Cavs 09-10 Season (official thread)

[NFBuck]

You don't easily win the regular season outright, twice, without one of the top teams in the league. Unfortunately for the Cavs, Mike Brown was so incompetent when it came to match-ups, you just couldn't win.

I can't claim Cleveland automatically beats Boston with a few adjustments, but it sure as hell makes them more competitive. Antawn Jamison was owned by Garnett. Get Jamison off the court and let Varejao get a bulk of the minutes. Rondo owned Anthony Parker and Mo Williams, but was passive and slowed down in the few minutes LeBron checked him. Take Mo off the court, let LeBron play the point, Parker on Ray Allen, Jamison on Pierce. Or just roll with Williams on Allen but let LeBron slow Rondo down.

Against Orlando, and I've hashed this out a million times...they got abused by Dwight inside whether they ran 2 bigs at him or not. So you let LeBron take Rashard at the 4 and keep Lewis in check. The entire series LeBron was guarding Rafer f'n Alston...f'n skip to my Lou...really? I mean really? Seriously? All those athletes on Orlando, but we'll stick our best defender on Skip to My [censored]in' Lou? Honestly.

That is why Mike Brown is no longer coaching in Cleveland. Because he lets our best athlete check Rafer [censored]in' Alston instead of Rashard Lewis, and he lets him check an ice cold Paul Pierce while Rajon Rondo takes whatever he wants on the court.

It's called match-ups and adjustments. Mike Brown has never met them.

Plus fucking one. Yes, Dwight Howard had his way, but thay was compounded by the Turk and Lewis blowing the rest of the team out of the water. The match ups and adjustments made in that series were laughable and had many calling for Brown's head right then. He was embarrassed by an overweight porn actor masquerading as a basketball coach.

The Boston series just drove that point further home. Clearly Boston is playing at a very high level right now, but part of that is that Mr. Potatohead's comical substitution patterns, the matchups he created and his inability to recognize simple mismatches allowed them to get there. If Boston wins this thing, they should send Mike Brown a ring. I'm dead serious. He was so in over his head in those two series that it just was hard to watch at times. I was screaming at the TV so much that my wife had to leave the room. You watch what he does in his next job. I'll lay dollars to donuts he's a sub-.500 coach without LBJ.

 

[tsteele316]

But you can't fault Jamison for playing poor defense on Kevin Garnett. That was a MIS-MATCH. KG should abuse him in that situation. This is why Mike Brown is a ri-tard. He let Jamison get abused all series long...there were adjustments, easy adjustments, that could have negated KG's dominance. Mike Brown didn't even sniff it.

the kick in the balls of it was that garnett couldn't come close to guarding jamison on the perimeter, especially in the pick and roll, and when cleveland ran it, it worked great. but for some reason, they rarely ran it, and I don't think they ever ran it after game 3.

 

[billmac91]

the kick in the balls of it was that garnett couldn't come close to guarding jamison on the perimeter, especially in the pick and roll, and when cleveland ran it, it worked great. but for some reason, they rarely ran it, and I don't think they ever ran it after game 3.

personally, I think the molestation of Jamison on the defensive end, led to his incompetence on the offensive end. Jamison was just as bad within 5 feet of the rim, as he was on the perimeter. Jamison couldn't defend, shoot, or finish at the rim. At some point that needs to be recognized and you go heavy on Andy and Hickson. That never happened. Jamison was still firing blanks deep into Game 6 when the Cavs were actually playing decent ball. About a third into the thrid quarter Jamison misses a lay-up, turns the ball over, then misses a 3 and Boston has an explosion where the Cavs could never recover. Brown takes a timeout and you're positive Jamison will be on the bench, but alas Jamison just about finishes the quarter out while the lead gets out of control. It was a debacle.

 

[NFBuck]

the kick in the balls of it was that garnett couldn't come close to guarding jamison on the perimeter, especially in the pick and roll, and when cleveland ran it, it worked great. but for some reason, they rarely ran it, and I don't think they ever ran it after game 3.

We all know the reason.

