May 27, 2010
Here’s the Question…

If Philly is indeed dumb enough to shop the #2 pick in the draft, but the only way to get it is to absorb Elton Brand’s contract…what do you do, hotshot?

Dad, Mike, and I exchanged several emails about this topic earlier today. In our defense, it’s not entirely a hypothetical, as evidenced by this post on ESPN’s Rumor Central:

Pistons president of basketball operations Joe Dumars spoke to the Detroit media Tuesday about a bunch of topics including making the team tough again. Terry Foster of The Detroit News has a trade in mind that could achieve Dumars’ wish, but it would require him to make a daring move.

Foster writes: “The 76ers are willing to unload the No. 2 pick in the draft along with 6-foot-9 power forward bust Elton Brand. … Brand could be what the doctor ordered for the Pistons. But Brand will make $15.6 million next season, $17.1 the following year and $18.2 million in 2013. That’s a lot of cash, but it would be a bold and daring move. And here’s how: Dumars should offer the 76ers the No. 7 pick in the draft, Richard Hamilton and Jason Maxiell for the No. 2 pick and Brand.”

Obviously, there’s no mention of the Cavs in either of those two paragraphs. But the implication seems to be that Philly’s top priority is getting out from under the massive financial boulder that is the next 3 years of Brand’s contract—even if that means giving up a potential franchise player in Turner (or DeMarcus Cousins, or Derrick Favors).

If the Cavs were to attempt to chase a similar deal, the key components would most likely be Antawn Jamison + Delonte for Brand and the #2 pick. Since both the Cavs and Sixers are considered over the cap for next season already, trade regulations would allow this exact deal to take place with no further players or cash changing hands. (For any budding capologists out there, the reason is that the total combined 2010-11 salary for Jamison ($13.4MM) and Delonte ($4.5MM, but only 500K guaranteed) is less than 125% + 100K of Brand’s 2010-11 salary of $15.6MM. As long as that’s the case with two teams over the cap, everything is golden.)

In theory, Jamison’s contract would actually be better for the Sixers in the long term than Rip Hamilton’s. Jamison has $28MM total remaining on his current contract, but the deal expires at the end of the 2011-12 season.  Hamilton, on the other hand, has $37.5MM total remaining, and the deal doesn’t expire until the end of the 2012-2013 season.

Further, if Philly’s main concern is the cap rather than talent, Delonte can be instantly cut for a savings of $4M and no salary obligation for future seasons. Maxiell, on the other hand, is owed $5M per year for the next three seasons.

In sum, the Cavs’ version of this deal would save the Sixers about $24M total ($9.5M on Hamilton + $14.5MM Maxiell) in comparison to the rumored Pistons’ version of the deal. For a cash-strapped franchise looking to build around their young talent, that figure is nothing to take lightly.

Now, am I entirely convinced that this is a viable option for the Cavs? Not really. The big advantage that the Pistons have at this hypothetical bargaining table is the #7 pick. Though it’s still highly questionable in my mind, the Sixers’ choosing to move down 5 spots for the opportunity to unload Brand isn’t a totally indefensible decision. However, that deal gets decidedly dicier if instead of moving to #7, they move out of the first round of the draft completely by trading with the Cavs (assuming Ferry couldn’t rope in a 3rd team to give up a reasonably high draft pick this year).

But assuming Ferry manages to construct such a deal, is the financial body blow (pause) of absorbing Elton Brand worth it?  After considering it, I’m convinced that the answer is ‘yes.’

At first glance, this would seem to go against my post the other night about how the Cavs need to stop thinking so much about buying their way to a title. However, my main issue with that strategy’s implementation is that they’ve spent the past few years trying to buy the title with old guys. At least overpaying for Turner would get the team a young franchise building block, and potentially a young star. (I also like the fact that regardless of whether or not LeBron stays, Turner would have the opportunity to become the most popular player in franchise history just because he went to Ohio State.) In a way, it would be a do-over for the front office’s inability or unwillingness to trade up last year to get Steph Curry, which, right now, looks like a major gaffe if the potential was indeed there.

