Iggy Does It: Andre Iguodala Wins Finals MVP as Golden State Claims First Title Since 1975
Usually, a player whose man nearly averages a triple double in the NBA Finals does not win the Finals MVP but the 2015 NBA Finals were unusual in many respects. Andre Iguodala, a 2012 All-Star who did not start a single regular season game for the 67-15 Golden State Warriors, won the 2015 NBA Finals MVP after Golden State defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers 105-97 in game six to clinch a 4-2 series victory. Iguodala finished with 25 points (tied with Stephen Curry for team-high honors), five rebounds and five assists. Iguodala averaged 16.3 ppg, 5.8 rpg and 4.0 apg for the series and he was the primary defender on LeBron James, who stuffed the box score en route to suffering his fourth defeat in six trips to the NBA Finals.
Iguodala's career arc is interesting and it illustrates what it takes to become an NBA champion. He is good enough to start for just about every team in the NBA. He is good enough to start for the Warriors, for that matter--but Iguodala understood that the Warriors would function best if he came off of the bench and he embraced that role, an unselfish and wise decision in a league where many players would rather be the number one option and never win a championship than sacrifice some of their statistics and glory in favor of the greater good. Manu Ginobili made a decision similar to Iguodala's and was rewarded with four championships. On the other hand, Stephon Marbury could have played his whole career alongside Kevin Garnett but Marbury did not want to be the second option--and, more recently, James Harden could have continued to be the sixth man for a powerful Oklahoma City team but he chose to seek more money and more glory. No one would expect LeBron James or Kevin Durant to take a back seat to anyone but if you are not one of the very best players in the NBA and you want to win a championship then it makes sense to put the team's needs before your desire to receive individual accolades.
Iguodala's Finals MVP award will surely generate some controversy. Curry, the 2015 regular season MVP, put up MVP caliber numbers in the Finals as well, leading the Warriors with 26.0 ppg while averaging 6.2 apg and 5.2 rpg. He poured in 37 points--including 17 in the fourth quarter--to lead Golden State to a 104-91 victory in game five but neither that signature moment nor his overall productivity were enough to move the media voters off of the small-ball storyline that gathered steam after Golden State Coach Steve Kerr benched starting center Andrew Bogut for game four and moved Iguodala into the starting five. Going small helped the Warriors open up the court and increase the tempo but the most important effect is that Kerr's move prompted Cleveland Coach David Blatt to counter with his own move: limiting starting center Timofey Mozgov to just nine minutes in game five after Mozgov had 28 points in game four. The Cavaliers were underdogs no matter what Blatt did but the rash decision to bench Mozgov hurt the team's chances to pull off the upset; when Cleveland took a 2-1 series lead, the Cavaliers' main weapons were LeBron James doing everything and Mozgov controlling the paint at both ends of the court. Playing Mozgov for 40 minutes per game the rest of the way in the Finals may not have been a winning strategy for Cleveland but limiting Mozgov's minutes in order to give playing time to James Jones and Mike Miller was definitely a losing strategy.
Klay Thompson, the other half of Golden State's All-Star backcourt duo known as the "Splash Brothers," had a quiet game six (5 points on 2-7 field goal shooting) but Draymond Green picked up the slack with 16 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists.
LeBron James put up monster numbers in the series and probably received serious consideration for Finals MVP honors even in defeat. He averaged 35.8 ppg, 13.3 rpg and 8.8 apg and he had two triple doubles but he also shot just .398 from the field and .687 from the free throw line. James is the first player in NBA Finals history to lead both teams in total points, total rebounds and total assists--but pro basketball history aficionados know that in the
1976 ABA Finals, Julius Erving led both teams in points, rebounds, assists, steals and blocked shots as his New York Nets defeated the star-studded Denver Nuggets to win the league's final championship. Erving shot .590 from the field while averaging 42.8 mpg during that series and no one--least of all Erving--spoke about Erving being fatigued. Ever since the infamous
"Decision" fiasco, James has usually said the right things to the media but he may have taken a step back in the 2015 Finals as in one breath he called himself the "best player in the world" but he also complainied about being fatigued. Most basketball observers understand that James is indeed the best player but if James is going to make bold public declarations about himself then he opens himself up to questions such as "If you are the best player, why are you so much more tired than the other great players who are logging heavy minutes in this series and the other great players who logged heavy minutes in previous NBA Finals?" Games five and six were winnable for the Cavaliers down the stretch if he had been more productive in the fourth quarter.
