Again Cavs were without 2 of their best 3 players and lost. NO team has ever won under those circumstances. If Cavs are taking a top heavy approach then so has every NBA Title winner in history. So chances are they are on the right track
Which is exactly my point...
Taking a 'top heavy' approach means you are taking that very risk. Your entire title hopes rest on the shoulders of 2 or 3 guys. One or two of those guys get hurt, and your championship hopes are dead.
We had exactly the same problem after our 2008 title. We were on track for #19 in 2009 until we lost KG for the season, and then our chances of a title were done. We never had a serious bench in any of those years - our starters had to carry us. If we had Pierce and Ray plus a solid bench to go with it...maybe things would have been different, even with KG lost.
I honestly believe the Cleveland would have needed all three of their JKL (James, Kyrie, Love) trio in order to have a legit hope of beating Golden State in a 7 game series - losing any one of those three guys IMO eliminated their chance of a title.
Likewise Miami would have needed Wade, Bosh and Lebron all healthy and playing at 100% strength to beat San Antonio in 2013/14.
Now the Warriors did not take a top-heavy approach. They do have two star players in Curry and Thompson, true. But they also had a LOT of depth. If they lost their third best player (probably Green) then Lee and/or Bogut would have had more minutes, and they probably wouldn't lose that much. If Thompson got hurt then Iggy and Barnes would have had more opportunities to make an impact. The only guy who would have really crippled Golden State would be losing Curry probably - in this case you're only dependent on one guy, rather than Cleveland who are dependent on all three staying healthy.
Same with the San Antonio Spurs in 2013/14 - that team was all about depth and teamwork, and it was too much for Miami's top heavy approach to match because Miami just didn't have enough depth to match the Spur's balanced assault. If San Antonio Lost any one of Parker, Duncan or Leonard, they probably still would have had a good chance. Obviously if they lost two or more of those guys, they'd be toast.
But that's the thing - no bench means you become dependent entirely on a three headed monster staying healthy. If that happens and you get lucky, then you're in great shape.
Hence why no have no intention of signing TT to such a contract.
Yet if they don't, they are likely to be even worse off than if they do...because without Thompson they are completely dependent on Kevin Love and Andersen Varejao both being healthy, and both being productive - and that's a big gamble given the history of both players.
Mosgov is more important to the Cavs than TT due to his rim protection and offensive versatility. He will be re-signed.
IMHO they really need both. Their PF spot is at too much risk without Thompson, and their Center spot is too thin without Mosgov.
It's a "[dang]ed if you do, [dang]ed if you don't" situation.
Maybe they can sign both, but it will push them way, way into luxury tax for a long time. Are they willing to do that? Not sure, maybe.
Well hey if MJ got hurt it would have been all over. If Kobe got HUrt it would have been all over. If Bird got hurt, it would been all over. If Curry got hurt it would be all over. Turns out when teams lose by far their best player, chances of winning reduces significantly! Guess thats breaking news eh?
Difference is that those teams were mainly dependent on one guy, maybe two at most. The Bulls were dependant on MJ, and maybe Pippen - that's two guys at the most. Who was their third best player in the first three peat? If they lost their third best player, they still have a strong shot at a title.
Same with the Lakers. Bynum was probably their third best player, but they managed to win anyway because even with Bynum mostly out, they still had Kobe, Gasol, Odom, Artest, Ariza, etc.
Cleveland might not be so lucky - if they lose their third best player (be that Kyrie or Love) then they can still make a deep playoff run (especially in the weak east) but their shot at a title is IMHO dramatically reduced.
Funny how Cavs were 6-4 vs all those teams over the season and 6-1 post mid season trades vs those same teams including embarrassing blowouts vs Memphis, Clippers and Warriors. But yh when fully healthy, those teams would magically beat the Cavs in the PO
That's when fully healthy...
My comment was a reference to the fact that people were impressed by Cleveland's ability to win a couple of games against the best team in the West despite being down 2/3 star players.
I'm saying that the feat isn't as impressive as it seems. If Cleveland played any of the top 5 or 6 teams in the West without Love and Kyrie, then I strongly doubt they would have won.
Hence Cleveland's ability to make the finals despite their injuries is (IMO) more a reflection of how weak the East was, rather than a reflection of how strong Cleveland was.
Also everybody knows that the regular season and playoffs are two different beats. The Celtics gave Miami major trouble in the regular season throughout the 'superfriend' years, but we were never able to beat them in a 7 game series.
Warriors never initially took Cavs seriously!!!Yup all Warriors had to do was radically change their whole starting line to beat a significantly decimated team!! I mean that starting line up had ran through the big bad West and put up historically RS numbers but they had to alter it completely to beat a decimated team. Def shows how much they didnt initially take Cavs seriously
Did you watch the first couple of games?
It was basically Stephen Curry running around jacking up horrible contested threes from 5 feet outside the three point line all night long, and then wondering why they were struggling.
It's a natural subconscious response for teams to not play as hard when you are up against a depleted (or weaker) team. That's why the Celtics in the Big 3 era tended to struggle against bad teams, but they'd beat the good teams. It's not because they consciously don't care, it's because subconsciously you feel like you have the advantage, and you can somewhat 'cruise'.
That combined with the fact that the opponent usually has the opposite mentality - they know they are weakened, so their subconscious reaction is typically to play twice as hard because you know you need to in order to have a fighting chance.
To me, from watching the games, it seemed pretty clear that Golden State thought they had this. Consciously they knew they couldn't play soft, but subconsciously they were like "they are weak, We've got this". They didn't expect Cleveland to fight the way they did, and they quickly got a rude shock.
That's how I saw it anyway - you don't need to agree, but that's my observation.
Anyways at the end of the day my point is this - the Cleveland has done nothing to improve this year, yet they have some question marks (will TT return, how productive will Love be?) and they are massively committed financially for years to come.
I feel like last year (after the trade) they had a good shot at a title, and they ran in to some bad luck.
This year I think their chance of a title is reduced given that some WC teams (San Antonio, Houston and the Clippers for example) got much stronger combined with the fact that Cleveland themselves failed to make improvements.
From 2016-17 on-wards their chance of a title could be under major threat, because we don't yet know if Tristan Thompson will still be there, and because so many teams will have cap space by that time...while the Cavs will really only be able to add players via min contracts, MLE and trades. Plus the fact that Lebron and Love have already reached their ceilings, so Irving is really the only one on the team with much potential.
Of course they may well win multiple championships for all we know, but their future might actually not look as bright as many think.