Did the Cavaliers improve enough to convince LeBron James to stay?
By Wes Goldberg
Before the start of the season, after signing a three-year, $57 million contract with the Sacramento Kings, George Hill was asked what he can teach the younger players on the roster. “Patience,” he said at media day, adding “It’s a building process.”
Hill was one of several veterans the Kings added over the summer, along with Vince Carter and Zach Randolph. He, however, was signed with the intent that he’d be a key contributor.
“Whatever the team needs me to do,” Hill said of his role. “I’ve never been that player that complains about playing time or how many shots I’m getting or what’s going on. If that’s what coach wants to do to help us get in the right position to win the game, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
What a difference a few months make.
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The Kings have one of the worst records in the NBA, and Hill — partly due to a youth movement and his own uninspired play — wasn’t happy with his situation. On Thursday, Sacramento shipped him off the Cleveland in a three-team deal for a second-round pick, Iman Shumpert, Joe Johnson’s expiring contract they plan on buying out and a bag of cash.
Similar to the Kings, veteran additions over the offseason didn’t work out for the Cavaliers. Derrick Rose and Dwyane Wade are gone after the deadline, and for the first half-plus of the season, Cleveland was fielding one of the worst defenses in NBA history.
On Thursday, the Cavaliers remade its roster on the fly, as general manager Koby Altman flipped six of Cleveland’s 15 players. Coming back from the Los Angeles Lakers are Jordan Clarkson and Larry Nance Jr., and Rodney Hood comes over from Utah. The nick-and-tucked Cavaliers will have little more than 20 games to coalesce in time for a postseason run.
They didn’t add an All-Star such as DeAndre Jordan or Kemba Walker, but the Cavaliers got better at the deadline, and they did it without flipping their prized Brooklyn pick. Hill, despite his poor performance thus far this season, is an immediate upgrade over Isaiah Thomas and Derrick Rose. Clarkson can do more stuff and play more often than Wade. Hood’s best basketball is ahead of him, and you can’t say that about Jae Crowder. Larry Nance Jr. always plays hard, and you couldn’t say that about anyone on the Cavs before Thursday. Head coach Tyronn Lue and LeBron James have quite the challenge ahead to integrate everyone, but they have a couple of stencils they can use to trace an outline.
The first being their first NBA Finals team. The one minus Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love due to injuries. Love will be back when his hand heals, but that team didn’t have anyone outside of LeBron who could create offense. It was LeBron surrounded by willing defenders such as Matthew Dellavedova and capable shooters, like J.R. Smith. That team competed with the Warriors with good old fashioned try hard bully ball.
The second is last season’s Houston Rockets team. James Harden mimics much of what LeBron is able to do in the way he penetrates and puppeteers a defense. Last year, he orchestrated one of the more prolific seasons in NBA history. The Rockets spaced the floor around him and put the rock in his hands. Harden’s usage rating soared to 34.2 percent, the sixth-highest in NBA history. It’s a clip that LeBron hasn’t sniffed since his first stint in Cleveland. On this team, he’ll have to come close to Harden’s historic usage.
Hill is a capable 3-point shooter and a good on-ball defender when engaged, but he’s hardly a creator. He’s not going to slice a defense, and he won’t have to. He plays the Patrick Beverley role.
Hood can get hot in a second but also has a tendency to disappear for games on end. There’s a reason Jazz fans aren’t that upset about letting a 25-year-old, 6-foot-8 wing who can guard and hit 3s get away for a pair of washed veterans. But if he blooms over these next couple of months, he’s someone who can theoretically defend Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson in the NBA Finals, while providing some needed scoring punch that Smith hasn’t provided for more than a short burst at a time. Cedi Osman will get more playing time, too, after showing he can guard multiple positions in Cleveland’s last few games before the deadline.
LeBron has been the de facto point guard for most of his career, and that will be the case now more than ever. There’s no Kyrie Irving to help shoulder that burden. Nor is there the hope of Isaiah Thomas getting healthy. Spread the floor, and let him work.
Kevin Love’s role to play in the games ahead is an interesting one. Lue has essentially relegated him to Richer Ryan Anderson, plopping him in the corner to space the floor. To give LeBron a breather, Lue should allow Love to post up more often. Love is averaging 1.01 points per post up — one of the most efficient marks in the league — but is only getting the ball there on 19.4 percent of his touches. The 76ers and Spurs, for example, have manufactured offense by throwing the ball down low to Joel Embiid and LaMarcus Aldridge, both of whom are posting up on 43.0 and 42.4 percent of their possessions respectively. Each of them score 0.98 points per post up. The Cavs don’t have many options for easy offense. More Love post ups may be the only non-LeBron solution.
Tristan Thompson still figures to be the starting center. He sets good screens, can credibly guard pick-and-rolls (though he usually ramps up a bit in the playoffs) and toggles on and off between being an engaged rebounder and not. Lue may want to try Nance as a small-ball 5. He’s played nearly half of his possessions at center for the Lakers this season, and he provides more bounce and vertical spacing than Thompson. He hasn’t been all that effective as a roll man in Los Angeles (just 1.03 points on an average of 1.5 possessions per game) but that should change when LeBron is feeding him.
Just as it has been for the better part of two decades, it all goes back to LeBron. Cleveland made upgrades on the perimeter, but at least Wade, Thomas and Rose could handle the ball and make stuff happen in a pinch. Clarkson can do that, but, like the abandoned trio of vets, isn’t a shooting threat from outside and so isn’t a great fit next to LeBron. Lue could work in some sets where LeBron screens for Clarkson to finagle some spacing and give his star player a break from facilitating, but Clarkson’s main role should be keeping the bench unit above water.
All of these deals were made to relieve some of the locker room tension and get out of the East, with an eye toward a rematch with the Warriors. Cleveland’s defense is stouter and switchier than it was 24 hours ago. It probably still won’t be enough to knock off the champs, but it shows LeBron that the front office is trying to do their best by him. As it stands, the Cavaliers are still $37 million over the cap next season, and that’s before re-signing Hood — a restricted free agent this summer. That changes if LeBron walks, in which case they can flip Love for picks and young players and launch into a full-blown rebuild. If LeBron stays, they still have the Brooklyn pick, which they can use in a loaded draft or package with, say, Love or Hill to acquire the next disgruntled star player some time in June.
The unexpected twist at the deadline was that in taking on Clarkson, the Cavaliers helped the Lakers clear the space needed to sign two max contracts this summer. Either Cleveland’s front office is (irrationally) confident LeBron is staying, or wildly unselfaware (not unlike when they traded their second best player to their main competition in the East). It’s a move that could end up being the Homer Simpson “Doh!” heard around the world.
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Then again, the Cavaliers will make the playoffs, and are still the safest wager to make it out of the East. The Lakers won’t come close to the postseason and don’t own their own pick in the upcoming draft. Not to mention there is no one currently on the roster LeBron will be motivated to play with (by the way, out in Oklahoma, Paul George has never looked better playing next to Russell Westbrook). The Cavaliers have an All-Star on the roster, a valuable and versatile lottery pick, and home field advantage in retaining LeBron. The ensuing months will determine LeBron’s next move, but the Cavaliers have, at least, stepped up.