathing criticisms recently came from ESPN columnist Bill Simmons who gave LeBron a thumb down after the All Star game and said, suspiciously without attribution other than to some unknown “connected” NBA types:
To LeBron James, who coasted through the Skills Challenge on All-Star Saturday and played the All-Star Game with the uplifting, charismatic intensity of a female porn star trying to break one of those "most male partners in one afternoon" records. Could we end up putting him in the "Too Much, Too Soon" Pantheon some day? Will he become the basketball version of Eddie Murphy, Britney Spears, Michael Jackson and every other celeb who became famous too quickly and eventually burned out?
Before he becomes a global icon, maybe LeBron should work a little harder on his game.
Here's what I know. I had four conversations with connected NBA people over the weekend that centered around the same themes: LeBron isn't playing nearly as hard as he did last season; it looks like his only goal right now is to get his coach fired; he's regressing as a basketball player (especially his passing skills and his shot selection); he made a huge mistake firing his agent and turning his career over to his buddies back home (all of whom are in over their heads); he was a much bigger problem during the Olympics than anyone realized; he doesn't seem to be enjoying himself anymore; he has an overrated sense of his own worth and his own impact in the sports world (as witnessed by the ESPN interview last week when he answered the "What are your goals?" question with two words: "Global icon"); he's been protected by magazine fluff pieces and buddy-buddy TV interviews for far too long; he doesn't have the same relentless drive to keep dominating everyone like Wade and Kobe have; and basically, we're much closer to LeBron re-enacting the career arc of Martina Hingis, Eric Lindros and Junior Griffey than anyone realizes. This will evolve into THE dominant NBA story of the next two months. You watch.
If you take out the direct references to LeBron and the NBA, it sounds exactly like every criticism of Woods in 2004, right down to a controversial firing of one of his entourage and the off-court activities. Perhaps the most outrageous prediction Simmons makes is to say that, with barely three years in the league, LeBron is on his way to becoming more hype than substance.
What Simmons and the rest of the LeBron detractors forget, conveniently, is that no one outside of Tiger Woods ever entered his or her own sport with more hype and expectations (although Michelle Wie is starting to approach that territory), including the aforementioned Hingis, Lindors and Griffey, Jr. Yet, both Woods and LeBron have easily outpaced that hype by simply performing at levels of sustained greatness from virtually the first day they stepped on their respective fields of play. But these days, apparently, even that isn’t good enough.
This bashing of LeBron is fascinating stuff and speaks more to outlandish expectations than rationale discourse. At this point, Lebron’s a veteran, but he’s still a very young veteran, barely 22 years of age. Dwayne Wade, by comparison is 24. That may not seem like much, but look back on your own life. If you weren’t much more mature at 24 than 22 then it’s time to grow up, Peter Pan. And while many talk about Wade’s continued ascension, keep that in context as well. Simply put, put Shaquille O’Neal on the Cavs and you could probably substitute Wade’s name in Simmons’ column.
For another comparison, look at Carmelo Anthony, about seven months older than LeBron. Anthony is still incredibly immature for his age and while a huge offensive talent and an elite player in the league, Anthony played in his first All Star game just this year and it took a David Stern holding his nose and looking the other way to accomplish that. And it wasn’t because Anthony didn’t have the numbers. It was because his relative lack of maturity and discipline resulted in a meltdown and an ensuing 15-game suspension. This isn’t to bash Anthony at the expense of LeBron. It’s merely to present the complete picture. In the end, ask yourself, would you trade LeBron even up for Carmelo? Didn’t think so.
If you still aren’t satisfied with these answers, consider another: his teammates and/or his coach. There are times, many times, when his teammates have the same outsized expectations of his talent. As a result, they spend too much time simply standing around on the offensive end waiting for LeBron to do something. That tends to keep the ball in LeBron’s hands even when he’d rather pass to someone heading toward the basket. With the shot clock inevitably winding down, LeBron then settles for still another jumper while his teammates stand idly by.
But whether you place this on LeBron’s teammates or his coach is your prerogative. They’re both probably to blame in equal measure. The least culpable is LeBron himself. Since he was in high school, LeBron has been the kind of player who takes his craft very seriously. He revels in getting others involved. He knows he’ll get his points so he often looks to pass first and shoot second. But either head coach Mike Brown and/or LeBron’s teammates just can’t seem to fathom how to utilize that kind of talent to its fullest and instead ask LeBron to do everything but sell slurpees at halftime. Talk about being in a can’t win situation.
