Dean Wade is a better player than Sam Merrill.
That's true in an objective sense. Wade is one of the most underrated defensive players in the league, capable of defending any frontcourt position at an elite level. He makes smart passes, he rebounds well, and he is comfortable taking 3-point shots.
Yet the playoff reality is that when Wade is on the court, teams are comfortable putting smaller players on him, particularly players who cannot hold up defensively against dangerous perimeter threats. Wade can hit a decent amount of shots from outside, but he isn't an elite shooter, and he isn't sprinting off of screens as a movement shooter to force a defender to stay with him on every step, fake and shimmy.
Merrill, of course, is exactly that kind of lethal movement shooter. He races around the court, curling off of screens ready to pull up and launch a shot from anywhere. That understandably puts a lot of stress on opposing defenses, and prevents team from aggressively helping off of them or stashing a slower / less attentive player on him.
That's a reality that didn't matter much in the regular season, but is suddenly coming to the forefront -- and the Cavaliers are not the only team that is learning that lesson.
The Cavaliers and Warriors are changing their lineups
There are few bigger fans of Moses Moody outside of the Moody family than me. He is without question one of the Golden State Warriors' top five players, and his two-way ability on the wing should make him a part of nearly every Warriors lineup when the chips are down.
While head coach Steve Kerr has often marginalized Moody for other players, this season he has come back to him and Moody has been a starter for the second half of the season alongside Jimmy Butler. Moody's combination of defense, rebounding, hustle and shooting make him an ideal complementary piece alongside the team's stars.
In the Warriors' first-round series against the Houston Rockets, however, Butler took a hard fall and missed much of Game 2 and all of Game 3. In that third game, with the Warriors playing at home without their co-star and needing a win, Kerr changed his starting lineup. Moody was out. And down the stretch of the game, Kerr went to a lineup that included veteran shooter Buddy Hield, not Moody, playing on the wing.
Moody is a better player than Hield. He also doesn't make some of the same boneheaded mistakes that Hield makes when trying to dribble the basketball. Yet what Hield does better than almost anyone in the league is his off-ball movement -- he's not on Steph Curry's level because no one in NBA history is, but he is the next tier down.
That forced the Houston Rockets into matchups they didn't want; no longer could they stash center Alperen Sengun on Moody and allow him to help inside. He couldn't possibly chase Hield around the court and through screens. Instead, he has to defend a player like Draymond Green who can then easily transition into the 2-man game with Curry.
It used to be that non-shooters would get played off the court. The next evolution for NBA playoff basketball is here, where even good shooters can be safe hiding places if they are not elite. The movement shooter thus becomes all the more valuable, as the Warriors are finding to gain the advantage on the Rockets in a hardfought series against an elite defense.
The Cavaliers are not locked into a battle in the first round; they are trouncing the outmatched Miami Heat, even with Darius Garland missing Game 3. Yet part of that separation has come because Kenny Atkinson didn't waste any time folding in a playoff adjustment, lowering the minutes for Dean Wade (and Isaac Okoro, to some extent) and increasing them for Sam Merrill.
Again, it's not that Wade is a worse player, but that Merrill's specific skillset makes it dangerous for the Heat to stash a terrible defender like Tyler Herro on him. And since Merrill can himself hold up on defense, the Cavaliers are having their cake and eat it too.
If Garland cannot go on Monday, Merrill may get another playoff start. That's an amazing rise from a player no one wanted a few seasons ago to starting in the playoffs. Kenny Atkinson is already coaching a brilliant playoffs, and he was the first to take action on the new NBA playoff strategy that could unlock an even higher ceiling for the Cleveland Cavaliers.