J.R. Smith scored 19 points in 34 minutes in game six but many of those buckets came late in the fourth quarter when the Cavaliers cut the Golden State lead to four before the Warriors closed out the series by making some free throws.
Turnovers killed Cleveland in game six as much as anything else. The Cavaliers committed 16 turnovers that led to 25 Golden State points, wiping out Cleveland's huge advantages in rebounding (56-39) and free throws attempted (39-29).
How would this series have been different if Cleveland's injured stars Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love had been available? That question cannot be answered with certainty but Cleveland's management has some very interesting personnel decisions to make soon and those decisions will be based in no small part on their expectations for Irving and Love moving forward.
Today, though, the story is about Golden State. Steve Kerr took over an improving, good team and helped transform it into a great, championship team. Along the way, Stephen Curry emerged as an elite player, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green carved out nice complementary niches, former All-Stars Andre Iguodala and David Lee sublimated their egos to come off of the bench and Shaun Livingston's comeback from a devastating knee injury culminated in his becoming a solid contributor on the league's best team.
Labels: Andre Iguodala, Cleveland Cavaliers, Golden State Warriors, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 3:00 AM
Warriors Demonstrate Folly of Trying to Play Small Ball Against Them, Take 3-2 Finals Lead Over Cavaliers
Stephen Curry scored 37 points--including 17 in the fourth quarter--as his Golden State Warriors defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers 104-91 to take a 3-2 lead in the NBA Finals. Curry shot 13-23 from the field, including 7-13 from three point range. He also had seven rebounds and four assists. Curry is one of five players to score 17 points in
the fourth quarter of an NBA Finals game in the past 40 years, a list that includes Shaquille O’Neal (2000 Lakers), Dwyane Wade (2006 Heat), Russell Westbrook (2012 Thunder) and Kevin Durant (2012 Thunder).
LeBron James had another huge game for the Cavaliers, compiling 40 points, 14 rebounds and 11 assists with just two turnovers in 45 minutes. James shot 15-34 from the field, including 1-4 in the final five minutes of the fourth quarter after the Cavaliers had trimmed the Warriors' lead to 85-84.
The big story--literally and figuratively--is Cleveland's starting center Timofey Mozgov, who played a scoreless nine minutes after scoring 28 points in game four and helping to keep the Cavaliers close with his inside presence at both ends of the court. Cleveland Coach David Blatt pulled Mozgov from game five after just five minutes with Golden State leading 8-2; Blatt did not give Mozgov a chance to go to work against Golden State's undersized lineup, a markedly different approach to coaching and matchups from the one that Golden State Coach Steve Kerr took in game four when he stuck with his small lineup despite trailing 7-0 early in the first quarter.
Any player--but particularly a big man whose size and length can wear down opponents over the course of a game--would struggle to find his rhythm if he is used to playing regular minutes but then is suddenly relegated to just four or five minutes per half.
Mozgov averaged 16.8 ppg on .550 field goal shooting plus 8.3 rpg in the first four games of the series, yet after Blatt benched Mozgov early in game five he did not put Mozgov back in the game until late in the third quarter. The Cavaliers cut a 71-67 Golden State lead to 78-77 during Mozgov's cameo second half appearance and then were outscored 26-14 the rest of the way after Blatt yanked Mozgov again. Essentially, Blatt iced his second best player and failed to exploit the only matchup advantage that the Cavaliers have other than James versus whoever tries to guard him one on one.
The minutes that Mozgov would have and should have played went to a combination of perimeter players J.R.
Smith (14 points on 5-15 field goal shooting in 36 minutes), James Jones
(0 points in 18 minutes) and Mike Miller (3 points in 14 minutes).
The bottom line is that Kerr has outcoached Blatt. Yes, Kerr has more cards to play but Blatt has the biggest card (LeBron James) plus the edge inside with Mozgov but Blatt has not taken full advantage of those trumps. On offense, the Cavaliers should be running a steady diet of James-Mozgov screen/roll plays, forcing the Warriors to either trap James and leave Mozgov open at the rim or else single cover James and pray for salvation. On defense, the idea that Mozgov could not guard any of the Warriors is wrong; Mozgov should be assigned to stand two feet away from Andre Iguodala, who is struggling to make uncontested and wide open 15 foot shots (Iguodala shot 2-11 from the free throw line in game five). The Cavaliers could then pack the paint, stay close to Golden State's three point shooters and dare Iguodala to beat them with two point jump shots. If that strategy sounds familiar that is because it is the strategy that Kerr used to beat Memphis in the playoffs, assigning Bogut to guard Tony Allen--and by "guard" I mean give Allen the space to shoot open jumpers to his heart's content. Iguodala is a very good all-around player but the Warriors are not going to win a championship with Iguodala shooting 15-18 foot jumpers while James and/or Mozgov are getting dunks and free throws.
