The Stone In The Sword
Except for their seemingly insatiable need to screw every available hole in the proverbial pooch while employing the best player in the NBA, their clown of an owner, their bratty jersey-burning fanbase, their noxious mustard / ketchup uniforms, and their (hopefully redacted) love of Comic Sans, and maybe some of their players, I don’t have much of a problem with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Which is to say that when they were playing the LA Clippers last week with a chance to break their 26-game losing streak, my non-chalant interest (bordering on full-throttle apathy, really) gave way to rooting like hell for the Clippers to come back and “earn” Cleveland the US professional sports loss record. Allow me to explain why I actually gave a shit.
By now, it’s safe to say that the city of Cleveland was unnecessarily humiliated by LeBron’s Decision talents no one should go through that embarassment etc etc etc. That said, the residents of Cleveland didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory during the aftermath of that debacle. Far be it from me to cosign LBJ’s douchey reap what you sow Tweet regarding CLE’s run of bad luck, but in the wake of what happened post-Decision– the jersey burnings, the unending & very vocal sulking from fans of all stripes,Dan Gilbert’s laughable open letter – it’d be hard to doubt that karma exists. It’s as if the Cavs never realized how good they had it with LeBron, and would rather pout about that unfortunate (albeit not unpredictable) turn of events instead of actually trying to move on.
Honestly, they should be happy the team did as well as it did. Despite doing whatever they could to turn one of the most exciting open-court players the NBA has ever seen into a half-court-offense slug, the Cavs were guaranteed 50+ game winners. They had some nice complementary pieces to go around LeBron, though they were never able to give the team the Pippen-esque second banana many believed they needed. More than anything, though, the Cavs needed ex-coach Mike Brown to run offensive sets that weren’t wearying one-on-five showcases for His Royal Highness. Maybe LeBron James was dogging it during that ignominious playoff series against the Celtics last year, but if I was forced on every possession to continually drive into the teeth of the NBA’s best defense while my teammates (and all my team’s fans) just stood by and waited for something Witness-y to happen, I’d probably consider easing off the gas on a few plays as well.
So maybe I’m luxuriating a little too much in the misery of a now-misbegotten franchise that’s not only lost their franchise’s best player, but (courtesy of injury) more than a few of their other players, including defensive stalwart / walking flop machine Anderson Varejao. (Varejao’s the sort of spastic obnoxious hustle-punk I wouldn’t mind so much if he was doing that nonsense for my favorite team and/or away from my field of vision). They’re not just snake-bitten; they’re snake-swallowed, stewing in its distended belly, waiting for digestion to finally kick in. It’d be hard to not find some sympathy for these dopes.
But then I’m watching the Cavs keep pace with an up-and-coming Clippers team, via the Cavs broadcast. Now, as you might have gathered, I’m a little biased against Cleveland. Nonetheless, the exuberance that the crowd and the broadcasters were luxuriating in as a long-awaited victory seemed at hand started to turn into the sort of self-satisfied smuggery that typified their mien during LeBron’s reign. Granted, I’m basing the existence of this vibe mostly on the shenanigans of the Cleveland broadcasters, who relished every break that went their way, and loved piling on the Clippers’ many misfortunes and miscues. Hearing color commentator Austin Carr sing along to Slade as a fouled-out Baron Davis walked off the court was especially obnoxious, even more than his relentless cavalcade of post-block “get that weak stuff outta here!” exhortations. (I don’t hate all fun, just certain types.) In a league where nearly every local broadcasting team proudly wears their home-team bias on their sleeves, the Cavs TV crew go above and beyond the call of duty.
My bias cuts both ways, however; not only do I find any reason possible to bag on the Cavs, but I’ve found myself jumping on the Clipper bandwagon. I guess I should clarify & say I’m aboard the Blake Griffin Express, because (like anyone with two eyes and a heart) I love watching that guy exhibit his unparalleled combination of strength and grace while throwing down a ridiculous litany of dunks. (Also, I can’t stand the relentless racism of their owner, Donald Sterling, & would rather root for the Clipper players to succeed in spite of his wanton societal incompetence.)