The Cavs may be the most consistently inconsistent team in the league, but it is ridiculous to lay that on LeBron’s already overburdened back and shoulders. The truth is, the Cavs need better players and without them, even exceeding his own lofty accomplishments to date is not going to suddenly make the Cavs an odds-on favorite to with the NBA championship.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Of Questionable Strategy
As the Cleveland Cavaliers approach the All Star break, they are on pace to win 48 games, two less than last year. Presumably, if the chat boards and sports talk shows are any gauge, this would be a major disappointment. But the real question is whether this disappointment is based on unreasonable self-inflicted high expectations or objectively indicates a step back.
The mission statement for this year’s statement was essentially ripped from the George W. Bush playbook: Stay the Course. The thought process was that another year of seasoning, coupled with the additions of the two young draft choices, naturally would lead to an even better result this year, particularly if Larry Hughes remained healthy.
But this always seemed like a tenuous theory, the kind of luck and hope strategy usually reserved for our friends in Berea. Instead, given the lack of moves made by the Cavs in the offseason, the belief here was that whether or not the Cavs significantly improved on their 50-win season of a year ago highly depended on the schedule. Back before the first game of the season, the following was noted:
So if you insist on dissecting the Plain Dealer's NBA preview supplement in today's paper for insight into how the Cavs will finish, don't look to the idle words of the self-annoited experts. We suggest you look solely at the schedule. You know that the Cavs will play on the road 41 times. That means that, at best, that will account for 20 wins because if there is one thing that is more true in the NBA than in any other sport, it's that the home court advantage is more pronounced. Next, look at how many times the Cavs play back-to-back games, particularly when the second game is on the road and even more particularly when they are both on the road. If there is anything even more true about the NBA than home court advantage, is that back-to-back games are greeted with about as much enthusiasm as a Thanksgiving trip to the in-laws. That should account for another 10 losses right there. In short, if the Cavs are as good as advertised, they'll win around 50-52 games. If they fall short of expectations, meaning they lose more games at home than anticipated, then they'll be in the 46-48 win range. Again, though, this is mostly meaningless because they'll make the playoffs either way.
At the moment, this prediction is looking pretty solid. The Cavs right now are winning 74% of their home games, compared with 75% all of last year, essentially a wash. The slight difference right now is on the road. With last night's loss to Utah, Cleveland is winning 40% of its road games to this point and last year they won 46%. Thus, the Cavs need to go 9-7 on the road the rest of the season to equal last year’s road win total and overall win percentage, assuming they continue to win at the same clip at home.
But in the grand scheme, the Cavs are likely to end this season in similar shape as last season and with a similar playoff seeding. The only real difference comes elsewhere in the conference. Toronto currently leads the Atlantic Division which was won last year by New Jersey. Similarly, Washington now leads the Southeast Division where last year they finished behind Miami. And Chicago currently has a better record than Miami, meaning Chicago would have the 5th seed and Cleveland would retain the 4th seed.
Given the make-up of the entire Eastern Conference, the real impediment at the moment to Cleveland making the NBA finals, even with its current line up, still remains Detroit. And that is the rub. When Danny Ferry chose to stay the course, he offered a strategy that failed to present any logical reason, beyond the power of hope, as to why that would be enough to overcome the Pistons. To this point in the season, the Cavs look no closer to solving the Pistons than they did last year. If anything, they seem to be further away.
It makes nice conversation on a snowy February day to further dissect what’s supposedly wrong with the Cavaliers. But objectively, nothing so much is wrong as most fans simply drank the Kool-Aid once again, wanting to believe that things would automatically get better. But when one views the season in terms of what has actually been accomplished to this point in relation to last year, it’s very clear that the only thing really wrong was another failed strategy by another Cleveland general manager.
The mission statement for this year’s statement was essentially ripped from the George W. Bush playbook: Stay the Course. The thought process was that another year of seasoning, coupled with the additions of the two young draft choices, naturally would lead to an even better result this year, particularly if Larry Hughes remained healthy.
