There Is Nothing Wrong With The Cleveland Cavaliers

By Keith Allison from Hanover, MD, USA - LeBron James, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=36918817

Lately in the news I've been hearing that the Cavs are struggling since the all-star break. However, compared to the rest of the league, this is simply not true. I tried to look for reasons why the Cavs are losing, adn I could not find many.

If you look at the Cavs record since the all-star break,it is 7th. You may look at that, and think that it is very bad. The Cavs lost to the Pistons where they just didn't play their best, Kyrie was the only one really playing great. The loss to the Toronto was just the Cavs playing a really good Raptors team. The game they lost to the Wizards, the team didn't have LeBron James. And the loss to the Grizzlies wasn't that bad as you would think it is. While the Grizzlies have had a lot of injuries of late, they still have managed to get the 8th best record since the all-star break. Not to mention, the only blowout loss, was the one where they didn't have LeBron.

Their offense and defense doesn't seem to be the problem as they have the 4th best net rating since the all-star break in the league and they have the 3rd best rebounding percentage. Their effective and true shooting percentages are both top 5 since the break, so it isn't them missing shots either. So if it wasn't anything the Cavs were doing wrong, it must be the opponent.

There was nothing special with the Cavs' opponents shooting percentages at all since the break, in fact, they aren't that high. I looked at 2nd chance, fastbreak points, points off turnovers, and points in the paint for the Cavs opponents since the break and I saw nothing, in fact the Cavs actually did very good in limiting these categories. So really, couldn't find anything wrong with the Cavaliers.



I then decided to check their clutch stats and how the team did when the game had a differential of 5 points or less in the last 5 minutes of the 4th. The Cavs game up quite a bit of possessions and lost 2 games in the clutch because their opponents FG% was so high. 48%. 9th worst in the league. The only other teams above .500 that were worse were the Detroit Pistons who only lost 1 game in the clutch and the Thunder who are actually struggling. It should be noted that the Thunder lost all 5 of their games in the clutch since the all-star break.

So is there really anything wrong with the Cavs? They lost a couple of close games and 1 without LeBron James. They just need to play a little better defense down the stretch. I wouldn't say that this team is struggling like the Thunder are though. The Cavs are fine. They are playing good defense and are playing good offense as well and they are still a title contender.