Konichiwa, Cavalier fans. I’m an Optimist – reporting for duty from Oakland, Californica, America.
Friends, I have a confession to make. After last Thursday’s Game 4 loss at The Q, I was as down as I’ve ever been as a Cavalier fan or employee. I ambled home in a stupor and sat listlessly on the couch, staring blankly for hours at the nightly “Forensic Files” marathon on HLN.
When I woke up the next morning, I thought to myself: ‘What the hell kind of optimist are you, man?!’
I felt shame. I even thought about wearing the Ribbons of Shame™ on the War Rig out to Oakland the next day. But Rafa talked me out of it, saying it would bum guys out on the trip.
So I apologize to you – Cavalier fans worldwide, dear readers of Cavs.com, the thousands of children that look up to me as a role model and, of course, the brave men and women of Delly’s Army.
I’m back! And I’m calling for back-to-back Cavalier wins to end this clustercuss of a series right now. Here’s Phase I of my plan …
The playoffs are about adjustments. If you don’t know that by now, you should.
In Game 4, Steve Kerr made the first big adjustment of the Finals by either team, replacing Andrew Bogut with Andre Iguodala in the starting lineup – thus “going small.” The move paid off in spades for Kerr and the Warriors. Iguodala continued his stellar play in the series, David Lee was big again off the bench and the Dubs got Cleveland to finally play at their pace.
On the other side, the Cavaliers were able to exploit Draymond Green’s size with Timofey Mozgov1 – who finished with 28 points and 10 boards, the best game for a Cavs center since Brad Daugherty’s 40-point, 16-rebound performance against New Jersey in 1992 – (a game in which Steve Kerr was the Cavs starting 2-guard.)
Mozgov has had a tremendous Finals so far – averaging 16.8 points and 8.2 boards, shooting 55 percent from the floor and 72 percent from the stripe. He only finished with six points in Game 3, but led both squads with four blocks.
And personally speaking, no matter how incredibly TheBron plays in the series, the Russian big man still might deserve Finals MVP consideration, if only because of this exchange at the postgame podium between Timo and an international reporter after last Thursday’s Game 4 loss …
Reporter: “You had a phenomenal night inside, scoring virtually at will. In fact, the points in the paint piled up. Yet, it did not free up the perimeter opportunities for the Cavs. Was it a combination of just more of a harassing defense on the part of the Warriors tonight, or, as Coach Blatt said, was the team a bit tired, a bit exhausted from the three games in five nights and the travel? Or a combination?
Timo: “That's a long question. Can you repeat it, please?”
How ‘bout our boy, Timo?! Breaking out a sense of humor like that after not only dropping a critical Finals contest at home, but after dealing with Joey Crawford yelling at him and hurting his feelings?
So I thought: Coach Blatt and his staff will make their adjustments. I’d love to help, but none of them have listened to me all season, no matter how many times I’ve handed them well-conceived, winning plays on bar napkins.
I’ll make my own adjustments, thank you.
For example: I had some close friends break my grapes because I went from my Elvis Playoff Hair™ to Full-Shump Playoff Hair™ in the middle of a two-game win streak. I am not a superstitious sort, but if it makes you guys feel better, I’ll go back to the Memphis Flash. I love Shump. You love Shump. We ALL love Shump. But when it comes to the King of Rock’n’Roll2, how can 50,000,000 fans be wrong?
Another adjustment is that instead of working so hard to work around the boring, administrative stuff like Birthdays, Today on This Date and Dead On This Day/Still Dead – why not embrace them and incorporate them into the narrative?
Now, if you’re thinking: ‘Nuts to that – I want some serious Cavaliers basketball jawboning!” I recommend checking out Joe G’s laborious Five Keys. If that’s not your cup of tea – (and I’d completely understand if it wasn’t) – you might want to check out THIS SITE about the Kansas Barbed Wire Museum in LaCrosse, Kansas – which features this bold and beautiful statement on its homepage: “Some say it was the six-gun that settled the West. Others know better.”