But this always seemed like a tenuous theory, the kind of luck and hope strategy usually reserved for our friends in Berea. Instead, given the lack of moves made by the Cavs in the offseason, the belief here was that whether or not the Cavs significantly improved on their 50-win season of a year ago highly depended on the schedule. Back before the first game of the season, the following was noted:
So if you insist on dissecting the Plain Dealer's NBA preview supplement in today's paper for insight into how the Cavs will finish, don't look to the idle words of the self-annoited experts. We suggest you look solely at the schedule. You know that the Cavs will play on the road 41 times. That means that, at best, that will account for 20 wins because if there is one thing that is more true in the NBA than in any other sport, it's that the home court advantage is more pronounced. Next, look at how many times the Cavs play back-to-back games, particularly when the second game is on the road and even more particularly when they are both on the road. If there is anything even more true about the NBA than home court advantage, is that back-to-back games are greeted with about as much enthusiasm as a Thanksgiving trip to the in-laws. That should account for another 10 losses right there. In short, if the Cavs are as good as advertised, they'll win around 50-52 games. If they fall short of expectations, meaning they lose more games at home than anticipated, then they'll be in the 46-48 win range. Again, though, this is mostly meaningless because they'll make the playoffs either way.
At the moment, this prediction is looking pretty solid. The Cavs right now are winning 74% of their home games, compared with 75% all of last year, essentially a wash. The slight difference right now is on the road. With last night's loss to Utah, Cleveland is winning 40% of its road games to this point and last year they won 46%. Thus, the Cavs need to go 9-7 on the road the rest of the season to equal last year’s road win total and overall win percentage, assuming they continue to win at the same clip at home.
But in the grand scheme, the Cavs are likely to end this season in similar shape as last season and with a similar playoff seeding. The only real difference comes elsewhere in the conference. Toronto currently leads the Atlantic Division which was won last year by New Jersey. Similarly, Washington now leads the Southeast Division where last year they finished behind Miami. And Chicago currently has a better record than Miami, meaning Chicago would have the 5th seed and Cleveland would retain the 4th seed.
Given the make-up of the entire Eastern Conference, the real impediment at the moment to Cleveland making the NBA finals, even with its current line up, still remains Detroit. And that is the rub. When Danny Ferry chose to stay the course, he offered a strategy that failed to present any logical reason, beyond the power of hope, as to why that would be enough to overcome the Pistons. To this point in the season, the Cavs look no closer to solving the Pistons than they did last year. If anything, they seem to be further away.
It makes nice conversation on a snowy February day to further dissect what’s supposedly wrong with the Cavaliers. But objectively, nothing so much is wrong as most fans simply drank the Kool-Aid once again, wanting to believe that things would automatically get better. But when one views the season in terms of what has actually been accomplished to this point in relation to last year, it’s very clear that the only thing really wrong was another failed strategy by another Cleveland general manager.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Insanity Is Not a Strategy
If Terry Pluto isn’t the best sportswriter in town, he’s at least the hardest working. His columns appear in the Akron Beacon Journal with such annoying frequency that you kind of get the sense that he’s being paid by the word. Still, most of what he says is worth reading and he often brings a perspective that you simply can’t find elsewhere.
All that being said, it’s difficult to completely grasp the point of his column Tuesday morning regarding Cavs head coach Mike Brown. (See column here) On the surface he appears to be supporting Brown during these somewhat turbulent times facing the Cavs. But beneath the surface he seems to be posing a question that no one has yet specifically asked: do the Cavs need to fire Mike Brown?
To this point, and other than some minor rumblings on the local sports talk stations, there doesn’t seem to be any real consideration being given by anyone of replacing Brown as the coach. Yet there was Pluto setting up the straw man and then seemingly knocking it down with ease by pointing out the general ineffectiveness of interim coaches. In fact, the defense of Brown was so effortless that it made one wonder if Pluto’s real aim was to at least start the debate over whether Brown is the right coach for this team.
Maybe the question is being raised because owner Dan Gilbert still suffers somewhat from a reputation as an activist owner with little patience. That impression was forged soon after Gilbert took over when he immediately dumped a grumpy and intransigent Paul Silas as head coach. But since then Gilbert has remained mostly behind the scene, allowing General Manager Danny Ferry to guide the action. Brown is Ferry’s guy and there is scant evidence, at best, suggesting either that Ferry is unhappy with Brown or, more generally, that Brown at all is the main problem plaguing this team.
It’s understandable the attention the Cavs rather dour play has drawn lately. The Browns seem to be forever engaged in a game of chasing their own tail and pitchers and catchers don’t report to Winter Haven for another few weeks. But regime change seems a little drastic to even be discussing at this point, unless everybody is at least convinced of two key points: 1. there is another coach currently available that is objectively better than Brown; and, 2. that this team, as currently constructed, is underachieving.
