It’s always an interesting discussion with Cleveland Cavaliers fans when they start talking about the player rotation decisions from head coach J.B. Bickerstaff. The Cavs are having a successful season so far standing at 42-27 and in 4th place in the Eastern Conference so some credit has to be given to the players and coach for reaching this point. However, recent moves made by the Cavs head coach by not playing a couple of key bench players including Cedi Osman and Dean Wade will ultimately hurt the team as they move into the playoffs for the first time in five seasons.
It’s been so frustrating to see Bickerstaff continually keep Wade and Osman, two key Cavs reserves, glued to the bench.
There’s been a lot of negative attention paid to the Cavs bench and trying to paint this picture that the bench is horrible. Granted the Wine and Gold’s bench scoring production is ranked 29th this season, but, some of that has to do with Bickerstaff only giving his bench players 79.8 minutes per game, which is 26th in the league.
Teams like the Phoenix Suns, Brooklyn Nets, and Milwaukee Bucks all use their bench much more. The Bucks average 92.3 minutes per game while the Suns average 87 minutes.
All this is to point out that, while the numbers show a poor bench, and that may be true to a certain degree, it also has to do with a head coach that is not playing his players off that bench enough to where they can make a dent. You have to build a bench over time and Bickerstaff hasn’t been willing to build that group. Instead, he keeps trying to plug players in with no consistency.
In the last week or two, he has settled on two players, Lamar Stevens and Caris LeVert, to play the most bench minutes. He’s sprinkled in Ricky Rubio too, but he’s left the rest of the group riding the pine. Two of those players are Osman and Wade and as I just mentioned, and keeping them idle is a bad move by Bickerstaff.
Dean Wade
The most fascinating part to me at this point is the conversation about how Wade, not so much Osman, has lost his confidence and thus Bickerstaff had to make the move to putting Lamar Stevens into that slot as a bench forward that had been Wade’s for a good chunk of the season. However, that take is so far from the truth.
When I heard from one fan that Wade passed on taking a layup recently and thus, he’s become a terrible player, just makes no sense.
These NBA players are in the league for a reason and that’s because they are the best of the best. Just because a player misses a layup or makes a decision that you don’t understand doesn’t mean it was the wrong call. As for Wade, Bickerstaff started stripping him of his minutes significantly a few weeks ago and then has him now riding the bench the rest of the way this season it appears.
It’s certainly a fall from grace and is a very bizarre decision by the coach. When fans suggest a loss in confidence in the player because he’s not shooting the ball, in the case of Wade it had a lot more to do with time on the court or lack thereof. Of course, your confidence will be rattled when a coach does that to you at any level.
In the first nine games after Kevin Love left to go to the Miami Heat, Wade was averaging about 25 minutes a game and went 13-of-32 from three-point range, which was 40.6%. Then Bickerstaff started pulling back the minutes and he only averaged 12 minutes and he stopped shooting the ball and thus the unfair criticism.
While some of you will blame the player, this whole situation with Wade has far more to do with Bickerstaff’s decision. He’s the head coach and he can do what he wants but it will hurt his team in the end.
Wade’s calling card is his defense and that will be missed if Bickerstaff chooses to not play him anymore. Stevens is also a great defender but for a team to go far in the playoffs, you need good consistent team defense, and you won’t get that for the long haul if you leave Wade on the bench.
Cedi Osman
Another player that has been mismanaged by Bickerstaff is Cedi Osman. When you look at Osman’s minutes by game over the course of this season, there is no rhyme or reason for any of it. As a player, that has to have an effect on your psyche. As I said earlier, these are NBA players and the very best but how Osman has been used all season has been a horrible coaching decision.
Osman has had 28 games of less than 20 minutes and 37 games of more than 20 minutes. You talk about a roller coaster, then look no further than this case study. How are players like Osman, a three-point specialist, supposed to knock down that three-pointer if they are being used in inconsistent ways. In the recent game against the Charlotte Hornets, Osman got a nice seven minutes in the first half and knocked down a three and then never saw the court again.
Since Feb. 15, Osman has played in seven games. In that time, he’s also been a DNP three other games and didn’t play at all. Of those seven games, he had two games where he had single digit minutes. You can’t do anything when given five minutes on the floor.
Osman isn’t known for his defense, and I can understand why he might not be used but he’s a good shooter and can produce points quickly, but he still needs like 15-20 minutes every night. The fact that many nights Cavaliers fans are pulling their hair out and complaining about the bench is a problem.
But, conversely, I believe more of the complaints should be directed to the coach, because he hasn’t shown all season long he knows how to manage that group. So, the fan excuse that it’s because the players are terrible doesn’t make much sense.