What did Kerr think of Blatt's quick hook of Mozgov? Here is what Kerr said after game five: "I thought from the very beginning when they went small, had their
shooters out there, I thought this is Steph's night. This
is going to be a big one for him because he has all that room. He took
over the game down the stretch and was fantastic." Translation: "If I had known that all I had to do was bench Bogut and Blatt would respond by taking out his second best player then I would have done it in game one and this series would have been over in four games. I will match our five best perimeter players against Cleveland's five best perimeter players any day of the week. Cleveland then has one matchup advantage with LeBron James but we have four matchup advantages and we do not have to worry about foul trouble or our guys getting worn down by banging around in the paint against a true big man."
While Golden State is deeper on paper than Cleveland, it is interesting to look at who is actually seeing action in this series. In game five, three Golden State starters played at least 40 minutes and seven Golden State players played at least 17 minutes; three Cleveland starters played at least 40 minutes and seven Cleveland players played at least 18 minutes. For all of the talk about fatigue and depth, the reality is that both teams are using seven man rotations. Yes, LeBron James is carrying a heavy individual workload but that is at least partially because Blatt refuses to take advantage of his second best weapon. Is James really more tired than Michael Jordan was in 1998 at the end of the Bulls' second three-peat or than Kobe Bryant was in 2010 after battling Boston's historically good defense for seven games or than most other great players were when they fought to win championships against worthy opposition? James is putting up great numbers but he is also consistently fading down the stretch while being offered (and accepting) a fatigue excuse that is rarely if ever granted to any other person who has held the greatest player in the world title.
Let's stop pretending that the Cavaliers are nothing more than LeBron James and a bunch of guys he rounded up at the YMCA. Timofey Mozgov is the best big man on either roster. Tristan Thompson is the leading rebounder in the series (and James is second). Iman Shumpert and Matthew Dellavedova are credible perimeter defenders. J.R. Smith is a talented, if erratic, player. The main difference in this series since Cleveland took a 2-1 lead is that Kerr convinced Blatt to bench Mozgov in exchange for Kerr benching Bogut, who is averaging 2.5 ppg in the Finals.
Maybe the Cavaliers would have lost game four even if Mozgov had played 35 or 40 minutes. Maybe the Cavaliers would have lost game five even if Mozgov had played more than nine minutes. However, it is a near certainty that if Blatt insists using some combination of Smith, Miller and Jones to match up with Golden State's skilled perimeter players while Mozgov languishes on the bench then Cleveland will lose every time.
As bizarre as this may sound, Cleveland could still win this series
if Blatt makes the right moves and if James figures out how to play as
hard and well in the final five minutes as he does the rest of the game. A Cleveland victory is by no means probable but it sure would be interesting to see what would happen if Blatt came up with a strategy other than expecting James to play point guard and center the rest of the way while Mozgov watches the action. Magic Johnson won his first NBA championship while doing the point guard/center routine in one game of the 1980 NBA Finals due to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's ankle injury--and Johnson's Lakers already enjoyed a 3-2 lead over Philadelphia, while James' Cavaliers trail 3-2. No one expected Johnson to do that for an entire Finals.
Labels: Andre Iguodala, Cleveland Cavaliers, David Blatt, Golden State Warriors, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Steve Kerr, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 3:36 AM
Adjustments for Cleveland Heading Into Game Five
Basketball is a game of matchups and adjustments but sometimes the best adjustment is no adjustment at all. The favored 67-15 Golden State Warriors had to do something after falling behind 2-1 to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the NBA Finals because it was clear that the slow down style of play that predominated in the first three games favored Cleveland. Golden State Coach Steve Kerr elected to try to speed up the tempo by going with a small lineup, replacing starting center Andrew Bogut with Andre Iguodala. The Cavaliers promptly took a 7-0 lead in game four by taking advantage of their size inside but the Warriors took control after the Cavaliers went small to match up with Golden State's small lineup; Golden State won 103-82 to even up the series.
