Many have tried to break down and analyze what’s wrong with the Cleveland Cavaliers after their 4-6 start. The man with the closest seat to all that ails Cleveland, coach Tyronn Lue, knows there isn’t too much to be said about his team that hasn’t been uttered already. But after Sunday’s 117-115 loss to an Atlanta Hawks team missing five players, Lue was not pleased in Monday’s practice.
“Have to keep showing film and continue to keep talking about it,” head coach Tyronn Lue said following practice. “Make sure we’re aware of it and I think guys are embarrassed and should be embarrassed of how we’re getting beat.
“Teams that we’re playing, having guys out, key guys out and still not being able to win. We all have to continue to keep searching and continue to keep fighting and continue to play hard.”
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LeBron James didn’t have much to say following the loss, unable to pinpoint why the Cavs couldn’t build off an impressive win against the Wizards.
Channing Frye and Kyle Korver focused on defense, explaining that consistently allowing 30-point quarters puts far too much pressure on the offense. Dwyane Wade, the anchor of Cleveland’s revamped and productive second unit, pointed the finger at the starters, lamenting countless early-game deficits.
“It’s not just the starters, it’s all of us,” Lue said. “We all have to get better and we have to put in the work to get out of this hole. Starters understand they have to play better. They know that. But it’s all of us.”
The issues are myriad for Cleveland, which has the league’s worst Defensive Rating yet is among the NBA’s upper crust in Effective Field Goal percentage and True Shootinge percentage:
That’s the problem. One night it’s poor pick-and-roll defense. The next it’s sloppy close-outs to perimeter shooters. The starters haven’t held up their end. The 3-point shooting has decreased drastically. There is no rim protection playing Love at the 5. The ball movement hasn’t been there.
There are countless holes to patch and overcompensating for one causes flooding from another.
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Lue said he never played on a good team that had a bad habit of getting off to slow starts and easing into games.
This isn’t new for the Cavs. Last season featured plenty of baffling losses, which sometimes Lue referred to as disrespecting the opponent. New Orleans. Sacramento. Dallas. Atlanta — which cost Cleveland the conference’s top seed.
But as Lue admitted Monday, the Cavs can’t cling to their previous conference standing and assume they can flip the switch whenever they feel like it.
“We’re a different team, so I hope not,” Lue said. “It’s not the same team we’ve had over the last three years. We have a lot of new faces, a lot of new pieces, a lot of guys out, so we can’t have that approach. Every night we step out on the floor, we have to be ready to play.”
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