DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum *** Cavs February/March Thread - Part Trois ***

I agree,...despite the record, we do not match up well with them.

hahahaha.

i dunno, charlotte scares me a little bit, steven jackson seems to be a load to handle.

i agree, i think coasting through the first 2 isn't the best thing in the world, it'd be nice to have some crucial moments instead of just blowing through everyone. plus it'd be nice to have a few extra games to work shaq in. he's claiming he is coming back closer to 6 than 8 weeks. we'll see.

let's add: it'd be nice as long as the series was never really in question.


just to be safe (this being Cleveland and all)

I be at the game tonight w/ my sister and 20,000+ fans, along with the Guiness Book of World Records. We will be setting a record for the most people ever to be wearing a blanket w/ sleeves! Yep, it's Cleveland Cavs Snuggie night!

Go Cavs!!!!!!

I agree ... Charlotte may have gone 3-1 over us this year, but like you said, most of those were on back-to-backs and I'm sure there were other mitigating circumstances. We can get past them in a 7-game series where all we need to do is focus on beating the Bobcats and we get days of rest in between.

If anything, we could use the "test" to get ourselves into that playoff gear. Last year we cruised through the first two rounds and weren't ready for it when Orlando hit us with playoff level basketball.

That's what I've mentioned several times when people freak out about us losing to Orlando last year. Despite getting hit by a perfect storm of every possible bad stroke of luck ... (Howard shoots 75% from the line, they shot something like 55% from beyond the arc, the Cavs came off a two week layoff and were REALLY complacent, Mo Williams was stone-cold, etc) ... we still were one basket and one rebound away from winning that series anyway.

Hopefully Stuckey is ok, pretty serious there.

He didn't look like there was a problem on his way to the bench but then he suffered a seizure.

Walked to the sideline and apparently suffered a seizure after being on the bench for a minute, there was a 12 minute delay while they attended to him. Apparently when he was taken to the ambulance, he was still unconcious. However, the update that they just gave said he was now breathing on his own again and alert.

Sounds like it was a pretty serious seizure and he was lucky to have medical attention immediately.

From Windy:

Stuckey walked off the court just fine after a timeout with 2:30 left in the quarter and the Pistons hanging onto an impressive 67-61 lead. He spoke briefly to coach John Kuester before sitting on the bench.

Moments later, Stuckey called over Pistons' strength and conditioning coach Arnie Kander and shortly thereafter appeared to start shaking like he was having a seizure. He fell to the floor in the gap between the bench and the court.

Paramedics were called in as were Cavs team doctors. The arena went dead silent during the 10-minute period when Stuckey was receiving treatment. Then he was taken off on a stretcher.

Link

I'm from Michigan and soon to be moving back. So I get a flood of texts from my buddies asking me how I feel about "this 'mediocre' Pistons team winning by 22 right now in your own building?"

My response. LOL. It's the NBA, dude. Everybody makes their run.

Truth.

Ask them how they feel about blowing a 22 point lead.

hope everything is ok with stuckey, that was scary.

really sloppy game, and i thought we got the benefit of a few borderline calls.

and lakers lose by 15 in charlotte.

Great show of respect after the game as both teams huddled up to say a prayer at center court.

j/c,....apparently Stuckey has had these symptoms before,...

http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/lebron%252C-cavs-rally-from-21-down

lebron is not going to play tonight.

where you hear that, I don't see it anywhere?

NM just saw it on FSN

No Shaq.

No Z.

No Lebron ......


Man, that's like playing with both hands and a foot tied behind your back .....

The Nets just beat Lebron James' New York Knicks.

Ugh. That loss is on everyone not named Lebron, Delonte, or Antawn, starting with Mike Brown's horrible rotations and ending with Mo's massive choke job.

mo just don't look right, i wonder if he is still injured.

Mo looked awful. Couldn't shoot, and couldn't handle the ball against Jennings. Delonte should've been running the point all game. Why Andy didn't start at the 5 is beyond me as well. Andy, 'Tawn, JJ, Delonte and Mo should've been our starting lineup. Way too much PT to Danny Green, no sign of Powe. It took them well into the second quarter just to figure out how to play without Lebron in there. They better hope they don't lose him when we play a team that's way better than the likes of the Bucks.

bucks have been playing better. hell they took a healthy lakers squad to the buzzer at their place earlier in the year.

i do like that jamison was able to fill some of the void left by lbj.

it's encouraging because when we get to the playoffs, if it's not quite going for lebron, it is someone you can depend on.

milwaukee had great outside shooting tonight, delfino and jennings were hot.

it's no cause for concern though. just somethign we are gonna have to get through until we can get lbj back. not sure if he plays monday he could sit out again against the spurs, and then because of the mac tournament, the cavs get a rare 4 days off in a row which could not have come at a better time, with shaq out, z still in limbo, and lebron has really gotten beat up the last 2 weeks.

Playing better or not, they're still a .500 ball club, and they had their way with the Cavs from wire to wire. One inside presence in Bogut and we let Delfino, Jennings and Stackhouse put up uncontested 3s the entire game. Defense was awful. It was like nobody had an idea how to play basketball...poor ball handling, fumbling away passes, not blocking guys out on the boards, giving up wide open looks. If Delonte doesn't take it upon himself to play streetball Cavs get blown out by 20+.

we really lacked an inside presence tonight, das ok, we will get our bigs back.

lakers lose today in orlando, very tough hard fought game, i was entertained.

this gives the cavs more reason to be cautious with lebron. they have not lost any ground on homecourt, which is basically all they have left to fight for until the end of the season.

it would be really nice to give the guy a week off in the 2nd part of the year. no team is really in shape to be doing that.

even though we stand little chance of beating san antonio without lbj shaq and z out, i say if we need to do it do it.