If our beloved Cavaliers are forced to win the NBA Championship back out here in Oakland next Friday, maybe we’ll stop there in the War Rig on the way back. I think the entire squad would like to know a little more about barbed wire.
Today’s Birthdays have a tenuous connection to the Cavaliers. There’s college hoops coaching legend Pat Summitt – along with Fred Funk, award-winning Polish author Jerzy Kosinski, Boy George, Steffi Graf, former Spur Bruce Bowen, Donald Trump3, Sam Perkins (“The Big Smooth”), Eddie Mekka (“The Big Ragu”) and Chinese pianist Lang Lang, who once played a duet with TheBron.
Your 2015 Finals Overview
The same goes for Dead On This Day/Still Dead. There’s really only one person who died on this day who really matters, and it’s not Japanese general Otomo no Otomaro, Indian actress Telangana Shakuntala, French poet Marin le Roy de Gomberville or the former King of Germania – Günther von Schwarzburg. It certainly isn’t Benedict Arnold.
It’s Cleveland’s own Henry Mancini, who wrote motion picture classics such as “Moon River” and “The Pink Panther Theme” – not to mention the theme to “What’s Happening!!” He passed on this day in 1994 and is generally considered the greatest composer in the history of film.
Like Mancini’s lone brilliance, only one event of any true significance happened on This Date in History – and that event took place in 1949. That’s when a valiant rhesus macaque named Albert II rode a V2 rocket to an altitude of 134 km, thereby becoming the first monkey in space.
Albert II is also a pioneer in this column, becoming the first to be mentioned in Today in History and also actually who (Died) On This Day – as Albert II was sent to monkey astronaut heaven on the same day when his parachute failed and he died on impact, following in the tragic footsteps of Albert I (suffocation during flight) and preceding Albert III (explosion), Albert IV (parachute failure) and Albert V (explosion).
One of the first chimpanzees in space – actually in the Mercury program – was “Ham4” (pictured above) who successfully returned to Earth safely.
Is Ham mugging for the camera – scratching his armpits or pounding his chest? Is he pestering that NASA nerd to his right for some banana-flavored Tang? Does he look frantic or agitated, like he’s about to poop his little monkey pampers?
Or does Ham look he's in complete control of the mission? That he totally understands the risk of failure, the glory of success. He looks like he realizes fully that his triumph in the outer reaches of space mean that one day a fellow monkey, or chimp, or gorilla, or orangutan or baboon – (although he’d have to be a pretty darn charismatic baboon) – might rise to the ranks of Captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise.
So you’re thinking: ‘OK, Optimist – but what do those space monkeys have to do with us?’
They have everything to do with us. That is us!
We’re going where Cavalier fans have never gone before. We’re out on a limb, into the stratosphere – and like me, sitting stupefied on the sofa after Game 4’s loss, we don’t really know what to do.
The best thing to do is trust someone who has been there; who’s WON THE WHOLE THING.
That man is TheBron.
But he’s not alone. And he won’t have to do it alone on Sunday night. Tonight is when J.R. Smith finally breaks free. Tonight is the night that Delly burrows deeper into the MVP’s fur. And tonight, the Wine and Gold feed the Warriors' interior a steady diet of Timo, Timo and more Timo – with a heapin’ helpin’ of the four-time MVP.
Who knows what’s going to happen? TheBron looked happy and confident at practice on Saturday afternoon in Oakland. And if the King ain’t worried – than why would you be, little space monkeys?
We had our Cleveland moment in Game 4. It’s out of the way. Tonight, the Cavaliers get their perimeter shooting back into gear. They get contribution from an unlikely source – keep an eye on Champ or Killer or the Matrix. And if they’re able to ward off any big runs, they’re bringing a 3-2 edge back to Cavalier Country.
And on Tuesday night, we gear up for the Final Frontier!
So strap in, Cavaliers fans. All you have to do is sit back and …
Keep the faith, Cleveland.
Sincerely yours,
The Optimist