Jack Cobra is up Friday as usual, and we don’t have much to say anyway after Cleveland’s Game 2 loss to the Pistons. We hate doing bulletpoints, but it’s all we can manage right now.
* Great first half. Movement on offense, and LeBron was on GO as soon as he got the ball. It worked and stuff – weird.
* CLE, due to Coach Mike’s infamous “dead, frowning puppies” halftime speech, continues to be the absolute worst 3rd quarter team in the history of sports, and the entire 2nd half it was back to “give LeBron the ball 35 feet from the hoop and have LeBron stand there for 3-5 seconds, allowing the DET defense to get set”.
(We realize this isn’t what Coach Mike is likely telling them to do, but they do it. Who do we blame when they do it repeatedly? Over and over and over, all season long? If any of you can figure out where we’re supposed to lay blame, we will.)
* Now, a lot of Cleveland fans are already pinning this on the refs, particularly with the last play, when LeBron drove, and may or may not have been fouled. Our position is as follows:
* They scored 26 points in the 2nd half.
In addition (more bulletpoints):
* On the last play (down 1 with 24 second left), Coach Mike calls a timeout, allegedly to set up a game-winning shot play. (For a moment, disregard that they should’ve gone for a quick score and relied on their defense, among other things.*) What was that play?
Give LeBron the ball 35 feet from the hoop and have LeBron stand there for 3-5 seconds, allowing the DET defense to get set.
Seriously? You called a timeout for that? That’s your whole play? The thing that sank your entire team in the second half? The BS, POS non-offense that allowed the Pistons to come back from 12 down?
That’s your whole play??? That’s it????
Fire him tonight – seriously. It’s beyond ridiculous at this point. He’s LeBron’s Doug Collins – we can only hope Danny Ferry can find his Phil Jackson this summer.
* And why wasn’t Z in there for a potential offensive tip? He’s the best at that – it’s like where half his boards come from.
UPDATE: It’s hard to even get mad at the Lasers. They’ve gotta be sitting back and being all, “How the hell are we winning these games? Doesn’t it seem like we shoulda lost?”
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hey, what’s wrong with bullet points…
It’s 2007 in the NBA, shouldn’t they be called wizard points?
Here’s some more:
- Rip Hamilton fouled LeBron 3 times on that last play.
- At 74-71 McDyess’ “block” on LeBron failed to make contact with the basketball.
- If LeBron hits both his free throws, we may not be having this conversation (Is this a conversation?)
- I don’t want Chauncey Billups next season.
- Tayshaun Prince is better than Paul Pierce? Really?
- Nice job by Rock Financial for supplying the thundersticks. Thanks Mr. Gilbert.
People will call it an ugly game, but the Cavs’ defense is excellent. Thought they did a phenomenal job on the perimeter, and Billups is mumbling to himself. But that McDyess block on LeBron was clean as a whistle, TVBrain. Don’t kid yourself. Meanwhile I wonder if The Cavalier likes Joe Dumars’ draft record a little more after getting a healthy dose of Jason Maxiell.
When was the last time a star’s weakness was exposed as openly as LeBron’s lack of a left hand? Wow. He lost any right to a foul on that last play when he slowed down to spin back to his right. No confidence going the other way.
Really TVBrain….Really??
-LeBron was not fouled on that play and the only people that get foul calls called on that type of very close play THAT late in a game are premier legends who like it or not, have earned it….particularly another famous player who wore #23.
-Tayshaun Prince is well overrated by everyone but Piston fans and the USA Basketball selection committee. Hell, TrueHoop’s got a prediction that he makes it as a starter on the team.
-Rock Financial has been the title sponsor for the Pistons since around 2003 (back before Gilbert tried to BUY the Pistons) and his company has a much bigger connection to Detroit than Cleveland. That deal ends as of ‘07 though so that could be the last of that connection.
The prevailing belief around my house is that, at the half, Coach Mike gets everybody in a circle, gets in the middle and just weeps. Like someone picked all the marshmallows out of his Lucky Charms. Then he looks each player in the eye (still weeping) and asks “Why?”.
Foul or no foul, you can’t miss from 7 feet when you are wide open in the last seconds of a game. Yes, I’m talking to you, Larry Hughes…awful. Varejao’s crazy tip on that shot had a better chance of going in.
TVBrain, we’ll give you the foul on McDyess, but we’ll take the strip by Billups on Varejao where it was a clean strip but they called a foul where Varejao hit 2 free throws.
Absolutely awful officiating… if you really want to get down to the nitty gritty about the game, just look at the 2 “strips” by Daniel Gibson where he absolutely raked Billups’ wrist, 1 on a shot attempt, and 1 dribbling in traffic. It’s a shame the officials aren’t setting a tone for these games, rather than just letting these guys come out and play. I’m all for letting guys play, but not when these fouls are as clear as day and would be called and respected on the playground.
