DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum *** Cavs February Thread ***

Well, he did have "The Shot" last year.

So Game 4 would be won with "The Drive" ...

Game 1 would have to be won after "The Fumble" ... opposing team inbounds the ball for final possession and Lebron steals it for a game icing dunk.

Game 2 ends in bizarre fashion as a drunken Jose Mesa in the stands, chucks his beer at an opposing star player, who then charges up in the stands to confront him. Player gets ejected for the rest of the series, and the game goes down as "The Jose Mesa Game" ... as an added bonus, Jose Mesa gets deported.

Game 3 would be lost after bench player Brian Scalabrine (signed as a FA after the ejection), unexplicably takes the court for the last play, and launches up a poor shot, which airballs to the right of the rim. Cavs win 89-88 ... or also known as "Red Right 88".

i don't put a ton into power rankings but the cavs, surprise to nobody, are #1 for the 7th straight week.

i really think the picture is starting to take shape.

the contenders in the west: LA, Utah, and Denver. spurs an outside chance the rest of those teams, not good enough, okcand memphis need a few more guys and another year or two... phoenix, dallas, and portland i just don't see it.

as far as the east.. i really think it's gonna be cleveland/orlando again for the conference with boston looking like they are about ready to call it quits, and atlanta knows they have zero chance against cleveland, and probably a somewhat better chance against orlando. their biggest hope is that boston gets it together and they get boston and somehow dodge the cavs.

i think thursday is huge. cavs are all but guaranteed a win against nj at the Q tomorrow (you never know, but c'mon) thursday we get the magic at home. one win on the road in orlando already, i think orlando looks to rain on our parade of winning all these games. i expect a full out battle. plus, it is the last game before the break so i think both teams go all out.

If it makes any difference, they are ranked 3rd by Hollinger's rankings, which appears to be more a function of taking into account Strength of Schedule than anything else.


Tomorrow - hopefully we'll come out fast again and break any thoughts the Nets have of putting up a fight.. then we can just cruise to another W.

Thursday - Will be the first real test against Orlando. The last time (Nov 11) we beat em by 9, but they were without 2 players - one being Rashard Lewis. Hopefully The Shaqtus will get inside Howard's head early and get him in fast foul trouble.

recent H/A splits also factor heavily in Hollinger's stats....

which is why early in the year the Cavs were consistently #1 even though we lagged behind the Lakers in wins.

j/c..

FWIW..Mo told reporters today that he expects Delonte to play tomorrow night..

I heard that Powe is starting to practice as well. In a few weeks, we'll have Delonte, Mo and Powe all in the line-up again.

Orlando is getting crushed by New Orleans without Chris Paul.

Wow, Vince Carter went on a scoring frenzy going into the fourth, and they ended up winning 123-117. 19-27 for 48 points, 7 Rebounds, and 2 Assists.

that just shows that even an old VC can score when guarded by even older Peja and Morris Peterson.

at least peterson used to be good at defense (back when he played with vince ironically)

J/C..

Looks like Mo was wrong..

Windy says DWest is probably not playing tonight...

We actually have a bit of a tough stretch coming up here ... Orlando, Denver, @Charlotte, @Orlando, New Orleans, @Boston and then @Toronto right after Boston.

That Denver game right after the break should be good. We travel to Charlotte the very next night, need to win that first one back.

Man, that's a great little lineup to get us into gear for the post-season.

The rock stars will definitely be getting separated from the groupies

I have a question for everyone. After all star break would it be wise to cut back on Shaqs minutes? We need a healthy well rested shaq to slow down Dwight in the playoffs. I know we need the #1 seed but we were able to do it with Z starting.

I think that Shaw will determine that, actually.
He isn't new to this thing, he knows his body and he knows what it takes - if he tells Coach that he's good to go, we'll keep on keepin' on.

I don't think 23 mpg is too much, I think that's just about right where it needs to be.

I'm sure something like that is in the plans, especially since Shaq has a personal vendetta with Orlando.

Dont forget about Powe coming back to. The thing I like about this year is that we have injuries which are forcing different lineups to develop chemistry with one another.

I think that with Mo and Delonte coming back along with Powe and maybe another big before the deadline we are going to have last qtr of the season for the finalo rotation to establish itself and peak going into the playoffs.


The Cavs are sick deep this year. That is is going to pay huge dividends in the post season especially when we go big with LBJ at the point. Mismatches all over.

The upcoming game vs. Orlando on Thursday may be a preview of the ECF. It's that important.

Both teams are clicking right now, and it will be an especially tough challenge for us because we're missing Mo and Delonte, but Orlando is fully healthy.

Has this team banned Free Throw practice or something? Varejao is the only guy that can make them consistently anymore. That's going to bite us in the tookus eventually.

i don't think mike brown cuts into shaq's minutes down the stretch, but i could definitely see him holding shaq out for a game here, a game there with some kind of phantom injury. especially when you approach a back to back or a 4 in 5, i'm not sure what we have left of those.

BW had a thing about the 4in5's back in December when we had a couple within 3 weeks.....

he said at the time we had one more stretch of them this season....I don't know if we've since past that or not, but I think we still have it coming.

also, on Shaq, we can't 'cut' his minutes anymore than we have....we need him to be able to go 30 minutes a game against Dwight and that means having the endurance to do it. I do agree with sitting him a few games here and there.

New puppet commercial this week, featuring LeBron and Z:

LOL!

With all of the rehearsed things that they've got, it does make ya wonder how early they have to report to get it all down

they do have a lot of plane rides and bus rides with nothing better to do....

I dont think we have anymore 4/5s. We have some 3/4s though.