My thoughts as well. Pretty much worked out perfectly for Cleveland. We rolled the dice holding LeBron out but it was the right move.

Their cushion on Orlando (5 games), even after this weekend, is almost insurmountable over a 19 game stretch. Even if Cleveland has a terrible stretch like (12-7), Orlando would have to then go (17-2), with a head to head win, to overtake them. That is really, really tough.

With LA losing and our head to head tie-breaker, we now hold a 3.5 game lead over them. With the Lakers having another 3 game road trip, combined with a 5 game road trip, it is going to be incredibly tough for them to overcome the Cavs.

Cleveland also got a break this weekend with Parker getting sidelined. If LeBron can play Monday, the Spurs game just became a bit easier.

web page

Rob Oller commentary: Without James, Cavs are just another team
Monday, March 8, 2010 3:46 AM
By Rob Oller


If there ever is a time to appreciate the magnitude of what LeBron James means to the Cleveland Cavaliers, and to the city in which he plays, it is right this second.

As James and coach Mike Brown weigh whether LBJ should test his gimpy ankle tonight against San Antonio - likely a game-time decision - it is worth considering what the Cavaliers would look like without their 25-year-old superstar.

Without James, the Cavs are a helplessly distraught Jimmy Stewart standing on the bell tower in Vertigo. They are painter Edvard Munch's haunting portrait of hopelessness in The Scream. They are a flat tire at 3 in the morning. And they are that not quite Oscar-worthy movie, The Hurt Locker room.

Without James, the Cavs are the Cavs of 2002-2003. That was the season before James arrived, when Cleveland finished 17-65, tied with Denver for worst in the NBA. The Cavs currently own the best record in the league at 49-15.

When James doesn't play, the Cavs are 9-12 overall since drafting him No. 1 in 2003. They have 10 straight losses dating to 2007 when James is missing from the lineup. The Los Angeles Lakers, meanwhile, won their first four games this season when Kobe Bryant sat out because of a sprained left ankle. Obviously, the Lakers remain a solid team without Bryant. Cleveland is a different story. The Cavs are not a playoff contender without James, whose claim on being the most valuable player to his team - and of the league - showed itself Saturday night in Milwaukee when his absence resulted in a 92-85 loss to the Bucks.

Granted, several factors beyond missing James were in play during the Milwaukee loss. It was the second game of a back-to-back for the Cavs (but also for the Bucks), and Cleveland was without a true center. Shaquille O'Neal is out because of an injured right thumb and Zydrunas Ilgauskas cannot re-sign with the Cavs until March 22. Also, Milwaukee is as hot as any team in the league, having won nine of its past 10.

Still, Cleveland probably wins the game if James plays. Antawn Jamison (30 points) and Delonte West (season-high 27), helped make up for losing James' league-leading 30-point average, but James' absence meant other players got more shots. Not a good thing. Only two players scored in double figures and point guard Mo Williams used those extra shots to finish 3 of 17. James would not have allowed that to happen. He would have limited Williams' touches, knowing he has been struggling with suspect shot selection since returning from injury.

It is the domino effect James has on his teammates that stands as testament to his importance. LeBron affects everything the Cavs do. If Bryant is a sniper - give me Kobe to make the shot to win a game - then James is the lieutenant who positions his men before fighting beside them. The Cavs average 44.3 points in the paint. They scored 30 against Milwaukee. Without James drawing switch-offs, Anderson Varejao and J.J. Hickson combined for five points in 45 minutes.

James' presence is essential off the court, too. No player matters more to a franchise and city than James, who provides Cleveland with legitimate hope when otherwise it has a thimble's worth.

Then there is the business side. A collective gulp goes up when word spreads around the arena that James will not play. The Lakers remain popular without Bryant. The Cavs do not.

Fortunately for Cleveland, James plays more often than any Cavalier ever. He is the franchise's career leader in minutes (21,573). Every time that number moves forward means another positive moment for the Cavs. It is worth taking a second to appreciate.

Rob Oller is a sports reporter for The Dispatch.

roller@dispatch.com

This is a response to the author, not you Saint......

Removing the best player from a team, especially when he's the best player in the league, is certainly going to make the team worse. I can't believe an article has to be written about one of the most obvious things to sports fan everywhere. I wonder if Indy would be "just another team" if they took Manning off it it.

Throw in that the Cavs were playing without Shaq (and only two players showed up to play) and yes, they're going to lose. Can't believe this is news to this guy.

The whole 10 games in a row thing is somewhat misleading. Certainly LBJ is irreplaceable but that 2007 team that racked up 8 or 9 straight losses was a one man band. Eric freakin snow was the PG and Drew Gooden was the PF. Throw in Larry Snooze and there's not a chance in hell they were beating anyone without LeBron. LBJ absolutely carried that team. The guy is implying that stat is somehow attributed to THIS team, which it is not.

The current squad has 3 other former all-stars and a budding young player in JJ. Clearly night and day from what Cleveland had previously. Would they be great? Well no but they would atleast be a competitive team over the course of a season.

Also, it was ONE game. Hard to draw conclusions (well not for this guy apparently). What he's saying surely makes sense but everyone tends to freak out over every little thing to do with the Cavs. "Oh my God! We lost a back-to-back road game to a team that has won 15 of 19. The world is going to end!"