The Pressure Is On LeBron James To Create His Own Space With J.R. Smith Out

LeBron James doesn’t want anyone to try to play J.R. Smith’s role but that’s exactly what has happened and needs to continue.

J.R. Smith will be out four to six weeks following a successful surgery to repair a fracture in his right thumb.

Luckily for the Cleveland Cavaliers, the team has played well without Smith, perhaps better. Yet, without Smith in the lineup they lose one of the best shooters in NBA history.

That’s likely why, when speaking about Smith’s injury after their recent victory over the Milwaukee Bucks, James said he doesn’t want other players trying to play Smith’s role. Yet, as he’s undoubtedly noticed, without Smith on the floor there’s just a little less space for everyone to attack. That is unless LeBron James creates his own space by being a three-point threat himself.

In a worst-case scenario, that keeps Smith out until close to the All-Star Break.

With the NBA trade deadline coming within days of the All-Star Break, that means that the Cavs will have the three-point shooting of Iman Shumpert and Mike Dunleavy Jr., two players that have the type of value and expendability that will make them viable trade assets for the team as Cavs’ general manager David Griffin tries to acquire a backup point guard for the defending champs. So there’s no need to expect any changes during Smith’s absence. Well, unless Griffin finds the right point guard, according to Cleveland Cavaliers’ head coach Tyronn Lue. Or if the team struggles without Smith.

The latter is less likely to happen as the Cleveland Cavaliers look like a balanced squad in the absence of Smith. With 6-foot-6 combo guard and defensive stud DeAndre Liggins in the starting lineup between Kyrie Irving and LeBron James, the unit’s overall production is tops in the league.

This is mostly because of his superior defensive ability in comparison to Smith, who has regressed as a defender this year due to both injuries and a greater defensive tenacity. To watch Liggins play defense is to watch a player like Patrick Beverley play defense, though Liggins is trying to pattern his defense after the renowned lockdown defender Tony Allen. Liggins will pick up his man fullcourt and do whatever it takes to stay in front of his man, harassing him until he gives up the ball or attempts a foolhardy shot against suffocating defense.

There’s a difference offensively as well.

Offensively, where Smith has the flourescent green light to shoot and takes full advantage of his role, Liggins is a willing shooter but more often is spotted sitting in the corner in a decoy-like fashion. Instead of a long, contested three-point attempt from Smith, the Cavs are keeping the ball in the hands up the Big Three. James, Irving and Kevin Love have been more efficient scorers than Smith and it makes sense that the Cavs offense would be more efficient with those three taking the bulk of the shots in Smith’s absence.

Nonetheless, the three-point threat Smith provides can’t be understated. With his average shot coming 21.8 feet away from the rim, combined with shooting 37.5 percent from three-point range over his career and his knack for knocking down the contested ones, Smith keeps the defense stretched so that James can attack the rim freely. Meanwhile, most of his threes come from above the break while Liggins is relegated as a spot-up shooter in the corners. That means that the Cavs will have to rely on the other members of the Big Three to make those deep threes to stretch the defense in the starting lineup.

To this point, Irving and Love attempt a combined 12.1 three-point attempts per game while making above 40 percent of their long distance bombs. James is making 38.0 percent of his threes on 4.8 attempts. The key for the starting lineup will be finding the three-point shooter that Liggins resembles the most out of the starting lineup from the season opener. Based on the unwillingness to shoot it’s James. Based on the locations of his most efficient shots, it’s Love.

Ideally, this would mean that Liggins takes the bulk of his threes from the corner or the top of the key. Luckily, Love won’t have a problem finding his rhythm as he’s a knockdown shooter from everywhere on the floor.

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Which Cav has the best chance at replicating Smith’s ability to knock down the pull-up threes? That would be Irving, who makes 37.1 percent of those types attempts while Smith only has made 27.8 percent of those attempts for this season. Thats down from the 31.1 percent he shot on pull-up threes last year but still a 

So where does that leave James?

In Irving’s role as a part-time catch-and-shoot option and a part-time pull-up option. The key is that James had to shoot efficiently and with a slightly greater volume of threes than he was taking before Smith’s injury. My guess is that’s part of why James took so many threes in his back-to-back games against the Milwaukee Bucks. In those two games, James took 16 three-pointers and made 9. Sure the Cavs were missing Love but they have a bevy of stretch-four options who can thrive in a catch-and-shoot role. James’ extra three-point attempts coincided with the absence of Smith and the subsequent enlargement of his role as a three-point threat.

In the starting lineup, James will have to be a bigger three-point threat in order for the team to keep firing from all cylinders offensively. Based on what the Cavs have seen from the King so far in Smith’s absence, that won’t be a problem at all.

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Will the Cleveland Cavaliers be able to maintain their three-point shooting without Smith? Let us know in the comments section or Twitter @KJG_NBA.

*All stats and data from www.basketball-reference.com and www.nba.com