Remember, the Sixers were one of the two teams with whom the Cavs had extensive trade talks but no trades last year (GSW being the other). As we saw with the Shaq trade, deals discussed in the previous season do have the opportunity to get resurrected in the off-season.

Is it a long shot? Absolutely. But is it impossible? No.

But on further review, maybe the real question is how many of you think I’m crazy for getting excited enough about the possibility that I write this post in the first place. In that case, consider the Comments section your firing range.

-T

2:30am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/637162839/heres-the-question
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FILED UNDER: NBA Trades Draft Evan Turner Cavaliers Sixers Pistons LeBron 
March 21, 2010
Cavs / Pistons Bazooka Point

I’m not going to try to reinvent the wheel with this post. The reality is that the Cavs continue to roll, and it’s increasingly difficult to find defining elements in any of their beat-downs of sub-.500 teams.

However, one number I’ll point to is this: +3.

No, I’m not trying to ignite a debate about +/-…raw, adjusted, regularized-adjusted, or otherwise. Tonight, +3 was the differential between the Cavs’ lead at the end of the 3rd quarter (22 points) versus the end of the game (25 points).

As those of us who watched the Cavs religiously last year know, the 2008-9 season involved a lot of blow-out wins. But many of those blow-out wins diminished dramatically in scale during the final quarter with LeBron and the other starters off the floor. 30+ point leads at the beginning of the 4th became 13 point victories fairly regularly. There were even a few games where Bron had to be pulled off the bench with less than 5 minutes left in the game to try to make sure the team didn’t, in the parlance of Matt Barnes, shit on the money and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. (If I remember correctly, one of these was against the Pistons at about this same time in the season).

By no means have the Cavs completely done away with this phenomenon this season. But as a fan, my comfort level with big leads is much greater this year than last. It’s arguably one of the areas in which the team’s new depth becomes most apparent. Most of the 4th quarter today was played by a line-up of Andy, Powe, Moon, Delonte, and Boobie—all of whom now qualify as reserves. From a productivity standpoint, it should be no surprise that those players are able to not only maintain a lead, but increase it. (Andy, Powe, and Delonte’s involvement in the early 2nd quarter is one of the reasons the Cavs are often able to handily outplay the opponents’ reserves in that stretch of the game, too.)

Compare that line-up to last season, when Coldstone would often throw out a squad comprised of JJ, Darnell, Boobie, Delonte, and Wally. My heart rate spiked just looking at that combination of names.

Beyond just kudos to Danny Ferry, Coldstone himself deserves some credit for the improvements. While we all have issues with his rotations some times, he’s certainly learned how to make garbage time less dramatic. Granted, that sounds like the world’s most back-handed compliment, but I mean it with no disrespect. Knowing your personnel and how to combine them in a way that won’t make the wheels completely fall off is a legitimate improvement.

Cavs are off until Wednesday, at which point they take on the Hornets in NOLA. It’s the first potentially challenging game on the schedule in what seems like a month. We’ll see how they respond, especially since—barring some freak occurrence—they’ll also be dealing with the re-integration of Z into the roster. (Welcome back, big guy.)

-T

10:25pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/465011872/cavs-pistons-bazooka-point
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FILED UNDER: NBA Cavs Pistons Bazooka Point LeBron 
March 16, 2010
Cavs / Pistons Bazooka Point

The Cavs clawed their way to a 113-101 road victory over the Pistons tonight. Much as the team had to endure the persistent attack and scrappiness of the Pistons themselves, I found myself struggling to endure the persistent idiocy and homer-ism of Detroit’s local announce team. (Among other tics, their play-by-play announcer loves to refer to, say, 6:45 left in the quarter as “6 and 45 left”; refuses to call Mo anything other than “Maurice”; and complains about calls / no calls more than any commentator this side of Quinn Buckner.)

