Rusty:
How does Bynum look so far?
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1232He looks really, really good. Whole different game when he is on the floor. Kyrie has to make sure that Bynum gets touches. Since Bynum can only play limited minutes that means he is the largest part of the offense when he plays. He scored almost half of the Cavs points last night in the first quarter.
If Bynum had not said recently that he did not feel like that he will every be as good as the past or that he may retire at any time due to his knees then I think no one could tell by his play.
If Bynum had not said recently that he did not feel like that he will every be as good as the past or that he may retire at any time due to his knees then I think no one could tell by his play.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1233Could be difficult to run one type of offense for the half a game when he's in there and an entirely different type of offense when Andy or Zellers is the center?
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1234Bulls 96, Cavs 81: Jason Lloyd's final thoughts
By JASON LLOYD Published: November 12, 2013
CHICAGO: Final thoughts from a strange night in the Windy City…
* First off, the tongue lashing Mike Brown gave to Kyrie Irving. I don’t know what Brown was so upset about and I’m not going to speculate, but Brown was hot when Irving left the game in the first quarter.
* To be totally honest, I rarely get to actually watch much of the first quarter because I’m usually busy writing and sending pregame notes. With the 8 p.m. start, I hardly watched any of the first 10 minutes of Monday’s game and didn’t see what Irving was or wasn’t doing. But I saw Irving leave the game and Brown follow him to the end of the bench.
* Brown’s back was to the media, but you didn’t need to see his face to see him really giving it to Irving. It was a stern chew out that included some head shaking from Brown and a lot of jawing.
* “There was a lot going on. It’s between he and I, but there was a lot going on,” Brown said. “Not just with him, but with the whole team.”
* “Just a conversation with my coach,” Irving said. “That’s about it.”
* Of course, there’s much more to the story, but we’ll likely never know it.
* This is new territory for Irving – and probably needed. He has enjoyed Big Man On Campus status since the Cavs drafted him and he was never really challenged or held accountable by Byron Scott.
* A perfect example of that was the third-to-last game of the season last year in Philadelphia, when a miserable season was nearly – mercifully – complete. The Cavs weren’t doing much of anything right and fell behind to the Sixers 12-3 after 4 ½ minutes. Scott cleared the bench and yanked all of his starters … except for Irving.
* He was allowed to stay in the game, even though he looked just as miserable and disinterested as everyone else. That’s also the game where he lost track of his fouls and inexplicably picked up two quick ones at the start of the third quarter. Then Scott finally benched him the rest of the game in a blowout. The fact Irving was allowed to stay in the game in the first half sent the wrong message to him and was noticed by people within the organization.
* I didn’t cover this team during Brown’s time with LeBron James, but I know Brown never backed down from Kobe Bryant, so he’s certainly not going to back down from Irving. Brown and Bryant had a handful of face-offs during their time together in Los Angeles, which is fairly natural for any relationship between coach and star player. It’s just Irving, to my knowledge, has never really experienced it until now.
* Since he was hired, Brown has balanced when to privately crack Irving and when to praise him. He showed Irving clips of his poor defense from the last couple of seasons and made it clear that simply wasn’t going to be good enough anymore. And to Irving’s credit, he seems to have bought in to Brown’s defensive principles. But Irving has also proven to be moody and petulant in his two-plus years here.
* Irving was harshly criticized both publicly and internally for his stunt at the end of last season, when he ran off the court following a loss in the home finale and didn’t stick around for the Fan Appreciation Night festivities. He responded the right way almost immediately. I have no reason to think this will be any different.
* Irving was in a fine mood after the game, even joking with Anthony Bennett about making the bus. Despite not playing in Monday’s game, Bennett was just hanging around at his locker well after the game ended and still in workout clothes. Irving was showered, dressed and walking out the door when he asked Bennett what he was waiting for. Bennett told him he was “just chillin’” and still had 15 minutes to make the second (and final) bus back to the hotel.
* “That’s OK, the bus won’t leave without you,” Irving joked. “The bus won’t leave without the No. 1 pick. You’re in a special fraternity.”
* Now before anyone misconstrues that as arrogant or tries to twist it any other way, Irving was clearly just being playful and joking with the rookie.
* As for Bennett, a Cavs spokesman said before the half he was healthy and available to play, then Brown said afterward he chose to hold him out because the shoulder was still bothering him.
* I was a bit surprised Bennett played in Saturday’s game after injuring it Friday. I thought the shoulder injury was a great way to sit him for a couple days and let him clear his head a little bit, but he was right back on the floor the next night. Now Brown said he wasn’t sure if Bennett would play Wednesday at Minnesota or not.
* Brown before the game: “You want the young fella to have success right away, but … we don’t have to count on him right now. It’s a luxury we have as an organization to play him when we feel like playing him and kind of help him along slowly. When he figures it out, we know he’s going to be great because we’ve seen it already.”
* Kind of along those lines, ESPN draft analyst Chad Ford wrote in a chat Monday that he doesn’t seen LeBron James returning to Cleveland because the Cavs haven’t drafted well enough. “I'm not sure the Cavs have drafted well enough to make it compelling for LeBron,” Ford wrote. “Had they chosen differently on Tristan Thompson, Dion Waiters and Anthony Bennett? Maybe … but they've clearly missed a few times on players that could've been more helpful to their cause. Thank goodness for Kyrie Irving.”
* Putting aside the whole James component, that is ridiculous. The player most often compared to the Thompson draft pick is Jonas Valanciunas, who averaged 8.9 points and 6 rebounds last season as a rookie and who is averaging 9.6 points and 6.9 rebounds this season. Thompson averaged 8.2 points and 6.5 rebounds as a rookie, 11.7 points and 9.4 rebounds last season and is now averaging 13 points and 10.1 rebounds this season.
* Valanciunas could have a better career than Thompson, but Thompson is still very much on an upward projectory and playing extremely well following the off-season hand switch.
* The Waiters pick will always be compared to Harrison Barnes and Andre Drummond. Waiters has been erratic, but seems to be settling into a rhythm the last few games. He told me before Monday’s game he recently had a heart-to-heart with his agent, Rob Pelinka, that helped clear his head. He is averaging 19 points in his last four games and is shooting 45 percent during that stretch. He has also played better defense lately.
* Something has just looked different about Waiters lately, it just looks like something is clicking with him. “It’s my attitude,” he said. “A couple talks I had with my agent talking about some things just motivating me. I was letting the game get me so frustrated.”
* Waiters said the team’s struggles were getting to him and “dumb things like, “I’m not touching the ball this many times.’”
* I’ll have more on my conversation with Waiters in the next few days, but the point is it’s ridiculous for Ford to say the Cavs have blown their picks the last few years. It’s really ridiculous to say it about Bennett, since he has played just seven games in his career.
* Speaking of Bennett, I jokingly asked Jarrett Jack if he would start fining Bennett for every 3-pointer he misses. “I’m going to get mad at him if he doesn’t shoot it,” Jack said. “He’s capable. Over the course of an 82-game season, you’re going to have a rough shooting patch. All of us are. That’s part of that rookie wall process. Obviously you want to come in right away and hit the ground running, but this is the NBA. It doesn’t always happen like that. Every book you read isn’t always a fairy tale. Throughout the season, you’re going to have peaks and valleys. How you handle those, that’s the make-up of a professional and you have to understand you’re a man now. There’s no hiding anymore. And he’s been taking it in stride every day, just constantly trying to get better, constantly working hard and constantly working at it. That’s all you can ask for of anybody in his position.”
* Somehow I wrote 1,400 words and have yet to get to Andrew Bynum making his first start for the Cavs. Brown did his best to keep it a secret, but once he hinted during the morning shootaround that a change could be coming, it was the most obvious move he could make.
* Brown has seemed frustrated in recent days that Bynum was playing with the second unit because he knew it was only temporary. It was throwing off the chemistry of the second unit, so Brown went ahead and made the switch even though Bynum is only up to about 20 minutes a game.
* It was obvious after the game Brown was upset by Bynum’s lack of touches. This is something that has to be addressed immediately. In fairness to the other players, the starters never really practiced with Bynum. That’s part of the reason, presumably, that Brown held a two-hour shootaround Monday morning to try and help acclimate Bynum with the starters.
* The plan seemed to be to run the offense through Bynum and make sure he gets plenty of touches, but the Cavs went multiple possessions without him ever touching the ball. Asked if in the future he wanted to establish Bynum more on the block, Brown said, “I’d love to. That’s what our goal was tonight.”
* “We don’t know how to play with a guy like that,” Brown said. “I thought almost every time he touched it on the block, something good happened. The easiest shot we had in the whole game, the ball went to him, they doubled, he kicked it to Dion for a wide-open 3 on the weak side. But we don’t understand that yet. Hopefully we will soon.”
* The Cavs are staying over in Chicago on Monday and will practice here on Tuesday. Bynum said he expected Tuesday’s practice to be geared toward offense (a rarity for Brown’s teams) in an effort to help ingratiate him better with the starters.
* Bynum said his game won’t change much by moving into the starting lineup, but the rest of the starters’ games will change. He’s right. The Cavs haven’t had a post presence like Bynum since Shaquille O’Neal’s one season here. Zydrunas Ilgauskas was an incredibly skilled big man, but Bynum demands a double team every time he touches the ball.
* “It’s going to be a big adjustment for all of us, especially the other four guys,” Irving said. “Drew is an established big man in this league and takes up a lot of space. We just have to get used to him being out there, gtting him going and playing off him, especially in the beginning of the game. We want to get him easy touches, easy baskets and just keep him going.”
* The starting lineup will still continue to fluctuate because Bynum said he’s still not playing on the second nights of back-to-backs. The Cavs have three more sets of back-to-backs this month and four sets in December, meaning Anderson Varejao will still start at least seven games through the end of the calendar year. Bynum, however, told me tonight he believes he’ll be able to play in back-to-backs at some point this season.
* His minutes are also steadily climbing and he believes he could be able to play typical starter’s minutes within a couple months. But again, there is no real timeline yet for any of this stuff. “They’re taking everything really slowly,” he said. “Maybe after January or something like that.”
* Bynum’s insertion in the starting lineup meant Anderson Varejao returned to the bench for the first time since May 2010, but Varejao said he didn’t have any ego to swallow. “My job is to play hard, that’s what I’m going to do,” he said. “Starting was never (a big deal) to me. To me it’s who finishes the game when a game is close. It doesn’t bother me.”
* While Bynum’s minutes are shortened, Varejao will still be one of the Cavs’ closers. Brown went much of the fourth quarter again with his three guards, Thompson and Varejao. That could be his closing lineup most nights given the ongoing search at small forward.
* I asked Alonzo Gee if he felt a sense of vindication for reclaiming the starting job at small forward after starting there every game last season. “I don’t feel like I lost it or Earl lost it, (Brown) is just trying to find the right fit,” Gee said. “We’re both capable of starting, it’s just finding the right group to be in there. Whoever gets the rhythm, it’s all about rhythm. It’s tough to get a rhythm when you keep switching up.”
* After all the work Gee put in shooting corner 3s in the summer, I’m going to track his progress throughout the season. He’s 4 of 9 thus far on corner 3s, a dramatic improvement (albeit a miniscule sample size) over his 31 percent from the corners last season. With Bynum now in the starting lineup and teams constantly doubling him, Gee will be open in the corner all season long. Gee said when he’s the feeder into the post and then cuts through, his man will drop off him and pick up Bynum, leaving a guard to rotate back to him.
* Gee said he’s looking forward to shooting the corner 3s, but said he couldn’t really put a percentage he was trying to hit because his defensive responsibilities change. The other night against the Sixers, for example, he picked up point guard Michael Carter-Williams for a few possessions similar to how he did many times with the opposing point guards last year.
* “I have to get back used to that,” he said. “I can’t really put a percentage on (3-pointers) because when I do stuff like that, it takes away a lot from my legs.”
* Interesting enough, Gee said when he picked up Carter-Williams, it didn’t come from the bench. He has the freedom sometimes to do it on his own.
* Cavs are 3-5, but turnovers killed them against the Bulls. They had 20 as a team (Waiters had six of them) and they led to 29 points for the Bulls. Just something else to work on during Tuesday’s “offensive practice.” I don’t doubt Bynum, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
By JASON LLOYD Published: November 12, 2013
CHICAGO: Final thoughts from a strange night in the Windy City…
* First off, the tongue lashing Mike Brown gave to Kyrie Irving. I don’t know what Brown was so upset about and I’m not going to speculate, but Brown was hot when Irving left the game in the first quarter.
* To be totally honest, I rarely get to actually watch much of the first quarter because I’m usually busy writing and sending pregame notes. With the 8 p.m. start, I hardly watched any of the first 10 minutes of Monday’s game and didn’t see what Irving was or wasn’t doing. But I saw Irving leave the game and Brown follow him to the end of the bench.
* Brown’s back was to the media, but you didn’t need to see his face to see him really giving it to Irving. It was a stern chew out that included some head shaking from Brown and a lot of jawing.
* “There was a lot going on. It’s between he and I, but there was a lot going on,” Brown said. “Not just with him, but with the whole team.”
* “Just a conversation with my coach,” Irving said. “That’s about it.”
* Of course, there’s much more to the story, but we’ll likely never know it.
* This is new territory for Irving – and probably needed. He has enjoyed Big Man On Campus status since the Cavs drafted him and he was never really challenged or held accountable by Byron Scott.
* A perfect example of that was the third-to-last game of the season last year in Philadelphia, when a miserable season was nearly – mercifully – complete. The Cavs weren’t doing much of anything right and fell behind to the Sixers 12-3 after 4 ½ minutes. Scott cleared the bench and yanked all of his starters … except for Irving.
* He was allowed to stay in the game, even though he looked just as miserable and disinterested as everyone else. That’s also the game where he lost track of his fouls and inexplicably picked up two quick ones at the start of the third quarter. Then Scott finally benched him the rest of the game in a blowout. The fact Irving was allowed to stay in the game in the first half sent the wrong message to him and was noticed by people within the organization.
* I didn’t cover this team during Brown’s time with LeBron James, but I know Brown never backed down from Kobe Bryant, so he’s certainly not going to back down from Irving. Brown and Bryant had a handful of face-offs during their time together in Los Angeles, which is fairly natural for any relationship between coach and star player. It’s just Irving, to my knowledge, has never really experienced it until now.
* Since he was hired, Brown has balanced when to privately crack Irving and when to praise him. He showed Irving clips of his poor defense from the last couple of seasons and made it clear that simply wasn’t going to be good enough anymore. And to Irving’s credit, he seems to have bought in to Brown’s defensive principles. But Irving has also proven to be moody and petulant in his two-plus years here.
* Irving was harshly criticized both publicly and internally for his stunt at the end of last season, when he ran off the court following a loss in the home finale and didn’t stick around for the Fan Appreciation Night festivities. He responded the right way almost immediately. I have no reason to think this will be any different.
* Irving was in a fine mood after the game, even joking with Anthony Bennett about making the bus. Despite not playing in Monday’s game, Bennett was just hanging around at his locker well after the game ended and still in workout clothes. Irving was showered, dressed and walking out the door when he asked Bennett what he was waiting for. Bennett told him he was “just chillin’” and still had 15 minutes to make the second (and final) bus back to the hotel.
* “That’s OK, the bus won’t leave without you,” Irving joked. “The bus won’t leave without the No. 1 pick. You’re in a special fraternity.”
* Now before anyone misconstrues that as arrogant or tries to twist it any other way, Irving was clearly just being playful and joking with the rookie.
* As for Bennett, a Cavs spokesman said before the half he was healthy and available to play, then Brown said afterward he chose to hold him out because the shoulder was still bothering him.
* I was a bit surprised Bennett played in Saturday’s game after injuring it Friday. I thought the shoulder injury was a great way to sit him for a couple days and let him clear his head a little bit, but he was right back on the floor the next night. Now Brown said he wasn’t sure if Bennett would play Wednesday at Minnesota or not.
* Brown before the game: “You want the young fella to have success right away, but … we don’t have to count on him right now. It’s a luxury we have as an organization to play him when we feel like playing him and kind of help him along slowly. When he figures it out, we know he’s going to be great because we’ve seen it already.”
* Kind of along those lines, ESPN draft analyst Chad Ford wrote in a chat Monday that he doesn’t seen LeBron James returning to Cleveland because the Cavs haven’t drafted well enough. “I'm not sure the Cavs have drafted well enough to make it compelling for LeBron,” Ford wrote. “Had they chosen differently on Tristan Thompson, Dion Waiters and Anthony Bennett? Maybe … but they've clearly missed a few times on players that could've been more helpful to their cause. Thank goodness for Kyrie Irving.”
* Putting aside the whole James component, that is ridiculous. The player most often compared to the Thompson draft pick is Jonas Valanciunas, who averaged 8.9 points and 6 rebounds last season as a rookie and who is averaging 9.6 points and 6.9 rebounds this season. Thompson averaged 8.2 points and 6.5 rebounds as a rookie, 11.7 points and 9.4 rebounds last season and is now averaging 13 points and 10.1 rebounds this season.
* Valanciunas could have a better career than Thompson, but Thompson is still very much on an upward projectory and playing extremely well following the off-season hand switch.
* The Waiters pick will always be compared to Harrison Barnes and Andre Drummond. Waiters has been erratic, but seems to be settling into a rhythm the last few games. He told me before Monday’s game he recently had a heart-to-heart with his agent, Rob Pelinka, that helped clear his head. He is averaging 19 points in his last four games and is shooting 45 percent during that stretch. He has also played better defense lately.
* Something has just looked different about Waiters lately, it just looks like something is clicking with him. “It’s my attitude,” he said. “A couple talks I had with my agent talking about some things just motivating me. I was letting the game get me so frustrated.”
* Waiters said the team’s struggles were getting to him and “dumb things like, “I’m not touching the ball this many times.’”
* I’ll have more on my conversation with Waiters in the next few days, but the point is it’s ridiculous for Ford to say the Cavs have blown their picks the last few years. It’s really ridiculous to say it about Bennett, since he has played just seven games in his career.
* Speaking of Bennett, I jokingly asked Jarrett Jack if he would start fining Bennett for every 3-pointer he misses. “I’m going to get mad at him if he doesn’t shoot it,” Jack said. “He’s capable. Over the course of an 82-game season, you’re going to have a rough shooting patch. All of us are. That’s part of that rookie wall process. Obviously you want to come in right away and hit the ground running, but this is the NBA. It doesn’t always happen like that. Every book you read isn’t always a fairy tale. Throughout the season, you’re going to have peaks and valleys. How you handle those, that’s the make-up of a professional and you have to understand you’re a man now. There’s no hiding anymore. And he’s been taking it in stride every day, just constantly trying to get better, constantly working hard and constantly working at it. That’s all you can ask for of anybody in his position.”
* Somehow I wrote 1,400 words and have yet to get to Andrew Bynum making his first start for the Cavs. Brown did his best to keep it a secret, but once he hinted during the morning shootaround that a change could be coming, it was the most obvious move he could make.
* Brown has seemed frustrated in recent days that Bynum was playing with the second unit because he knew it was only temporary. It was throwing off the chemistry of the second unit, so Brown went ahead and made the switch even though Bynum is only up to about 20 minutes a game.
* It was obvious after the game Brown was upset by Bynum’s lack of touches. This is something that has to be addressed immediately. In fairness to the other players, the starters never really practiced with Bynum. That’s part of the reason, presumably, that Brown held a two-hour shootaround Monday morning to try and help acclimate Bynum with the starters.
* The plan seemed to be to run the offense through Bynum and make sure he gets plenty of touches, but the Cavs went multiple possessions without him ever touching the ball. Asked if in the future he wanted to establish Bynum more on the block, Brown said, “I’d love to. That’s what our goal was tonight.”
* “We don’t know how to play with a guy like that,” Brown said. “I thought almost every time he touched it on the block, something good happened. The easiest shot we had in the whole game, the ball went to him, they doubled, he kicked it to Dion for a wide-open 3 on the weak side. But we don’t understand that yet. Hopefully we will soon.”
* The Cavs are staying over in Chicago on Monday and will practice here on Tuesday. Bynum said he expected Tuesday’s practice to be geared toward offense (a rarity for Brown’s teams) in an effort to help ingratiate him better with the starters.
* Bynum said his game won’t change much by moving into the starting lineup, but the rest of the starters’ games will change. He’s right. The Cavs haven’t had a post presence like Bynum since Shaquille O’Neal’s one season here. Zydrunas Ilgauskas was an incredibly skilled big man, but Bynum demands a double team every time he touches the ball.
* “It’s going to be a big adjustment for all of us, especially the other four guys,” Irving said. “Drew is an established big man in this league and takes up a lot of space. We just have to get used to him being out there, gtting him going and playing off him, especially in the beginning of the game. We want to get him easy touches, easy baskets and just keep him going.”
* The starting lineup will still continue to fluctuate because Bynum said he’s still not playing on the second nights of back-to-backs. The Cavs have three more sets of back-to-backs this month and four sets in December, meaning Anderson Varejao will still start at least seven games through the end of the calendar year. Bynum, however, told me tonight he believes he’ll be able to play in back-to-backs at some point this season.
* His minutes are also steadily climbing and he believes he could be able to play typical starter’s minutes within a couple months. But again, there is no real timeline yet for any of this stuff. “They’re taking everything really slowly,” he said. “Maybe after January or something like that.”
* Bynum’s insertion in the starting lineup meant Anderson Varejao returned to the bench for the first time since May 2010, but Varejao said he didn’t have any ego to swallow. “My job is to play hard, that’s what I’m going to do,” he said. “Starting was never (a big deal) to me. To me it’s who finishes the game when a game is close. It doesn’t bother me.”
* While Bynum’s minutes are shortened, Varejao will still be one of the Cavs’ closers. Brown went much of the fourth quarter again with his three guards, Thompson and Varejao. That could be his closing lineup most nights given the ongoing search at small forward.
* I asked Alonzo Gee if he felt a sense of vindication for reclaiming the starting job at small forward after starting there every game last season. “I don’t feel like I lost it or Earl lost it, (Brown) is just trying to find the right fit,” Gee said. “We’re both capable of starting, it’s just finding the right group to be in there. Whoever gets the rhythm, it’s all about rhythm. It’s tough to get a rhythm when you keep switching up.”
* After all the work Gee put in shooting corner 3s in the summer, I’m going to track his progress throughout the season. He’s 4 of 9 thus far on corner 3s, a dramatic improvement (albeit a miniscule sample size) over his 31 percent from the corners last season. With Bynum now in the starting lineup and teams constantly doubling him, Gee will be open in the corner all season long. Gee said when he’s the feeder into the post and then cuts through, his man will drop off him and pick up Bynum, leaving a guard to rotate back to him.
* Gee said he’s looking forward to shooting the corner 3s, but said he couldn’t really put a percentage he was trying to hit because his defensive responsibilities change. The other night against the Sixers, for example, he picked up point guard Michael Carter-Williams for a few possessions similar to how he did many times with the opposing point guards last year.
* “I have to get back used to that,” he said. “I can’t really put a percentage on (3-pointers) because when I do stuff like that, it takes away a lot from my legs.”
* Interesting enough, Gee said when he picked up Carter-Williams, it didn’t come from the bench. He has the freedom sometimes to do it on his own.
* Cavs are 3-5, but turnovers killed them against the Bulls. They had 20 as a team (Waiters had six of them) and they led to 29 points for the Bulls. Just something else to work on during Tuesday’s “offensive practice.” I don’t doubt Bynum, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1235Cavaliers sideline reporter takes ball to the head on live television, shakes it off like a pro
http://ftw.usatoday.com/2013/11/cavs-re ... ce=fbshare
http://ftw.usatoday.com/2013/11/cavs-re ... ce=fbshare
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1236Tempers flare at Cavs' meeting
Updated: November 16, 2013, 3:06 PM ET
By Brian Windhorst | ESPN.com
The Cleveland Cavaliers are dealing with a three-game losing streak, and perhaps some chemistry problems within the locker room.
The Cavaliers held a players-only meeting following Wednesday's 29-point loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, multiple sources told ESPN.com. But the meeting got contentious, and players confronted each other, according to sources.
The Cavs lost Friday, 86-80, to the Charlotte Bobcats after squandering a 12-point second-half lead.
Cleveland, which has lost five of six games since starting the season 2-2, plays Saturday against the Washington Wizards.
In a loss at the Chicago Bulls on Monday, Cavs coach Mike Brown and star guard Kyrie Irving got into an exchange on the bench after Brown pulled Irving from the game.
The Cavaliers also have been making lineup changes recently, as several players' roles have been changing.
Irving is struggling, shooting just 38 percent from the field and 32 percent from 3-point range. He was just 5-of-16 shooting in the loss to the Bobcats.
Irving, who is averaging a team-leading 19.3 points and 7.2 assists, took to Twitter after Friday's loss.
Cleveland could receive a boost Saturday from center Andrew Bynum, who is expected to return to the lineup after missing two games because of personal family reasons.
Updated: November 16, 2013, 3:06 PM ET
By Brian Windhorst | ESPN.com
The Cleveland Cavaliers are dealing with a three-game losing streak, and perhaps some chemistry problems within the locker room.
The Cavaliers held a players-only meeting following Wednesday's 29-point loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, multiple sources told ESPN.com. But the meeting got contentious, and players confronted each other, according to sources.
The Cavs lost Friday, 86-80, to the Charlotte Bobcats after squandering a 12-point second-half lead.
Cleveland, which has lost five of six games since starting the season 2-2, plays Saturday against the Washington Wizards.
In a loss at the Chicago Bulls on Monday, Cavs coach Mike Brown and star guard Kyrie Irving got into an exchange on the bench after Brown pulled Irving from the game.
The Cavaliers also have been making lineup changes recently, as several players' roles have been changing.
Irving is struggling, shooting just 38 percent from the field and 32 percent from 3-point range. He was just 5-of-16 shooting in the loss to the Bobcats.
Irving, who is averaging a team-leading 19.3 points and 7.2 assists, took to Twitter after Friday's loss.
Cleveland could receive a boost Saturday from center Andrew Bynum, who is expected to return to the lineup after missing two games because of personal family reasons.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1237Sam Amico
Confrontation between Cavs players reported by ESPN involved Dion Waiters, source says. Waiters sat out last night, didn't travel today.
Confrontation between Cavs players reported by ESPN involved Dion Waiters, source says. Waiters sat out last night, didn't travel today.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1238Anthony Lima @AnthonyLima 93 the fan
If you don't think that contentious Cavs players' only meeting was a mutiny against Kyrie, you're fooling yourself. Players sick of his act
Retweeted by Daryl Ruiter
If you don't think that contentious Cavs players' only meeting was a mutiny against Kyrie, you're fooling yourself. Players sick of his act
Retweeted by Daryl Ruiter
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1239Anthony Lima @AnthonyLima 93 the FAN
I was attacked when I shared some behind-the-scenes stories of Kyrie last year. Pretty evident now I wasn't making stuff up
Retweeted by Daryl Ruiter
I was attacked when I shared some behind-the-scenes stories of Kyrie last year. Pretty evident now I wasn't making stuff up
Retweeted by Daryl Ruiter
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1240KI might be an arrogant prima dona. But the talk about a mutiny against him is bullshit.rusty2 wrote:Anthony Lima @AnthonyLima 93 the FAN
I was attacked when I shared some behind-the-scenes stories of Kyrie last year. Pretty evident now I wasn't making stuff up
Retweeted by Daryl Ruiter
From one of the insiders over at RCF;
Quote Originally Posted by gregdawg
heh...a while back i tried to bring this stuff up about Kyrie being a headcase and everyone acted like i was trolling. there have been reports and signs pointing to truths about Kyrie for a while now. i'm glad certain media people aren't afraid to reveal it.
Quote Originally Posted by Maximus
Heh, except for the fact that he's either uniformed or lying. Look, I have issues with Kyrie. But, the meeting was not at all a mutiny on Kyrie. Kyrie called the meeting. There is plenty of blame to go around and a lot of issues were aired out...some with Kyrie...but this wasn't all about Kyrie or anything near a mutiny. It was a great thing that Kyrie stepped up and called the meeting.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1241Player Meeting a Good Thing?
Miles said it was too soon to tell if the meeting really helped, but he sensed that it did.
"We talked about what we wanted to do and what we wanted to continue to try to do as a team -- just the little things we felt we needed to put out on the table…and what we can do to get everybody on the same page all the time,'' he said. "That was pretty much it. Guys basically agreed to what we wanted to do and we're just going to keep moving forward.''
"It's not unusual,'' Brown said. "It happens. Guys care about winning. They care about winning and trying to do it the right way so they wanted to talk amongst themselves, which was great. I encourage that any time. The better teams, when they start being able to take ownership and look each other in the eye and say whatever they feel like they need to say to one another, then, to me, that's a positive.''
The coach also addressed some innuendo that Dion Waiters, who missed games Friday and Saturday with an illness, was not really sick.
"He's been to the doctor twice,'' Brown said. "Somebody says they're sick, they go to the doctor, the doctor takes care of it and we move on.''
Miles said it was too soon to tell if the meeting really helped, but he sensed that it did.
"We talked about what we wanted to do and what we wanted to continue to try to do as a team -- just the little things we felt we needed to put out on the table…and what we can do to get everybody on the same page all the time,'' he said. "That was pretty much it. Guys basically agreed to what we wanted to do and we're just going to keep moving forward.''
"It's not unusual,'' Brown said. "It happens. Guys care about winning. They care about winning and trying to do it the right way so they wanted to talk amongst themselves, which was great. I encourage that any time. The better teams, when they start being able to take ownership and look each other in the eye and say whatever they feel like they need to say to one another, then, to me, that's a positive.''
The coach also addressed some innuendo that Dion Waiters, who missed games Friday and Saturday with an illness, was not really sick.
"He's been to the doctor twice,'' Brown said. "Somebody says they're sick, they go to the doctor, the doctor takes care of it and we move on.''
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1242The word mutiny may be too strong but there are players that feel that Kyrie was not giving his all so far this season and was being a prick to certain new players. Lots of grumbling behind his back. Kyrie calls a team only meeting. Certain players state their case and there are some heated words exchanged.
Next night Kyrie comes out and throws up 28 shots and scores 41 points.
Message was delivered and received.
Next night Kyrie comes out and throws up 28 shots and scores 41 points.
Message was delivered and received.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1243http://www.stationcaster.com/player_ski ... &f=2119883
Brian Windhorst on the Cavs current situation.
Brian Windhorst on the Cavs current situation.
Re: Cleveland Cavaliers
1245Cavaliers: Andrew Bynum adapting game amid knee issues
By Bob Finnan, The News-Herald & The Morning Journal
Posted: 11/25/13, 6:11 PM EST |
Cavaliers coach Mike Browns isn’t sure Andrew Bynum’s explosiveness will ever return.
Even if it doesn’t, the Cavs center can still be among the top five centers in the Eastern Conference.
“For a guy his size, he was a quick jumper and a multiple jumper,” Brown said. “But as you guys can see, he doesn’t need his explosiveness offensively.
“You look at a guy like (Indiana center) Roy Hibbert. Roy is not necessarily a big-time athlete. Andrew is just as skilled if not more skilled than Roy playing the game offensively. Roy is an impact player in this league. Andrew can be an impact player on both ends without getting his explosiveness back because he’s very smart. He’s long. He’s strong. He’s got a lot of intangible things about him that can help get him there.”
The 7-foot, 294-pounder has started five of the 10 games in which he’s played. He’s averaging 6.9 points, 3.6 rebounds and a team-high 1.2 blocks. He’s shooting 40.6 percent from the field and 89.5 percent from the foul line.
Bynum is coming off his best game of the season with 16 points and six rebounds in the 126-96 loss at San Antonio on Saturday.
What was encouraging about that game was it was the second night of a back-to-back set — the first time this season he’s done that.
“It’s just getting more and more touches,” Bynum said. “My touch is coming back.
“I just played free (on Saturday). That’s all I’m going to keep doing, just go out and try to score in the paint. Then, defensively, try to get better on that end. I gave up some points to (Spurs center Tiago) Splitter that I shouldn’t have. As my knees get better, my defense will get better.”
He said he hasn’t asked to increase his minutes.
“I think I can play 20 minutes a game pretty comfortably at this point,” he said. “I feel good. We’ll just monitor minutes.”
Bynum, 26, missed the entire 2012-13 season with problems with both knees.
The downside is he’s feeling pain in his knees.
“It’s every time (I got up and down the court,” he said. “I’m playing through that.”
The former All-Star said whenever he tries to exert himself, he feels sharp pains in his knees.
“Whenever I try to do anything explosive, it’s (painful),” Bynum said. “I’ll just stick to the floor — ground game. Position defense and position offense on the ground.”
He said the pain was worse last year.
“I had time to heal,” he said.
Bynum said one solution would be to get stronger, but that’s difficult at this stage of the season.
“I think I can get stronger,” he said. “But, obviously during the season it’s harder to get stronger because we have to practice or play like the other day.”
He said his teammates are adjusting to playing with a legitimate low-post threat.
“I really don’t know the offense all that well,” Bynum said. “I’m still learning it, so that’s been a bit of an issue with the first unit. But like I said, I still have limited minutes so we just try to feature me at that time. It’s been kind of tough on the team in that regard.
“I try not to modify my game that much. I usually just run to the block. Obviously, I kind of dictate where the offense goes.”
Brown said the Cavs center showed his versatility in the Spurs game.
“It’s the first time he’s gotten close to showing everybody the full package of what he can do,” he said. “He’s a guy who can post up, shoot right hand, left hand jump hooks. He can shoot a turnaround jump shot. He can shoot a jump shot. He’s a very capable 3-point shooter.
“But just to show some of his versatility on the offensive end, we were able to see some of it throughout the course of the game.”
Bynum needs to work on the defensive end.
“He still needs to continue to grow on that end of the floor,” Brown said. “I, obviously, saw him at his height when he was an All-Star. He was great offensively, very skilled, but he had an explosiveness to him, too, that we haven’t seen yet.
“Whether we see it or not it doesn’t matter because he’s so big and so strong and so long and very intelligent that his offensive game will always be there. Nobody is ever going to block his jump hook. He’ll always be able to step out to 17 feet and knock that shot down. The one thing he still has to continue to work on is his defense. I’ve seen bits and pieces of it throughout the year, but, yeah, I thought he could’ve been better defensively, as well as everybody else.”
Quick shots
-- Guard Jarrett Jack injured his neck in the Spurs game, but returned to take his full turn in practice on Monday. He’ll play against Miami on Wednesday.
-- The same might not be able to be said about guard C.J. Miles. He missed both the weekend games with a strained right calf. He practiced on Monday, but didn’t do any contact work.
-- Brown was encouraged by forward Anthony Bennett’s nine-point effort vs. the Spurs.
“It was good to see in a game, but we see flashes of it in practice all the time,” Brown said. “He’s a young guy who needs to continue to gain confidence and continue to understand how hard it is to be able to have success on this level. But we saw it in college. He did it in college and he’s done it in flashes so far. He just needs to string some together now.”
-- Brown said Bennett must show more consistency on the practice court to earn his way back into his rotation.
“Right now, Earl (Clark) is playing some decent minutes for us at the ‘4,’ ” Brown said. “I’m going to try to settle these guys down into a rotation here pretty soon.”
By Bob Finnan, The News-Herald & The Morning Journal
Posted: 11/25/13, 6:11 PM EST |
Cavaliers coach Mike Browns isn’t sure Andrew Bynum’s explosiveness will ever return.
Even if it doesn’t, the Cavs center can still be among the top five centers in the Eastern Conference.
“For a guy his size, he was a quick jumper and a multiple jumper,” Brown said. “But as you guys can see, he doesn’t need his explosiveness offensively.
“You look at a guy like (Indiana center) Roy Hibbert. Roy is not necessarily a big-time athlete. Andrew is just as skilled if not more skilled than Roy playing the game offensively. Roy is an impact player in this league. Andrew can be an impact player on both ends without getting his explosiveness back because he’s very smart. He’s long. He’s strong. He’s got a lot of intangible things about him that can help get him there.”
The 7-foot, 294-pounder has started five of the 10 games in which he’s played. He’s averaging 6.9 points, 3.6 rebounds and a team-high 1.2 blocks. He’s shooting 40.6 percent from the field and 89.5 percent from the foul line.
Bynum is coming off his best game of the season with 16 points and six rebounds in the 126-96 loss at San Antonio on Saturday.
What was encouraging about that game was it was the second night of a back-to-back set — the first time this season he’s done that.
“It’s just getting more and more touches,” Bynum said. “My touch is coming back.
“I just played free (on Saturday). That’s all I’m going to keep doing, just go out and try to score in the paint. Then, defensively, try to get better on that end. I gave up some points to (Spurs center Tiago) Splitter that I shouldn’t have. As my knees get better, my defense will get better.”
He said he hasn’t asked to increase his minutes.
“I think I can play 20 minutes a game pretty comfortably at this point,” he said. “I feel good. We’ll just monitor minutes.”
Bynum, 26, missed the entire 2012-13 season with problems with both knees.
The downside is he’s feeling pain in his knees.
“It’s every time (I got up and down the court,” he said. “I’m playing through that.”
The former All-Star said whenever he tries to exert himself, he feels sharp pains in his knees.
“Whenever I try to do anything explosive, it’s (painful),” Bynum said. “I’ll just stick to the floor — ground game. Position defense and position offense on the ground.”
He said the pain was worse last year.
“I had time to heal,” he said.
Bynum said one solution would be to get stronger, but that’s difficult at this stage of the season.
“I think I can get stronger,” he said. “But, obviously during the season it’s harder to get stronger because we have to practice or play like the other day.”
He said his teammates are adjusting to playing with a legitimate low-post threat.
“I really don’t know the offense all that well,” Bynum said. “I’m still learning it, so that’s been a bit of an issue with the first unit. But like I said, I still have limited minutes so we just try to feature me at that time. It’s been kind of tough on the team in that regard.
“I try not to modify my game that much. I usually just run to the block. Obviously, I kind of dictate where the offense goes.”
Brown said the Cavs center showed his versatility in the Spurs game.
“It’s the first time he’s gotten close to showing everybody the full package of what he can do,” he said. “He’s a guy who can post up, shoot right hand, left hand jump hooks. He can shoot a turnaround jump shot. He can shoot a jump shot. He’s a very capable 3-point shooter.
“But just to show some of his versatility on the offensive end, we were able to see some of it throughout the course of the game.”
Bynum needs to work on the defensive end.
“He still needs to continue to grow on that end of the floor,” Brown said. “I, obviously, saw him at his height when he was an All-Star. He was great offensively, very skilled, but he had an explosiveness to him, too, that we haven’t seen yet.
“Whether we see it or not it doesn’t matter because he’s so big and so strong and so long and very intelligent that his offensive game will always be there. Nobody is ever going to block his jump hook. He’ll always be able to step out to 17 feet and knock that shot down. The one thing he still has to continue to work on is his defense. I’ve seen bits and pieces of it throughout the year, but, yeah, I thought he could’ve been better defensively, as well as everybody else.”
Quick shots
-- Guard Jarrett Jack injured his neck in the Spurs game, but returned to take his full turn in practice on Monday. He’ll play against Miami on Wednesday.
-- The same might not be able to be said about guard C.J. Miles. He missed both the weekend games with a strained right calf. He practiced on Monday, but didn’t do any contact work.
-- Brown was encouraged by forward Anthony Bennett’s nine-point effort vs. the Spurs.
“It was good to see in a game, but we see flashes of it in practice all the time,” Brown said. “He’s a young guy who needs to continue to gain confidence and continue to understand how hard it is to be able to have success on this level. But we saw it in college. He did it in college and he’s done it in flashes so far. He just needs to string some together now.”
-- Brown said Bennett must show more consistency on the practice court to earn his way back into his rotation.
“Right now, Earl (Clark) is playing some decent minutes for us at the ‘4,’ ” Brown said. “I’m going to try to settle these guys down into a rotation here pretty soon.”
"I've suffered a great many tragedies in my life....most of them never happened". Mark Twain