In my newest article at
The Roar, I explain why Cleveland's best adjustment now is no adjustment at all, but rather
sticking with the team's strengths and forcing the Warriors to match up
with them or get pounded in the paint:
Cleveland Needs LeBron--and Timofey Mozgov's Height--to Win the TitleLabels: Cleveland Cavaliers, David Blatt, Golden State Warriors, LeBron James, Steve Kerr, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 6:23 PM
Warriors Regain Homecourt Advantage with 103-82 Game Four Win
Golden State defeated Cleveland 103-82 to tie the NBA Finals at 2-2 and regain homecourt advantage. Stephen Curry and Andre Iguodala led Golden State with 22 points apiece. Timofey Mozgov scored a game-high 28 points for Cleveland while pulling down 10 rebounds. LeBron James finished with 20 points on 7-22 field goal shooting plus 12 rebounds and eight assists.
This game is yet another reminder of how quickly things can turn in a seven game series and how foolish it is to make too much of just one game. Prior to game four, everyone was talking about the Cavaliers being on the verge of pulling off a huge upset as James authored possibly the greatest performance in NBA Finals history. Then in game four the Cavaliers suffered the fourth worst home loss in Finals history. The same people who were writing off Golden State after game three will probably write off Cleveland after game four. The reality is that, except for an occasional mismatch, most NBA Finals are seesaw affairs in which each game is both its own individual story and also one chapter in a larger story that cannot be completely understood until after the fact. It could very well be that the most important moment of the 2015 NBA Finals has not happened yet--or it may have already happened and we do not realize it because we do not know the final outcome.
Most of the analysis of game four will probably focus on Golden State Coach Steve Kerr's decision to go small by inserting Andre Iguodala in the starting lineup over Andrew Bogut. Iguodala, a former All-Star, had started every game of his career prior to this season but had yet to start a single game for Kerr's Warriors. Kerr's move had such an immediate impact that Golden State promptly fell behind 7-0. You can bet that this part of the story will be left out or glossed over in most accounts of the game.
Kerr's decision to go small did not spark the Warriors--but what happened shortly after the game started did. To understand that part of the story we need to look at the plus/minus numbers from this game. Every Cleveland player who played significant minutes had a plus/minus number of -12 or worse except for Mozgov (-5). Kerr went small for two reasons: to accelerate the pace of the game (which favors the Warriors because they are deeper and because their perimeter players are better than Cleveland's) and to entice the Cavaliers to take the bait and also go small--and Blatt fell for the banana in the tailpipe, giving J.R. Smith 28 minutes even though Smith was a one man disaster area. Smith's plus/minus number of -27 (12 points worse than any other player who
appeared in the game) only hints at how poorly he played and how
negative his impact was. Smith shot 2-12 from the field (including 0-8
from three point range) and finished with as many fouls as points
(four).
The Warriors made a 10-4 run to take a 22-20 lead after J.R. Smith replaced Matthew Dellavedova in Cleveland's lineup. Matters really went south for Cleveland after Blatt took out Mozgov at that point to go small with James Jones; Golden State pushed the lead to 31-24 before Blatt put Mozgov back in the game.
There is a natural tendency to focus on the fourth quarter in general and the final minutes/final plays in particular but students of the NBA understand that games are often decided early, even if there are subsequent runs by both teams. Cleveland made a late run in game four but the Cavaliers could not overcome the double digit lead that Golden State built by halftime. Golden State did a lot of damage in the first half with Mozgov on the bench; the Cavs played too fast during that stretch and Smith was awful. Instead of going small, Blatt should have stayed true to his team's strength and exploited his team's advantage inside.
When the Cavaliers went small they also started to play faster and they started firing up three pointers. Cleveland shot 4-27 from three point range. The problem is not just the number of misses or even the number of attempts but rather the quality and nature of the shots. Cleveland won games two and three by pounding the ball inside with James posting or driving, Mozgov cutting through the lane and Tristan Thompson pounding the offensive boards. Most of the Cavaliers' three pointers in those games came as a result of penetration and good ball movement. In game four, James did not attack as much, the Cavaliers settled for low percentage three pointers and the Cavaliers paid the price for Blatt's substitution patterns.
