The Cleveland Cavaliers have not been playing how we’ve been seeing them play for much of this season over a number of weeks, even prior to the team/Cleveland hosted the All-Star Weekend festivities.
The Wine and Gold are still currently in sixth place in the Eastern Conference, but they’ve lost eight of their last 11 games, and their defense has not been close to the same. In that span, Cleveland is 24th in defensive rating, as compared to them ranking fourth in that metric for the season.
Granted, for the team overall, them not having Darius Garland initially post-All-Star break (lower back soreness), and the Cavaliers still not having Caris LeVert yet because of a foot sprain has not helped their cause.
Garland has been back since, but he the offensive inconsistencies Cleveland has had hasn’t exactly put their defense in the best positions, and to make matters worse, now All-Star 5 man Jarrett Allen is out indefinitely with a finger fracture. He is out indefinitely and could miss the rest of the regular season, and sustained a quad contusion as well in Cleveland’s win last Sunday over the Toronto Raptors.
The Cavaliers will have to push forward, though, as the East is so competitive, and the way things are trending, Cleveland is going to have quite a challenge ahead from here.
In any case, when looking back on this past week’s slate of games, in which the Cavs went 1-2, not factoring in that Raptors game, there still were some positives, and a clear standout performer was big-time for the Wine and Gold. We’ll take a closer look at that Cavalier here, in that realm.
Evan Mobley made his presence felt with an expanded role with Allen out, and the rookie was the Cleveland Cavaliers Player of the Week for March 7-13.
The Cavaliers’ last two losses in their Friday-Saturday back-to-back at the Miami Heat and Chicago Bulls were far from great from the team overall, and Garland had some really rough stretches due to defensive pressure and attention, but Mobley did play well.
With Allen out, Evan Mobley has played far more at the 5, which is his more natural position, and while the Cavaliers can’t replace what Allen brings, Mobley did make a big impact on offense, in particular.
In his three games this week, he had 22 points on 8-of-15 shooting at the Indiana Pacers on Tuesday, and he knocked in 6-of-8 free throws. Along with that, he came up with a number of crucial plays throughout the game defensively, en route to having a whopping five steals, and tacked on three assists on the other end.
At the Heat, although I’m not going to say there weren’t some hiccups defensively, and it’s an adjustment for him to not be switching as much with Allen out, to protect the rim, he did still provide his share offensively, and had 19 points and 12 rebounds. He had four assists also, to go with a steal and a block, but the passing from Mobley continues to stand out for the Cavaliers, especially, and he’s only going to get better with more experience in that area.
And from there, even with Nikola Vucevic having 20 points and 14 boards on Saturday, in what is a tough matchup, and with Mobley feasibly having to help in other areas, Mobley did have 17 points and seven boards.
Needless to say, it was a strong week from Mobley, all things considered. He was also a plus-6 at Indiana and plus-7 at Chicago, for what it’s worth (at Miami, he was a minus-9).
Regarding other notable performers this week, Garland did have his moments at Miami still, and was good in the second half at Chicago, and most notably, was incredible at Indiana, with a career-best 41 points and tacked on 13 assists. It was largely a less than stellar last two games for him, though, and it’s evident that there’s such a heavy workload for him, and the lack of LeVert, to go with Collin Sexton, doesn’t help.
From there, Kevin Love did have a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds in a start at Chicago filling in for Lauri Markkanen, who was out due to ankle soreness, and Love was solid at Miami with 10 points, eight rebounds and two assists in 22 minutes off the bench. It’s been tougher of late for him to get freed up, however, and the Cavs should probably try to involve him in pick-and-pops more in coming games, as our own Amadou Sow suggested, particularly with Allen out.
In relation to others, I did think Isaac Okoro did do a solid job on defense, but there unfortunately were some miscommunications involving screens that couldn’t enable him to stay as attached, and with the lack of Allen, that didn’t help wing defenders, either.
As an aside, anyhow, I do have to give Lamar Stevens his credit for his big defensive plays at Indy, where his two blocks and defensive efforts were crucial, and especially one right near the end, as our own Justin Brownlow alluded to. But he fouling from Stevens on jump shooters is something he’ll need to clean up, objectively.
Well, circling back, while the Cavaliers again need to get some things fixed here, and be able to give Garland some more relief as shooters, it has been nice to see Mobley step up of late, and rebound from what was previously a difficult offensive stretch for him.
I do still firmly believe when it’s all said and done, Evan will end up being the Rookie of the Year this season, with how he’s been able to affect games in a plethora of ways. That’s for the vast majority of the season, at least.