Aside from a petty means of venting, I bring up the announcers because they pulled out one of my all-time least favorite ideas in the final minute of playing time: the notion that the final score of the game will not indicate how closely played the game really was.

On the one hand, it’s hard to dispute the logic. Prior to the final minutes of the 4th quarter, the Cavs never opened up a lead larger than 7 points (to my recollection)—and even when they managed to get that much separation, it was extremely short-lived. To their credit, the Pistons fought hard from the opening tip tonight, much as they did a couple of weeks ago in the Q. Any time it looked like the Cavs were on the verge of blowing the game open for good, Detroit immediately went on a little burst to pull the score even. For non-partisan basketball fans, it would’ve been a fun game to watch for about 45 minutes and 30 seconds of game clock.

Down the stretch, though, the Cavs completely out-executed the Pistons and won the game by a more-than-comfortable margin of 12 points. In that sense, the back-and-forth struggle of the previous 3.5+ quarters is completely immaterial, and the Pistons’ announcer couldn’t be more off-base with his assertion that the score won’t indicate the competitiveness of the game. Yes, the Pistons fought hard and played well…but when the game was really, truly on the line, the Pistons got rolled by the Cavs, and a double digit loss couldn’t be more justified.

This ‘scoreboard fallacy’ has a close relative that also gets used frequently in the sports world:  the idea that a team is “better (or worse) than their record.” This past football season was the first time I actually heard someone of authority dispute this idea. (I believe it was Bill Belichick, though I’m not completely certain. I heard it from the Sunday Night Football announcers, not the source himself.) Belichick’s* response to this idea was simple: no team is EVER better or worse than their record indicates, because the only thing that ultimately matters is who actually wins the game. Individual stats, team stats, effort level—all of those things go out the window, because what decides playoff seeding and championships is wins vs losses, period.

To be completely fair, there are maybe three circumstances that I could say counter-act this idea. One would be if a team made major mid-season personnel moves; another would be if a major player or players returned after missing significant time due to injury; the last would be if the team began the season as a very young team that has since matured considerably and can do things in the second half of the season that they couldn’t in the first.  But by and large, I love the notion that the team’s record is the truest representation of their quality.

We’ve written many columns about why teams have won or lost a particular game.  Statistical aberrations, dumb luck plays, the way the game is officiated—all of these elements can come into play and be seen as the deciding factor in a tight contest. But the tell-tale sign of any team that has a serious chance at a championship is composure down the stretch. Bad teams don’t have it, and no matter how hard or how well they play for the first 98% of the game, they are rarely able to hold it together enough in that final 2% to come away with an upset. Tonight, the 23-45 Pistons were no different. As a result, they lost by a wide berth.

The reality is that winning a game for 46 or 47 minutes means absolutely nothing. Yes, basketball is incredibly complicated, incredibly rich, incredibly fascinating for an incredible number of reasons.  But in the final analysis, every game is ultimately a binary event: 1 or 0, up or down, win or lose. As they’ve done repeatedly this season, the Cavs didn’t play their best, didn’t always seem engaged…but figured out a way to win a game that a lesser team would’ve been okay with conceding. It’s not a statistical measure of the team’s quality in and of itself, but the mental toughness and the pride it took to win tonight—and ultimately, to win handily—is a great indicator of why this Cavs team has a true chance to be there at the end when the dust settles.

Oh, and despite what Piston-defenders might say or write, the Cavs won by double digits, and there’s nothing about the Pistons’ performance that changes that fact.

Cavs get the Pacers at home Wednesday. Keep an eye on Danny Granger’s FG%. Ought to be grisly.