I understand that Blatt has limited options due to injuries but in order for Cleveland to win this series Mozgov's minutes need to go up, Smith's minutes need to go down and James cannot sit out the first two minutes of the fourth quarter because every time that happens Golden State goes on a run; this almost cost Cleveland in game three and it thwarted a potential Cleveland comeback in game four.
James may have to play 42 or 43 minutes per game the rest of the way, including all 12 in the final stanza. That work load is not the cruel and unusual punishment that the media portrays it to be. In the 1993 Finals, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen--en route to winning their third straight championship--averaged 45.7 mpg and 44.3 mpg. In the 1996 Finals, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen--en route to completing their second three-peat--each averaged more than 41 mpg (and Gary Payton averaged almost 46 mpg for Seattle in a losing cause that year). Superstar players should not only expect heavy minutes in the Finals but they should demand heavy minutes.
Hall of Famer Jerry West, a consultant for the Warriors,
has said that in the NBA when you don't have talent coaching can only do so much but when you do have talent coaching is everything. While it is true that Golden State has more talent and more depth than Cleveland, for all intents and purposes both teams are using a seven man rotation now and both teams are talented or they would not be in the Finals; in game four, seven Cleveland players played at least 18 minutes (and three players received three garbage time minutes apiece) and seven Golden State players played at least 15 minutes (and five other players received between one and seven minutes, with four of those players playing three minutes or less). Kerr may have more chess pieces to move around the board than Blatt does but Blatt has the ultimate chess piece (James) and he has a chess piece who is a matchup nightmare for Golden State (Mozgov) so within the options that Blatt has he needs to make the best possible choices to maximize the damage done by his two best pieces.
In addition to Kerr outcoaching Blatt (or Blatt outcoaching himself), the other big factor in game four is that LeBron James was not nearly as aggressive as he had been in the first three games of the series when he averaged 41 ppg. James scored 10 points on 4-12 field goal shooting in the first half and if he had reached his normal level of production in this series then Cleveland would not have trailed by 12 at halftime. Yes, that is a lot to ask of one player but when James is aggressive he not only creates scoring opportunities for himself but he also creates scoring opportunities for his teammates.
James suffered a large gash late in the first half when he hit his head on a courtside camera lens after receiving a hard foul from Andrew Bogut. It is unclear how much that injury affected James but he had been passive and the Cavaliers had been trailing even before that happened.
As a longtime advocate for the ABA, I cannot neglect to mention that even though James' 123 points through the first three games of the Finals is an NBA record it is not a pro basketball record; in the
1976 ABA Finals, Julius Erving scored 124 points in the first three games as his underdog New York Nets took a 2-1 lead over the powerful Denver Nuggets. James now has 143 points after four games but Erving scored 158 points in the first four games in the 1976 ABA Finals and for the series he led both teams in scoring (37.7 ppg), rebounding (14.2 rpg), assists (6.0 apg), steals (3.0 spg) and blocked shots (2.2 bpg) as the Nets won 4-2 over a squad that featured two Hall of Famers (David Thompson and Dan Issel) plus the best defensive forward in pro basketball (Bobby Jones) and a Hall of Fame coach (Larry Brown). Erving shot .590 from the field against the Nuggets. Considering the quality of the opponent, the all-around statistical dominance and the efficiency, a good case can be made that this is the greatest single series performance in pro basketball history. Just keep that historical perspective in mind when placing James' numbers in proper context. James has played great overall in the first four games but basketball history did not begin with Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan and basketball history includes (or should include) the ABA, though you might not realize this if you depend on the mainstream media outlets for basketball commentary.
OK, enough with the historical interlude for now. What will happen next in the 2015 NBA Finals? The only honest answer is, "I don't know." What I do know is that Golden State has the better team but Cleveland has the best player. Cleveland is capable of winning by employing the right strategy and playing really hard but Golden State has a larger margin for error. If Cleveland wins this series it would clearly be an upset but I am not sure it would be the biggest upset ever, as some people have suggested; let's wait and see if Cleveland prevails before trying to figure out how big of an upset it would be.
Labels: Andre Iguodala, Cleveland Cavaliers, David Blatt, Golden State Warriors, Julius Erving, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Steve Kerr, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 3:14 AM
Cleveland Shows the Value of the Paint--and the True MVP
The Cleveland Cavaliers lead the Golden State Warriors 2-1 in the 2015 NBA Finals but the score could easily be 3-0 either way. Cleveland may be halfway toward completing an improbable upset but Golden State may come back and cap off a 67 win season with a championship. Since the outcome is still in doubt, it would be premature to make definitive conclusions about what we have seen so far.