It’s always difficult to tell, of course, whether there is a better coach available. The answer to that question usually is a qualified “yes” irrespective of who the current coach is. Likely there is any number of coaches, usually current assistants, just waiting to break through and odds are that one of them will be a great coach. Finding that person, of course, is the difficult part, but pretending that there usually isn’t someone better is simply naïve. The better and more pertinent issue is whether this hypothetically better coach can do more with what is currently on the roster than Brown. It’s here that doubts enter.
A strong consensus seems to be emerging that Ferry’s working assumption going into the season was flawed—that another year of growth coupled with a healthy Larry Hughes would magically elevate this team past the second round of the playoffs. In many ways, it’s the same assumption Indians GM Mark Shapiro made entering into the 2006 season and we all saw how that turned out. Shapiro has since spent the off-season filling holes and bringing in veterans to complement a young team with some talent. Now, of course, some corners are screaming that he’s not giving “the kids” the chance to develop, so it appears that Shapiro can’t win either way. The point though is that standing pat while other teams around you continue to adjust has a better chance of succeeding if your team was already of championship caliber. Whatever one thinks of the Cavs last season, it was clear that talent-wise they were not a championship team and neither were the Indians at the end of 2005.
The silence coming from Ferry’s office these days is deafening. It’s doubtful that he’s ducking the media. More likely, he’s spending every waking moment trying to figure out how to find a credible point guard without otherwise stripping away other key elements. Given the Cavs salary situation and its lack of draft picks, making a deal that can spark the team like Flip Murray did last year is a long shot.
If a deal is not in the offing, the only other option for the Cavs is for Brown to rethink his personnel. To this point he’s been reluctant, hoping against hope that a stronger defensive effort holds the key and that somehow Eric Snow’s skills will quit diminishing. And this is where Brown needs to be most careful. As a young coach he needs to learn that altering his philosophies is not a sign of weakness, rather it’s a sign of strength. If Ferry can’t make any meaningful maneuvers, Brown needs to adapt to his players rather than continuing to try to pound square pegs into round holes. This is a lesson that the best coaches in every sport eventually learned and is what Brown needs to learn quickly if he’s going to quell talk of his being replaced. Continuing to do the same things in the same way but hoping for a different result is not a strategy. It’s the definition of insanity.
All that being said, it’s difficult to completely grasp the point of his column Tuesday morning regarding Cavs head coach Mike Brown. (See column here) On the surface he appears to be supporting Brown during these somewhat turbulent times facing the Cavs. But beneath the surface he seems to be posing a question that no one has yet specifically asked: do the Cavs need to fire Mike Brown?
To this point, and other than some minor rumblings on the local sports talk stations, there doesn’t seem to be any real consideration being given by anyone of replacing Brown as the coach. Yet there was Pluto setting up the straw man and then seemingly knocking it down with ease by pointing out the general ineffectiveness of interim coaches. In fact, the defense of Brown was so effortless that it made one wonder if Pluto’s real aim was to at least start the debate over whether Brown is the right coach for this team.
Maybe the question is being raised because owner Dan Gilbert still suffers somewhat from a reputation as an activist owner with little patience. That impression was forged soon after Gilbert took over when he immediately dumped a grumpy and intransigent Paul Silas as head coach. But since then Gilbert has remained mostly behind the scene, allowing General Manager Danny Ferry to guide the action. Brown is Ferry’s guy and there is scant evidence, at best, suggesting either that Ferry is unhappy with Brown or, more generally, that Brown at all is the main problem plaguing this team.
It’s understandable the attention the Cavs rather dour play has drawn lately. The Browns seem to be forever engaged in a game of chasing their own tail and pitchers and catchers don’t report to Winter Haven for another few weeks. But regime change seems a little drastic to even be discussing at this point, unless everybody is at least convinced of two key points: 1. there is another coach currently available that is objectively better than Brown; and, 2. that this team, as currently constructed, is underachieving.
It’s always difficult to tell, of course, whether there is a better coach available. The answer to that question usually is a qualified “yes” irrespective of who the current coach is. Likely there is any number of coaches, usually current assistants, just waiting to break through and odds are that one of them will be a great coach. Finding that person, of course, is the difficult part, but pretending that there usually isn’t someone better is simply naïve. The better and more pertinent issue is whether this hypothetically better coach can do more with what is currently on the roster than Brown. It’s here that doubts enter.