There are a number of us that have been saying Mike Brown was in over his head for four years now. You could see it at times during the regular season. The playoffs, where teams with comparable talent had opportunities to exploit his inability to make simple adjustments that the casual fan could call at home, was where it really showed. His substitution patterns were seemingly random. No excuse at all for not playing J.J. Hickson more. Jamario Moon was horribly under-utilized. He is a subpar nba coach that was blessed with one of the Top-5 talents to ever play in the league. It's too bad they waited so damn long to take action. I'm still not 100% convinced LBJ IS leaving. But, if he is, Mike Brown should go down as one of the biggest blunders in Cleveland's dubious sports history. His coaching, nearly single-handily, cost the Cavs two series.

 

[exhawg]

I hope Vince delivered the news.

YouTube - Isiah Fired

Smackdown is in Cleveland tonight. :p

 

[exhawg]

personally, I think the molestation of Jamison on the defensive end, led to his incompetence on the offensive end. Jamison was just as bad within 5 feet of the rim, as he was on the perimeter. Jamison couldn't defend, shoot, or finish at the rim. At some point that needs to be recognized and you go heavy on Andy and Hickson. That never happened. Jamison was still firing blanks deep into Game 6 when the Cavs were actually playing decent ball. About a third into the thrid quarter Jamison misses a lay-up, turns the ball over, then misses a 3 and Boston has an explosion where the Cavs could never recover. Brown takes a timeout and you're positive Jamison will be on the bench, but alas Jamison just about finishes the quarter out while the lead gets out of control. It was a debacle.

I'm not sure if anyone said this already, but Mike Brown's greatest fault was not finding a way to put good matchups on the floor. Jamison couldn't defend Garnett, but I bet he would have been a little better against PP. He probably would have been better on offense if he could have posted up Pierce as well. The Cavs played best against the Celtics this season when JJ saw heavy minutes, but for some reason he doesn't even get on the floor so that Brown wouldn't hurt Shaq or Z's feelings. Lebron is big and athletic enough that he could defend Rondo without giving a ton of effort, yet he was rarely used. I think a good coach would spend the first game or two of a series testing different matchups to see what give his team the best chance to win.
I'm not sure if anything Brown did would have allowed the Cavs to beat the Magic last year, but it never really seemed like he tried anything. I fully believe that a better coach could have beat the Celtic's this year with the Cavs lineup.

 

[BB73]

As bad as the defensive matchups against Rondo and Garnett were, I thought the Cavs had more problems on the offensive end against the Celtics. Any time either one of the Allens was guarding LeBron, his ass should have been on the low block, posting up. And when he was guarded by somebody bigger, they should have had him driving past high screens.

 

[MUBuck]

As bad as the defensive matchups against Rondo and Garnett were, I thought the Cavs had more problems on the offensive end against the Celtics. Any time either one of the Allens was guarding LeBron, his ass should have been on the low block, posting up. And when he was guarded by somebody bigger, they should have had him driving past high screens.

This. We set ourselves up for offensive failure throughout the regular season by never running plays and not speeding up the tempo.

I think we can all agree that this team wasn't doing anything that it should have been doing, and it's hard not to blame Brown for most of it.

 

[jlb1705]

As bad as the defensive matchups against Rondo and Garnett were, I thought the Cavs had more problems on the offensive end against the Celtics. Any time either one of the Allens was guarding LeBron, his ass should have been on the low block, posting up. And when he was guarded by somebody bigger, they should have had him driving past high screens.

This is the key, IMO. For all the successes he had, this is one major quality that he lacked. If you look all across sports, pretty much all of the good coaches and managers are able to identify matchup advantages, force them to arise during the course of a game, and exploit them relentlessly until the other team does something to stop it. Brown had almost a bunker mentality that allowed his adversaries (Stan Van Gundy?!) to impose their matchup advantages on him instead.

 

[buchtelgrad04]

While I agree that adjustments and in-game coaching aren't his thing, but I still don't see how anyone can say he isn't a good defensive coach, when the numbers & stats say otherwise. I agree he kicked the can "when it counted", but it was moreso individual match-up issues.