However, there are some trends that seem to be emerging, including the value of having an "inefficient" superstar who attracts a lot of defensive attention and the way that post play, team defense and rebounding can overcome analytics-driven small ball.
At
The Roar, I discuss some of the things we have learned from the first three games of the Finals:
Cleveland Shows the Value of the Paint--and the True MVPLabels: 2015 NBA Finals, Cleveland Cavaliers, Golden State Warriors, LeBron James, Matthew Dellavedova, Stephen Curry, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 11:20 PM
Cavaliers Tie Series as James Posts Triple Double and Curry Struggles
LeBron James posted big numbers across the board--39 points, 16 rebounds, 11 assists, 11-35 field goal shooting, 14-18 free throw shooting--as his Cleveland Cavaliers defeated the Golden State Warriors 95-93 in overtime to tie the NBA Finals at 1-1. "Stat gurus" will decry his lack of efficiency and bemoan Cleveland's reliance on isolation plays for James that lead to the dreaded shots that are neither layups nor three pointers (i.e., the lost art of the midrange game, the same skill set that enabled Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant to lead their teams to multiple titles). Obviously, it would be better for James and the Cavaliers if James shot a higher field goal percentage but the way James is playing now is the right way: he is in aggressive, attack mode and he is forcing the defense to stop him from scoring before he gives up the ball. If James had played like this throughout his NBA Finals career then he probably would have never lost in the NBA Finals. Precisely by scoring so prolifically he is bringing out the best in his teammates, because as Golden State sends more defenders toward James he is able to pass the ball to his teammates for wide open shots. This is the way that Kobe Bryant played during his prime but many members of the media never gave him proper credit for it. I
praised Bryant for shouldering the responsibility of being a great player and I say the same thing about James now. Cleveland is succeeding despite being undermanned by relying on a tried and tested formula: defense, rebounding and the brilliance of a great player who is not afraid to keep shooting.
James is doing a lot but he is not all by himself. Timofey Mozgov contributed 17 points, 11 rebounds and excellent defense in the paint. Mozgov's size and ability to draw fouls hurt Golden State. Tristan Thompson has little offensive game (he scored just two points) but he is so ferocious on the boards (14 rebounds) that Golden State tried to face guard him at times, a tactic which may not have been seen at this level of the game since Dennis Rodman's prime.
Matthew Dellavedova's stat line does not look like anything special (nine points on 3-10 field goal shooting, five rebounds, three steals, six turnovers) but he played a huge role in Cleveland's victory; his tough defense against Stephen Curry contributed to Curry's poor shooting performance and Dellvedova made several crucial hustle plays, culminating in grabbing an offensive rebound, getting fouled and nailing the game-winning free throws with 10.1 seconds remaining in overtime.
ABC analyst Jeff Van Gundy said it all about J.R. Smith: "Dumb gets you beat." Smith was Cleveland's third leading scorer (13 points on 5-13 field goal shooting) but he earned Van Gundy's ire with a series of stupid fouls that almost cost Cleveland the game. Smith is an enormously gifted player who can shoot, drive, pass and defend but after more than a decade in the NBA he still has not figured out how to intelligently use his gifts on a consistent basis.
Klay Thompson kept Golden State in contention by pouring in 34 points on 14-28 field goal shooting but he did not receive much help. Curry never found his rhythm, scoring 19 points while shooting just 5-23 from the field (including 2-15 from three point range). Curry also had six rebounds, five assists and he tied Dellavedova with a game-high six turnovers.
It is humorously inevitable that the team that has just won in the NBA
Finals is described by the media as being nearly invincible/a team of
destiny while the team that just lost has choked/has no chance but the
reality is, in the words of Triangle Offense guru Tex Winter,
"Everything turns on a trifle." In a seven game series, the best team
will almost always win but each play, each game and the series itself
can turn in a moment: a call, a missed shot, a deflected pass, a
ligament strained just past its limits.
