Cleveland Cavaliers: Poor preseason, unresolved issues hint at long year
By Chris Parker
The Cleveland Cavaliers have made noises this year like they expect to compete for one of the last Eastern Conference playoff spots and the press, in a sign of goodwill, have indulged them. That makes little sense, as making the postseason will be really difficult for this team.
The press point to how bad the East is, and make some noise about Kevin Love returning for the Cleveland CavaIiers. I suppose because Love made such a difference to those lottery Minnesota Timberwolves teams while he was there.
Even lining up the fellow cellar dwellers by their two best scorers doesn’t suggest much, if any, talent gulf.
While it’s arguable whether Kristaps Porzingis/Tim Hardaway Jr. (New York Knicks), Kemba Walker/Nicolas Batum (Charlotte Hornets), Evan Fournier/Aaron Gordon (Orlando Magic) and Zach LaVine/Lauri Markkanen (Chicago Bulls) are any better, they don’t sound demonstrably less promising than Kevin Love/Rodney Hood. Only the Atlanta Hawks with their Taurean Prince/Kent Bazemore cornerstone pairing appears to be definitively worse.
There are a lot of other reasons to wonder about the relative positioning of the Cavaliers with respect to other probable Eastern Conference lottery teams. Most of them are defensive, though LeBron James’ departure looms large as well.
The first issue that comes to mind is the interior defense (or really, lack thereof). Last season, with James’ athleticism and shot blocking and free safety-like threat on the weak side, Cleveland still was bottom ten in opponent paint points per game, per NBA.com.
It will be a big problem again this season.