If we want to say he's a bad defensive coach after 2 lackluster series, then does that make Tressel (or Heacock) a bad defensive coach because of the UF loss, LSU, Texas, or Purdue losses? No. The whole picture of it is, he's a good specialist coach, if he was an assistant hired to strictly handle defense, he's a gem.

 

[aurorabuckeye13]

Its funny how Mo Williams came out and supported Mike Brown when he was on the floor when the team blatently ignored him urging them to foul at the end of Game 6.

This change needed to be made. He hasn't got the job done with two pretty damn good teams and thats the bottom line.

 

[billmac91]

While I agree that adjustments and in-game coaching aren't his thing, but I still don't see how anyone can say he isn't a good defensive coach, when the numbers & stats say otherwise. I agree he kicked the can "when it counted", but it was moreso individual match-up issues.

If we want to say he's a bad defensive coach after 2 lackluster series, then does that make Tressel (or Heacock) a bad defensive coach because of the UF loss, LSU, Texas, or Purdue losses? No. The whole picture of it is, he's a good specialist coach, if he was an assistant hired to strictly handle defense, he's a gem.

It's a best of seven series though. And he continually gets beat by the same match-up disadvantages. And he never creates his own mis-matches. That is why he sucked. Our team defense will look good over the course of a season, especially with so many average teams who don't have the talent to create match-up problems. But you get to the post-season and it turns into an embarrassement because Brown refuses to adjust. His stubburness and committment to what he wants to work, kills the team over a series. How deflating must it be to watch Kevin Garnett get whatever shot he wants for six straight games because Antawn Jamison doesn't have the size to guard him?

I'd be livid and questioning my coach.

You can't coach a ball into the basket...sometimes you're just cold. However, you can control making life harder for opponent defensively through match-ups. LeBron on Rondo would have made life more difficult for Rajon. As it was, Rajon just moon-walked his way into the lane whenever he wanted. I don't know about you, but after 5 games of that shit, I'm trying something new.

 

[buchtelgrad04]

It's a best of seven series though. And he continually gets beat by the same match-up disadvantages. And he never creates his own mis-matches. That is why he sucked. Our team defense will look good over the course of a season, especially with so many average teams who don't have the talent to create match-up problems. But you get to the post-season and it turns into an embarrassement because Brown refuses to adjust. His stubburness and committment to what he wants to work, kills the team over a series. How deflating must it be to watch Kevin Garnett get whatever shot he wants for six straight games because Antawn Jamison doesn't have the size to guard him?

I'd be livid and questioning my coach.

You can't coach a ball into the basket...sometimes you're just cold. However, you can control making life harder for opponent defensively through match-ups. LeBron on Rondo would have made life more difficult for Rajon. As it was, Rajon just moon-walked his way into the lane whenever he wanted. I don't know about you, but after 5 games of that shit, I'm trying something new.

I understand and agree with what you're saying 100%, but at the same time, this post is criticizing his adjustments & ability to simplify the game of basketball. Something even HE has to know he sucks at. But his ability to get his team to play team basketball is pretty good.

 

[billmac91]

I understand and agree with what you're saying 100%, but at the same time, this post is criticizing his adjustments & ability to simplify the game of basketball. Something even HE has to know he sucks at. But his ability to get his team to play team basketball is pretty good.

I don't understad. Maybe explain further?

 

[buchtelgrad04]

I don't understad. Maybe explain further?

I apologize for not making myself coherent (this may not be any better, I'm drunk....what's that you say? On a Tuesday? Yes, don't judge me.) . Mike Brown established a defensive identity during his tenure with the Cavs. Of course there were some (and by "some", I mean countless) times where times where he had mental lapses, but Cleveland was an all around solid defensive basketball team. Defense isn't something teams just "do", they have to be coached. He wasn't a guy who would out coach anyone, but there were 3 things for certain when you watch a Cavs game. 1. They'll play excellent defense during the first 6 minutes and the last 7 minutes. 2. The offense will be awful all game. 3. You'll ask yourself why he was ever hired. I don't know where I'm going with this.