NBA Playoffs 2018: 5 biggest x-factors

2. Jordan Clarkson

What the Cleveland Cavaliers lost when they traded Kyrie Irving, and what they hoped they were getting in Isaiah Thomas, is a player who can relieve LeBron James when he needs a break from doing all of the scoring.

Amazingly, Jordan Clarkson has been the closest thing the Cavaliers have had to Irving since shipping him to Boston.

Since the trade deadline, Clarkson is third on the team with an average of 13 points per game and has virtually the same usage rating as Kevin Love. Cleveland is relying on him to anchor the bench, and to be a second ball-handling option late in games (Clarkson is scoring the second-most points per fourth quarter).

James is having one of the best offensive seasons of his career, and his durability is other-worldly, but he’s going to need a break at a point. He won’t be able to play all 48 minutes. When that happens, the Cavaliers can’t put themselves in a hole that James will have to work extra hard to dig his team out of.

Nearly 40 percent of Clarkson’s minutes come when James is on the bench, according to NBAwowy.com. He spends most of his time playing with Jeff Green and Kyle Korver. Green has been a nice pick-and-roll partner for Clarkson, while Korver provides spacing as a 3-point outlet. Clarkson is only averaging 1.7 assists per game in Cleveland after averaging 3.3 in Los Angeles. He may need to do more facilitating in the playoffs, but the key will be when he’s the second scoring option when he and James do share the floor.

There will be times when defenses wall off James from the paint, and he’ll need to find a teammate to help breakdown the defense. Sometimes that will be Love posting up, other times it’ll be getting the ball to another perimeter player. That’s never really been George Hill’s game, and Rodney Hood, when healthy, isn’t consistent enough. Clarkson, meanwhile, loves to dribble.

Those moments when James can hand the offense to Clarkson and take a breather will be priceless down the stretch, and necessary for the Cavaliers to have any hope of winning a championship.

As we learned in 2015, James can’t do it all.