No one can say for sure who will win this series. Golden State was and remains the smart pick because the Warriors were much better than the Cavaliers during the regular season, because the Warriors are great at both ends of the court and because the Warriors are deeper and healthier. Yet, the first two games have demonstrated that these teams are evenly matched enough that anything could happen. Golden State could be ahead 2-0 now and the talk could be about how the Warriors rank among the league's all-time best teams and about how James falls short so often in the NBA Finals; Cleveland could be ahead 2-0 now and the talk could be about how James is on the verge of playing the 1975 Rick Barry role, flipping the script on the Warriors.
One thing that is interesting to note about this series is that the new, "advanced" theory of basketball may have a chink or two in it. The math behind relying on three point shooting makes sense; a 40% three point shooter is statistically equivalent to a 60% two point shooter and since the current defensive rules make it much easier to get open on the perimeter than inside it seems to make sense to jack up three pointers as much as possible. I get that; in fact, nearly 20 years ago when no one talked about "advanced basketball statistics" I used to argue with the older guys who played pickup basketball with me that dumping the ball inside to an inefficient big guy made no sense if a team had a consistent three point shooter. However, a style of play that works in pickup basketball or college basketball or even FIBA basketball may not be quite as successful in the NBA. The problem is that a good inside player who shoots 50% or 55% or 60% probably can do that fairly consistently; he shoots close to the basket and has little margin for error (he also probably gets fouled a lot and puts his team in the bonus early). A three point shot covers greater distance and has a greater margin for error. A three point shooter who shoots .400 from three point range might be 1-10 one night and 7-10 the next night. His team will almost certainly lose on the nights he shoots 1-10 (that is a lot of empty possessions to overcome) but may not necessarily win on the nights he shoots 7-10. The variability of three point shooting can work against using it as the staple of a team's offense. Teams like the Olajuwon Rockets and the Duncan Spurs established an inside presence and shot three pointers off of double teams, ball reversal and offensive rebounds. Now, many teams just jack up three pointers at any time. The math looks good on paper but it can also lead to results like last night's, when a team that seems to have an advantage at four out of five positions plus a deeper bench got sucked into a slow down game in which one team established at least some inside presence while the other team kept shooting jumpers, expecting that they have to go in sooner or later.
LeBron James is attacking the hoop like Jordan and Bryant used to do via drives and postups, which also creates opportunities for Mozgov to attack the hoop and for Tristan Thompson to get offensive rebounds. Look at the last shot that James missed during regulation: he attacked the hoop and, even though he missed, he attracted so much attention that Tristan Thompson had a chance for a point blank tip in shot. When James missed a long jumper at the end of regulation in game one, the defensive attention he attracted led to an offensive rebound but one that was further from the hoop and led to a lower percentage attempt.
In the long run, attacking the hoop on offense, playing solid defense and rebounding remains a pretty good championship recipe. If Golden State does those things--or limits Cleveland's ability to do those things--the Warriors can still win this series. If the Warriors continue to "let" LeBron James put up historic stat lines, then the Cavaliers can pull off the upset; I use "let" advisedly, because I am not sure that the media characterization of Golden State's strategy is correct. Contrary to published reports, Golden State is not defending James one-on-one and just letting him score. The Warriors are sending a lot of help defenders in James' direction. The problem is that they are not doing so effectively enough; Mozgov cannot be left open running through the lane, Thompson cannot be left unattended on the boards and Smith cannot be left open for three point shots. The Warriors should help in such a fashion that Iman Shumpert is left open for two point jumpers and Dellavedova is forced to create shots off of the dribble.
The one thing that remains constant in the NBA Finals and in all forms of competition is the importance and the purity of playing with maximum effort at all times. Precisely because everything turns on a trifle, the players and teams that exert maximum effort for the longest period of time are most likely to be rewarded. "Super John" Williamson used to exhort his teammates, "Go down as you live" and one of those teammates--Phil Jackson--later adopted that as a slogan for the teams he coached to 11 NBA titles.
The twists and turns of game two, culminating in a Cleveland win that most analysts considered to be improbable if not impossible, reaffirms the wisdom of what I
wrote just prior to that contest:
"I disagree with the notion that LeBron James is playing with 'house
money' just because his team has suffered injuries. He has some talented
teammates and any team that is good enough to make it to the Finals
should not just be happy to be there. James is the best player on the
court and he has the ability to elevate his team so that each game is at
least competitive."
Labels: Cleveland Cavaliers, Golden State Warriors, J.R. Smith, Klay Thompson, LeBron James, Matthew Dellavedova, Stephen Curry, Timofey Mozgov
posted by David Friedman @ 2:56 PM