The Clippers are actually a team full of spectacular athletes, though none of them exhibit the polish that Griffin’s already showing despite his lack of experience. Forward / center DeAndre Jordan isn’t quite Griffin’s equal when it comes to dunking, but he ain’t half bad; compared to his rookie season, when he couldn’t walk two feet without getting whistled for three fouls, he’s now a superstar. There’s also lanky forward Al-Farouk Aminu and super-quick guard Eric Bledsoe, two young players whose potential is only matched by their athletic awkwardness. If you like seeing young ballers steamroll their way into bad passes and offensive fouls, tune in when Bledsoe & Aminu are on the floor (& search YouTube for any DeAndre Jordan blooper reels from his rookie year).
Though it’s probably (hopefully) unintentional, these young turks seem to be emulating Baron Davis, a veteran point guard with All-NBA talent and a second-grader’s attention span. One minute, he can execute a behind-the-back fake that players half his age couldn’t pull off; the next, he’ll force a heavily contested three-pointer two seconds into the shot clock. Or he can do what he did in the waning minutes of the Cavs game, making bonehead decision after bonehead decision with the ball (either on the pass or the shot).
Despite their shortcomings, and an awful 1-14 start to the season, the Clippers had become one of the more dangerous teams to play in the league, thanks to Davis’ inspired play at the point (a rare occurrence these days), Griffin’s all-around athletic awesomeness, and the steady scoring of shooting guard Eric Gordon. Unfortunately for the Clippers, Gordon hurt his wrist on January 24th, an injury that’s scheduled to sideline him for at least a month. Without Gordon’s shot in the line-up, the Clippers’ offense becomes decidedly Blake-tastic, with the other teams focusing primarily on defending Griffin and daring the other guys on the court to hit open shots. During one post-Gordon game, the opposing team took to triple-teaming Blake Griffin. & they weren’t even faking the triple team; they were simply going 3-on-1 against him, and daring him to give up the ball to a wide open teammate. Needless to say, that strategy (along with variations on that theme) worked as expected; either Griffin would be forced into a bad shot, or his teammates would fail to hit what looked to be very makeable shots.
Still, a Gordon-less Clippers team should have been able to hold their own against this rather punchless & undermanned Cavalier team. That night, however, the Cavs came out swinging. Antawn Jamison, the guy acquired last year that was supposed to guarantee Cleveland an NBA championship, scored 35 points, including a three-pointer late in overtime that proved to be the game-winning shot. Mo Williams, in his first game back from a hip injury, came off the Cavs bench to score 17 points and dish out 14 assists; most importantly, his ridiculous swagger was back, as if he hadn’t stopped coasting in LeBron’s wake.
The Cavs’ most important player this night, however, was the reliably unreliable JJ Hickson. In addition to contributing on the boards and in the scoring column, he played spectacular defense against Blake Griffin, blocking a couple of his shots down the stretch, & earning a few “weak stuff” shout-outs from Carr. Hickson also had a game-saving block at the end of regulation to send the game into overtime which wasn’t a block. And he also fought for a loose ball in the overtime period, clearly climbing over the back of a Clipper in order to do so yet not getting whistled for his 6th foul while doing so. Again, I might be biased, but I’m not the only one tooting this horn. The calls seemed so clear to my impartial eyes (cough cough), I joked that this game’s turn of events was the 2011 equivalent of the “famous” “frozen envelope.”
But even if David Stern wanted to make sure an NBA team didn’t own the professional loss record, I can’t offer any sort of conspiracy theories with a straight face. Bad calls happen all the time; if you happen to watch a CSN Celtics broadcast, you might start to believe I mean that literally. More importantly, bad teams beat less bad teams all the time, too; just last night, the Cavs stuck it to the defending NBA champions for their 10th victory of the year. To put things in perspective, the Cavs won their 10th game last year on November 21st.
To make things worse, the Cavs don’t have an Eric Gordon mending in the wings, nor do they have a bunch of promising rookies and sophomores that might give fans something to look forward to during these rebuilding years. The Cavaliers were built to win in a very specific way, with a very small window of opportunity. They forced themselves into this particular corner because they weren’t willing to ask themselves the tough questions, especially this one: What would happen if our best player left us in the lurch with a bunch of low-ceiling rookies and underwhelming, overpaid veterans? This isn’t to excuse their lack of foresight, but given the answers they’ve come up with this year, I can see why.