A strong consensus seems to be emerging that Ferry’s working assumption going into the season was flawed—that another year of growth coupled with a healthy Larry Hughes would magically elevate this team past the second round of the playoffs. In many ways, it’s the same assumption Indians GM Mark Shapiro made entering into the 2006 season and we all saw how that turned out. Shapiro has since spent the off-season filling holes and bringing in veterans to complement a young team with some talent. Now, of course, some corners are screaming that he’s not giving “the kids” the chance to develop, so it appears that Shapiro can’t win either way. The point though is that standing pat while other teams around you continue to adjust has a better chance of succeeding if your team was already of championship caliber. Whatever one thinks of the Cavs last season, it was clear that talent-wise they were not a championship team and neither were the Indians at the end of 2005.
The silence coming from Ferry’s office these days is deafening. It’s doubtful that he’s ducking the media. More likely, he’s spending every waking moment trying to figure out how to find a credible point guard without otherwise stripping away other key elements. Given the Cavs salary situation and its lack of draft picks, making a deal that can spark the team like Flip Murray did last year is a long shot.
If a deal is not in the offing, the only other option for the Cavs is for Brown to rethink his personnel. To this point he’s been reluctant, hoping against hope that a stronger defensive effort holds the key and that somehow Eric Snow’s skills will quit diminishing. And this is where Brown needs to be most careful. As a young coach he needs to learn that altering his philosophies is not a sign of weakness, rather it’s a sign of strength. If Ferry can’t make any meaningful maneuvers, Brown needs to adapt to his players rather than continuing to try to pound square pegs into round holes. This is a lesson that the best coaches in every sport eventually learned and is what Brown needs to learn quickly if he’s going to quell talk of his being replaced. Continuing to do the same things in the same way but hoping for a different result is not a strategy. It’s the definition of insanity.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
The Missing
It’s a long season, irrespective of the sport, and sometimes a loss is just a loss. But every so often a certain loss has a way of staying with you like an undercooked Stadium hot dog. Wednesday night’s Cavs loss to Philadelphia seems to have fallen into that category.
In this regard, Terry Pluto’s column in the Akron Beacon Journal was right on the mark. Something was missing in the Cavaliers performance against the hapless Philadelphia 76ers. Remember, Philadelphia is a depleted and dispirited team with one of the worst records in the league. They were playing on the road in the second of back-to-back games. That should spell rout no matter how the players are shuffled. Yet the Cavs found a way to keep Philadelphia around long enough to allow them to eek out the win.
If the Cavs underachieve this season, which seems to be the one constant in Cleveland sports that you can bank on, fans likely need not look beyond last night’s game to figure out why. No matter what schemes, offensive or defensive, that head coach Mike Brown seems to employ, when the game is on the line the Cavs always look like just four guys in Cleveland uniforms standing around hoping LeBron James will do something great.
James, who had a season high 39 points Wednesday night, should have won the game in regulation but his final shot rattled out of the rim. In a way, though, it’s probably a good thing the shot didn’t go in. A last second victory likely would have masked what appear to be deepening problems with this team as it struggles to meet the accomplishments of last season.
There were, of course, the usual culprits in last night’s loss, poor defense and even worse offense. But those are the technicalities. The fact is that these players either cannot or will not respond to what Brown is asking of them. And that has to be of paramount concern to both GM Danny Ferry and owner Dan Gilbert.
The guess here is that Ferry is feverishly working to find this year’s Flip Murray, a player who can come in and provide some sort of spark. That even may work again but it’s starting to look like the issues are more systemic than that. But addressing these kinds of core issues is extremely difficult, particularly in the middle of the season. Moreover, it’s not as if the exact problem is as obvious as they are for, say, the Cleveland Browns. Likely it has as much to do with the mix of players on this team as it does with Brown and his coaching style.
In many ways, it is reminiscent of the problems plaguing the Cleveland Indians, particularly last year. Just as with the Cavs and their offensive woes, it was easy to point to the Indians and say the problem, of course, was the bullpen. And while neither point is particularly wrong, the strong feeling is that something more fundamental was missing but pinpointing the source is proving to be just as elusive as finding good beer at reasonable prices.