-T

11:23pm  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/453935667/cavs-pistons-bazooka-point
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FILED UNDER: NBA Cavs Pistons Bazooka Point 
March 6, 2010
Cavs / Pistons: Bazooka Point

Another win for the Cavs—the sixth straight—despite a very shaky first half. Another spectacular night for LeBron: 40 points on 16-27 FG, 13 reb, 6 ast, 2 blk, 3 stl, 4 turnovers, in 42 minutes.

But unfortunately, another discouraging performance from the Cavs’ starting back court.

Mo vs DET: 9 points on 3-9 FG, 2 reb, 4 ast, 1 blk, 0 stl, 2 turnovers in 33 min

Parker vs DET: 2 points on 1-6 FG, 0 reb, 3 ast, 0 blk, 0 stl, 1 turnover in 30 min

The team’s starting guard play has been a red flag all season. As we all know, if Mo isn’t hitting from deep, he’s basically a liability. Meanwhile, Parker is having his career-worst season in per-36 minute scoring (9.2 points) despite shooting a career-best 45.6% 3FG.

Here are their lines in the previous two games:

Mo vs. NJ: 16 points on 5-12 FG, 1 reb, 6 ast, 1 blk, 0 stl, 3 turnovers in 28 min

Parker vs. NJ: 8 points on 2-5 FG, 4 reb, 3 ast, 0 blk, 1 stl, 1 turnover in 30 min

Mo vs. NY: 7 points on 2-8 FG, 3 reb, 10 ast, 1 blk, 0 stl, 1 turnover in 25 min

Parker vs. NY: 8 points on 3-4 FG, 5 reb, 1 ast, 1 blk, 1 stl, 1 turnover in 27 min

Add all of that up, and you get the following:

Mo (last 3 gm total): 32 points on 10-29 FG, 6 reb, 20 ast, 3 blk, 0 stl, 6 TO in 86 min

Mo 3-Game Avg: 10.7 pts on 34.5%FG, 2 reb, 6.7 ast, 1 blk, 0 stl, 2 TO per 29 min

Mo 3-Game per 36: 13.3 pts on 34.5%FG, 2.5 reb, 8.3 ast, 2.5 TO

Mo Season per 36 (Actual): 16.7 pts on 43.6%FG, 3.1 reb, 5.3 ast, 2.7 TO

Parker (last 3 gm total): 18 points on 6-15 FG, 9 reb, 7 ast, 1 blk, 2 stl, 3 TO in 87 min

Parker 3-Game Avg: 6 points on 40%FG, 3 reb, 2.3 ast, 0.3 blk, 0.7 stl, 1 TO per 29 min

Parker 3-game per 36: 7.5 points on 40%FG, 3.7 reb, 2.9 ast, 1.2 TO

Parker Season per 36 (Actual): 9.2 points on 44.2% FG, 3.5 reb, 2.1 ast, 1.1 TO

In summary, this tells us that what you’re seeing right now from the starting Parker / Williams tandem is about what you should expect to see for the rest of the season and, more importantly, the playoffs. In fact, if you look at his overall game, it’s arguable that Mo has actually been playing better all-around over the course of the last 3 games than over the course of the season. Yes, his FG% and scoring are down, but his assists and rebounds have been WAY up with only a minimal rise in his TOs. That said, I suspect this is largely a result of the increased pace the Cavs played against the Knicks and Nets, so the whole thing may be a moot point.

The reality is that Delonte is still the team’s best guard by a wide berth, and unless he gets to play starter minutes (with a healthy dose of Jamario Moon off the bench), the Cavs are going to have to rely on their front line to carry them the rest of the way, just like tonight.

Bucks Saturday. Shaping up to be a tough road game, especially if JJ has another all-game Glitch like he did tonight. Expect him to be mauled regularly by Andrew Bogut for the first 6 minutes of the game, until Coldstone inserts Varejao to take his place.

-T

2:45am  |   URL: http://www.josemesaisdead.com/post/430043442/cavs-pistons-bazooka-point
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FILED UNDER: NBA Cavs Bazooka Point Pistons Detroit