I’d say it was called evenly both ways, so I have a hard time complaining about officiating.
Paul Pierce wouldn’t have been able to D up LeBron… Tayshaun may have had 2 rough nights, but he dominated the Bulls and kept Deng from going off… Pierce wouldn’t have been able to do that.
please, don’t give Tayshaun any credit, he’ll take it from those that actually know what they’re talking about.
I never said he was better than Pierce, I said I’d take him over Pierce. The game isn’t all about offense Mr. Brain.
pierce would have done a halfway respectable job on lebron, and then put up 25 points
“respectable” doesn’t earn a 14 when you’re on the floor, even if you’re shooting 1-9.
If LeBron went to the post, Tayshaun would be a moot point. Wallace also shoved Varajeon, another awful call. I don’t give a damn what Andys’ rep is, when the offensive player fully extends his arm on a push, that is an offensive foul. LeBron got fouled twice on that last play, anyone who can’t see that is either biased or ignorant. BUT I ain’t blaming the refs, the Cavs play in the second half was, again, pathetic. The odd thing is I can easily see the Cavs taking the next two at home.
If LeBron goes down on the post, Tayshaun can’t stop him. That’s a point I’ve never argued with… the extending of the arm was a foul, but the flop by Varejao to try and get the call wasn’t necessary. The game was called horribly for both teams.
After looking at the last play, LeBron was fouled on the floor and not on the shot. He initiated the contact on the shot by extending his elbow into Hamilton’s chest, but Hamilton definitely did mug him on the floor, no doubt.
Why is noone talking about the Kobe-like elbow from ‘Bron in game 1? Next time he does it I believe your boy Stu Jackson will have something to say about it.
Boney is spot on about the horrible call AV got when Billups cleanly stripped him.
The reffing was pathetically bad. This ‘let them play’ thing is BS. No one can play basketball when the refs can’t call the game. Unfortuanately the last 2 blown calls went against the Cavs. Doesn’t mean they didn’t miss a million more throughout the game for both teams.
The Cavs can’t stick with what’s working for some reason. Neither the players on the floor nor the coach. It’s a great mystery to me. Hopefully the Cavs back at the Q get a few more whistles and few more cajones.
Does anybody else get turned on by Madea? I’d like to stick my US in her A if you know what I mean….
the problem is that the cavs TRY to stick with what worked in the first half, but the pistons make adjustments to counter that, so it’s no longer working anymore. a brighter offensive coach would make adjustments to their adjustments, but thats not what mike brown does.
* As the Cavalier noted, let’s not (just) blame the refs. While the CLE-NJN series was going on someone wrote that whichever superstar had the ball for the last play would cause his team to lose. It’s been the same story here. It’s not like screens are forbidden in the last minutes, are they?
* The way both teams started was shocking, no turnovers or field goals missed during the first 2 minutes. Chris Webber dunking! Feeding Ilgauskas! It pretty much went downhill from there.
* The Cavs had two players playing up to their level: Pavlovic & Gibson. LeBron was amazing for a half. And yet they were in this game. The East is painful.
* Having an actual point guard would have helped.
* At least half of the offensive rebounds in this game were due to players just falling asleep rather than amazing effort.
* When Coach Mike got that technical it was pretty obvious he was just doing that because that’s what coaches are supposed to do. You could tell he didn’t believe in it. Good coaches = good actors. Assistant coaches that are in over their head = not so much.
* It’s a pity Adelman didn’t want to leave the West, he could do something with this team. It seems like all the possible replacements left are flawed (lack of experience, bad offense, annoying). If Ferry has the guts to fire Brown that is.
* If one of these teams wins two games against the Spurs it’d be an upset.
What tragic and funny is that this is exactly the same problem as last summer – they desperately need an assistant coach that’s an offensive guru. Coach Mike seems to be against that, but it’s not like Phil Jackson didn’t get all the credit for what Tex Winter did with the triangle. He’ll still get the glory or whatever. I just want to see passing and ball movement and cutting and all that stuff people refer to as “basketball”.
USA Basketball? Is that the new standard? Call me when they win something.
About 2 of the “strips” in this whole series have been clean.
Pistons in 5.
If Mike Brown returns next season sans a new plan on offense, I may have to boycott
Edit: A plan on offense, the qualifier wasn’t necessary
Dave, that may have been true last night, but it doesn’t explain a whole season of going away from what works.
It’s like they don’t have any real ingrained plan on offense, and I think that’s exactly the problem. Adjustments might work if they had something with which to begin.
The one up for Brown is that this team truly plays better defense than I ever would have believed they could play.
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