The Cleveland Cavaliers have righted the ship.
After beginning its ballyhooed 2014-2015 season just 19-20, LeBron James and company have gone 29-7 – the league’s best record over that timeframe. Though defensive improvement spurred by the January addition of Timofey Mozgov has received most attention for Cleveland’s turnaround, its actually dominance on the other end that has the Cavaliers looking like a title contender.
The offensive rating of David Blatt’s team since its low point 10 weeks ago is 111.4, a mark that tops the league and sits comfortably ahead of more heralded offenses like those of the Golden State Warriors, Los Angeles Clippers, and Atlanta Hawks. For so much consternation regarding Kevin Love’s lack of involvement and Cleveland’s penchant for devolving into isolation basketball when the going gets tough, the Cavaliers have become the historically elite offensive unit so many expected them to be upon James’ return to Northeast Ohio.
But media narrative cares not for such success, and will always ruffle feathers when any opportunity to do so presents itself. During an appearance on the B.S. Report recently, ESPN’s Brian Windhorst created a minor frenzy by noting the means of which Cleveland has become basketball’s best offense.
Surprise! Blatt isn’t calling the shots for his club; LeBron is basically its player-coach. Here’s Windhorst:
The Princeton offense that David Blatt installed in the preseason, they just threw it out. What typically happens is that LeBron will take the ball and LeBron will call the play. David Blatt will see what play LeBron calls and then he’ll repeat it to the team. That happens on a regular basis.
And the hysteria resumes.
Anyone who has been watching the Cavaliers all season long is only using Windhorst’s remarks as confirmation for their eye-test. James isn’t only Cleveland’s primary ballhandler but its primary in-game strategist, too, a role he’s occupied for the majority of his career – even during his most comfortable seasons under Erik Spoelstra utilizing the Miami Heat’s “pace and” space offense. Elements of the Princeton-based, motion-style attack that Blatt implemented with ease for the Cavs’ Summer League squad are fleeting at the very most.
What many outlets reporting on Windhorst’s comments, though, have conveniently left out of their coverage is that Cleveland leaves most timeouts running sets that he’s drawn up. This one against the Brooklyn Nets last week was especially beautiful:
LeBron even showed his coach some love following this brilliant sideline ATO in crunch-time versus the Los Angeles Clippers a couple months back:
Despite what the layman would have you believe, Blatt isn’t some helpless patsy. He’s simplified the Cavaliers’ offense from what he envisioned with a helping hand from James, an occurrence hardly uncommon for many newly constructed teams that feature a ball-dominant superstar.
Does that mean Cleveland will always play this brand of offense? Hardly. The 2010-2011 Heat didn’t exactly boast the free-flowing, ball-moving attack that took supreme advantage of LeBron’s post preeminence that later editions of the team did. Teams are always evolving – especially ones that consist of multiple stars and a first-time NBA coach.
But another Windhorst quote from later in the podcast won’t help the public calmly accept that reality. Asked by Simmons if he gets the sense that James and his teammates sometimes ignore Blatt’s instructions and defer to lead assistant Tyronn Lue and others in the huddle, Windhorst confirmed that long-standing sentiment and then some.
Yeah… [LeBron] has gotten himself to a place where he knows ‘these are my responsibilities, this is what I’m gonna do, and I’m gonna try to get this team to a certain level, and David Blatt only figures into part of that.’
However, Windhorst then repeats his belief that the Cavaliers have become increasingly effective out of timeouts mostly due to Blatt’s play-calling prowess – an opinion that James holds, too.
Where do these incendiary remarks Cleveland? Exactly where they were before – as something close to co-favorites in the Eastern Conference and one of several teams that have legitimate championship aspirations.
Now, Windhorst’s intel is a reminder that things are more tenuous with the Cavaliers than they are for the league’s competing elite. Perhaps this supposed undercurrent of tension boils over in the playoffs and Cleveland falls apart entirely. But that seems as likely a possibility as Blatt and James coming closer together than ever and leading their team to a title.
It’s a common and tired sports idiom that “anything is possible” in the postseason. For the Cavaliers, though, that trope seems to ring especially true.