Fortunately for the Cavs, the NBA’s Eastern Conference is looking more and more like the weak sister to the Western Conference. Toronto leads the Atlantic Division despite playing less than .500 ball. Only two teams are above .500 in the Southeast Division while four teams in the Central are above that line, but all barely so. At this point in the season, none look to be even competitive with teams like Phoenix or Dallas.
But that’s what makes this all the more frustrating. The Cavs have a golden opportunity to assert themselves as an elite team but continue to play down to their level of competition instead. True, just before embarking on their west coast swing the Cavs were playing their best basketball of the season. But even then you got the sense that there is no way they could rip off a string of 12 or 15 straight victories like both Phoenix and Dallas have done this season.
But because the conference is so relatively weak, the Cavs do have the luxury of time to figure it out. With the joke of a system that passes for the post-season in the NBA, only the real drecks of the league, like the Cavs pre-LeBron, are likely to find themselves sitting at home when the regular season ends. But unless something dramatic happens and soon, Clevelanders are likely to once again find themselves watching a ticker tape parade being celebrated in some other city at season’s end. And the real kick is that even with their problems, the Cavs still are the best team Cleveland has to offer. Oy vey.
In this regard, Terry Pluto’s column in the Akron Beacon Journal was right on the mark. Something was missing in the Cavaliers performance against the hapless Philadelphia 76ers. Remember, Philadelphia is a depleted and dispirited team with one of the worst records in the league. They were playing on the road in the second of back-to-back games. That should spell rout no matter how the players are shuffled. Yet the Cavs found a way to keep Philadelphia around long enough to allow them to eek out the win.
If the Cavs underachieve this season, which seems to be the one constant in Cleveland sports that you can bank on, fans likely need not look beyond last night’s game to figure out why. No matter what schemes, offensive or defensive, that head coach Mike Brown seems to employ, when the game is on the line the Cavs always look like just four guys in Cleveland uniforms standing around hoping LeBron James will do something great.
James, who had a season high 39 points Wednesday night, should have won the game in regulation but his final shot rattled out of the rim. In a way, though, it’s probably a good thing the shot didn’t go in. A last second victory likely would have masked what appear to be deepening problems with this team as it struggles to meet the accomplishments of last season.
There were, of course, the usual culprits in last night’s loss, poor defense and even worse offense. But those are the technicalities. The fact is that these players either cannot or will not respond to what Brown is asking of them. And that has to be of paramount concern to both GM Danny Ferry and owner Dan Gilbert.
The guess here is that Ferry is feverishly working to find this year’s Flip Murray, a player who can come in and provide some sort of spark. That even may work again but it’s starting to look like the issues are more systemic than that. But addressing these kinds of core issues is extremely difficult, particularly in the middle of the season. Moreover, it’s not as if the exact problem is as obvious as they are for, say, the Cleveland Browns. Likely it has as much to do with the mix of players on this team as it does with Brown and his coaching style.
In many ways, it is reminiscent of the problems plaguing the Cleveland Indians, particularly last year. Just as with the Cavs and their offensive woes, it was easy to point to the Indians and say the problem, of course, was the bullpen. And while neither point is particularly wrong, the strong feeling is that something more fundamental was missing but pinpointing the source is proving to be just as elusive as finding good beer at reasonable prices.
Fortunately for the Cavs, the NBA’s Eastern Conference is looking more and more like the weak sister to the Western Conference. Toronto leads the Atlantic Division despite playing less than .500 ball. Only two teams are above .500 in the Southeast Division while four teams in the Central are above that line, but all barely so. At this point in the season, none look to be even competitive with teams like Phoenix or Dallas.
But that’s what makes this all the more frustrating. The Cavs have a golden opportunity to assert themselves as an elite team but continue to play down to their level of competition instead. True, just before embarking on their west coast swing the Cavs were playing their best basketball of the season. But even then you got the sense that there is no way they could rip off a string of 12 or 15 straight victories like both Phoenix and Dallas have done this season.
But because the conference is so relatively weak, the Cavs do have the luxury of time to figure it out. With the joke of a system that passes for the post-season in the NBA, only the real drecks of the league, like the Cavs pre-LeBron, are likely to find themselves sitting at home when the regular season ends. But unless something dramatic happens and soon, Clevelanders are likely to once again find themselves watching a ticker tape parade being celebrated in some other city at season’s end. And the real kick is that even with their problems, the Cavs still are the best team Cleveland has to offer. Oy vey.
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