The end of Feb is rough with a couple back to backs I know, but after that I think we have 1 maybe 2 back to backs left.

Nothing like the 7 back to backs we had to start the season.

we definitely have the meat grinder coming up (as my hs hockey coach used to say) but i think these guys are up for it, we won't sweep through it, but i expect an impressive record. esp with a lot of these big ones at home and with teams like boston looking like they are about done.

at the beginning of the year, i wanted boston in the playoffs. now, i don't want them anymore, i just want orlando, and i want them bad.

I have watched that about 20 times now and it's just as great as the first time.

That's what Super Bowl commercials should be like ..... not the lame crap we got last Sunday.

We don't have any more 4 in 5s ... Infact, we only have 4 back to backs left for the season. We are pretty much half/half home and away as well.

Brian Windhorst's podcast from today can be found here if anyone is interested.

Quick Summary:

- He thinks Cavs have a higher opinion of J.J. Hickson than other teams, they can't figure out why the Cavs have made him almost untouchable. A lot of trades are being hung up by the Cavs refusal to include Hickson. Cavs also asking for picks in return for taking on additional money. My opinion, Ferry is just posturing and may move him closer to the deadline.

- He thinks Hickson can be a core player but not a franchise player. Says playing with LeBron and Shaq make him better and would make anyone look better (obviously). Cavs don't feel they have many other core young players besides Hickson, may be why they are refusing to trade him up to this point. Cavs don't think they can get a player of Hickson's caliber at pick #30.

- He doesn't think the Cavs will make a move in response to another teams move. Doesn't think Orlando will make a move either.

- He says Pacers are backing down a little on Troy Murphy. Windy says they are no longer demanding a 1st round pick but still want J.J. Windy said Cavs will NOT trade Hickson for Murphy. Cavs also feel Jamison is a much better option than Murphy and the appealing thing about Murphy is his $12M comes off the books next year and not so much his skills as a player. Thinks its more likely that Murphy will get traded for Kenny Thomas or Hakim Warrick (or their contracts more specifically).

- He thinks J.J. might be given up for either Iggy or Jamison, and that this also would have LeBron's blessing. That surprised me as I thought the reason the Cavs were so reluctant to let him go was his relationship with LeBron. Just my own speculation, but this may mean we end up with Iggy since there was already an offer made by Philly.

- He thinks that a lot of the talk about major trades to slash payroll is just that, talk. Nobody has done it yet and he isn't so sure many, if any teams will give up talent for money. He says the Cavs are confident that will change next week though, and Dan Gilbert will be in the ears of the other owners.

- He says the Cavs feel good about their ability to beat the top teams with the team they have right now. Cites the 5-0 record against the Lakers, Magic, and Hawks. I thought it was interesting that we give Atlanta that much respect, I hadn't considered them a real threat in the playoffs but the Cavs are taking them seriously.

- Cavs and Houston have been talking about making a three team swap, however so far there is not a third team in the mix.

- Talk about the kings maybe trading Kevin Martin. Bucks have made an offer of Ridnour-Alexander-Warrick, but maybe needs a third party to get it done.

- He says the Cavs are very interested in Al Harrington. He says the Cavs will not give the Knicks any salary cap relief and may pursue him in the summer and not at the deadline, but he is on their radar. Says Knicks are a possibility in a three team swap.

- He thinks Boston and LA both could possibly make minor moves but highly doubts they do anything at all. Windy hopes they swap Augustin for Glen Davis as Davis has been a thorn in our side. Does not think Ray Allen gets moved but says its a possibility they move Scalabrine or Tony Allen. He thinks if either team does anything it will be for guys who were bought out. Says Jerry Buss wants desperately to stay under the luxury tax and may even ask Phil Jackson to take a pay cut. Thinks money will prevent them from going after Hinrich.

- He commented on the rumor of Iggy for Amare and says its beyond ridiculous. Says both teams are also desperate to slash payroll, but with Philly being 4.5 games out they may change their tune.

Thanks for the synopsis. Always thought Windy does a solid job covering the cavs. Looks like the team is trying but nothing is imminent

Big game tonight fellas!

Kind of off topic ... ESPN had a fan vote for greatest "poster dunks" of all time. Of the 16 they had there, Lebron was on twice (and of course couldn't win either vote due to all the Lebron haters) ... I thought the funny thing was, the two they had weren't even his two greatest posterizations. They had the dunk on Duncan and the dunk on Amon Jones ... but his two best IMO were his dunk on Rasheed and his dunk over KG (both in the playoffs).

the dunk over sheed was probably my fav. it changed that entire series..

although as good as lbj can ruin someone, this is one of my favorite of all time

http://www.youtube.com/v/mK9wYQkBrAQ

Didn't think the Delonte dunk was that huge ... He had his guy beat and basically threw it down before he could get the chase-down block.

Completely agree about the Rasheed dunk though. Detroit was up 2-0 at that point, and Cleveland was scrapping out a close game at home. Lebron threw down that dunk over Rasheed and served notice. Detroit was never the same and Cleveland realized they were contenders. Later that series, Lebron had that 45 point game.

My favorite though is probably the KG dunk. He beat Pierce and Posey to get into the lane and then slammed it over KG while he was getting no-call fouled. That was impressive.

Quote:

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Didn't think the Delonte dunk was that huge ... He had his guy beat and basically threw it down before he could get the chase-down block.

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Josh Smith has 6 inches on Delonte and is one of the best shot blockers in the game. Delonte didnt really "have him beat" either, You could see Josh trying to just keep his position and angle to block it from behind.

It was a pretty impressive dunk.

B.Davis gets my vote: