We’re Playing Just Like Christmas Music

Kyrie Irving hasn’t played since November 19^th because of a broken finger.  Around the same time, my work decided to start playing Christmas music.  Non-stop Christmas music.  This is fitting though.  The Cavs turned to hell to watch, and well, work continued being hell, just a hell with Christmas music (this makes it much less bearable).  

Like all things, this Kyrie less Cavs team and Christmas hell have become bearable through time.  Dion Waiters went out two games ago with a sprained ankle and still isn’t back.  At that time, I had to once again readjust to watching the Cavs for them to be bearable.  It resulted in many turned off games.  The Cavs without Waiters is equivalent to work not only playing Christmas music over the store speakers but also forcing me to wear an iPod playing a loop to loop track of “Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer.” 

I’m a product of evolution though, so this did not faze me too much.  Last night, I made it through the whole game.  I made this Cavs team my own much in the way I subvert work’s Christmas songs by remaking them into songs such as “Rudolph the Red Nosed Drunk,” and “Santa Claus Is Cumming On Your Mom.”  The human mind is amazing.  It has allowed me to really get into all that Tyler Zeller is about.

Let’s look at this man and his friends:

Tonight Tyler Zeller didn’t get into the game for the first five minutes, but during the first quarter he saw quite a few things.  Scoring was not one of these things, as the Cavs didn’t get a point until Daniel Gibson slid by defenders for a lay up four minutes in.  We kept allowing ourselves to get into the corner where a second defender came in and would force bad passes.  It seemed like every pass the Cavs made during the first quarter was met with a hesitant catch.  The players might have had an open shot, but they didn’t take it fast enough to make it worthwhile.  We would then pass the ball and be forced to take a contested shot or have a shot clock violation.

Tyler Zeller entered the game around the 8 minute mark and immediately did some nice things.  At 7:18, he grabbed a bad pass then pushed the ball up court while continuing to come down and get fouled off the ball.  At 3:34, he blocks Kevin Love and then runs all the way back down court to get the ball.  He fails to finish but he hustled at least.  At 2:28, Zeller does his trademark show the ball and drive it in to finish close to the basket.  He gets an and 1.   I also thought Zeller played good defense in the sense that he knows where to position himself when his man doesn’t have the ball.  He can help others without being beat by his guy, unless it is a really challenging/lucky shot being thrown down by Kevin Love.   

We were outscored a ton the first quarter, but it wasn’t a matter of our defense being that bad or theirs being that good.  Although, Andrei Kirilenko and Nikola Pekovic are good rim protectors.  The big issue was second possession finishes.  We didn’t have any.  They had many due to Kevin Love and Andrei Kirilenko being relentless on the boards.  It also doesn’t help that Kevin Love is a crafty man.  He knows whoever is covering him will play very tight.  He uses to his advantage by running his defender into his own teammates;  defenders don't watch the whole floor when they cover him.

The second quarter didn’t see any Zeller.  Very sad.  I thought both second units played really even.  It was relatively boring except this time our shots were going in while their shots weren’t.  As always this didn’t last the whole quarter because at the end we just started to blow it.  We lost track of Kevin Love so he nailed a three.  Then Luke Ridnour got two quick layups at the end.

The third quarter we blew opportunities to begin with.  We couldn’t finish on a three shot attempt possession, and Tristan Thompson fouled a three line non-jumping Kevin Love.  However, Alonzo Gee didn’t notice any of this as he threw down not one dunk.  Not two dunks.  Not three dunks.  But four dunks.  Gee just kept faking at the corner to drive in for a dunk or would crossover one man and be up for the dunk before help came.  We were only outscored by 2 this quarter, and a large part of that was because we lost AK a lot (We could have been up).  I think it’s hard for defenders to actually play up on him because he doesn’t try to really score, but the issue is that he can score when open.  He doesn’t hesitate to drive not so much as he rather look to pass. A lot of defenders start to leave him thinking he will just pass.  AK got six uncontested points this quarter due to this thinking.

The fourth quarter was just as sad.  Zeller was involved and not in just fouling a three-point shooter like in the third, thankfully.  Zeller had a nice offensive board on the third possession, which he dished to Donald Sloan for an easy layup.  He also got a layup off of another offensive rebound the following possession.  He left the game shortly after this, but he showed a great hustle on those points.  The rest of the game was bad.  The Timberwolves kept causing turnovers for us and preventing us from turning any we got into points.  We couldn’t make our shots, so trading possessions was a losing affair for us as the Timberwolves kept scoring during the fourth to win by 18 . 

It was a frustrating game.  The Cavs biggest issue comes from not being able to score multiple two-three minute stretches at a time.  We need to become more efficient at turning fastbreaks, steals, and second chance possessions into actual points.  We’re leaving so much out of the hoop.   

Until then, my Christmas song bastard on the team is going to have to be Tyler Zeller.  He played very good ball last night by hustling for the offensive boards and knowing where to stand on the defensive end to make a little bit of a difference to driving peoples’ shots.  Tyler Zeller is going to be made into Z in my head by the time Kyrie is back just how "Rudolph The Red Nose Drunk" exists as a real thing for me right now.

Here are some general takes from all of the quarters:

-On defense, Daniel Gibson is great at going into the paint and frustrating big men by yanking or denying the ball away.   He did this four times last night.

- Love had three fouls committed on him from around the three line.  Lots of birds were got as Austin Carr would say.

-This is the most dunks the Cavs have had all year.

-Omri Casspi sucks.  He couldn’t hit his open shots tonight.

-Gee is a great player when he is driving and can hit a corner three point shot. 

-Where was the offensive pick and rolls for Varejao?  Kevin Love is not a premier defender.  Bang into him.

-We had the world’s lowest combined vertical jump jump ball between Wild Thing and Nikola Pekovic.

-Timberwolves have very good shot blockers.  Kirilenko is so long he can run into the paint when someone is driving to contest and if they kick out he still has a chance to run out and alter the shot too.

-The Cavs are getting better with their risk taking.  When we trap on offense, we are overloading one side now, so there is more of a chance to get a steal off of the pass.  We now do not have two semi open men when we trap.  We have just one totally open man.  That's only a one in five chance for  something to go wrong for us.  I like the odds.

-Our ineffectiveness scoring is shown when you see the Timberwolves had 32 points off of 20 turnovers while we only had 22 off of 21 turnovers.

The Fuck Truck driver of the night is Alonzo Gee.  Alonzo Gee gets it for blowing out his man shocks on some thundering dunks.  He also gets it for being the first Cav on dunk of the night.  Keep on truckin, Gee.  Drive the ball and then hit some threes.  We know you play D.