This is pretty good…
Tag: Cleveland Cavaliers (Page 27 of 53)
It looks like Shaquille O’Neal’s regular season may be over.
Now the Cavaliers hope the center they acquired for the postseason will be back in time for the playoffs.
O’Neal will undergo surgery Monday to repair his injured right thumb. He was examined Sunday by Dr. Thomas Graham at the National Hand Center in Baltimore. Graham will perform the surgery.
The Cavaliers said they will update a timeline for his return following the procedure, but a typical recovery period is 6 to 8 weeks. There are seven weeks left in the regular season.
With 22 games to play, the Cavs have a six-game lead on Orlando, so I don’t think they’re in any danger of giving up the top seed in the East. The greater concern to me is what kind of shape Shaq will be in when he returns to action. Six or seven weeks is a long time for a person with his weight issues to be sidelined, and he’s already looking a little heavy. While a thumb injury shouldn’t keep him off the treadmill, he doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy that is going to bust his butt to stay in top physical condition.
The Cavs may very well find their groove without Shaq in the lineup, and then his return could throw a monkey wrench into the machine. The good news is that he would return during the first or second round of the playoffs, so there would potentially be a series or two for him to work the kinks out. I think the greater concern is how his return would affect the way the Cavs play offensively.
Photo from fOTOGLIF
It seems pretty simple when Chuck says it…
LeBron James posted 33 points, nine rebounds and six assists, and Antawn Jamison bounced back from a dreadful Cav debut with a nice 19-point, eight-rebound effort, but the Magic supporting cast came up big in the fourth quarter to give Orlando a 101-95 win.
Jameer Nelson (18-4-5) and Vince Carter (11-1-3) hit several big shots in the final period, and Rashard Lewis (15-4-2) hit a corner three that sealed the win for the Magic. Dwight Howard (22-16, 4 blks) did his usual damage early on, but Orlando went away from him in the fourth quarter, using a series of Nelson-Carter pick-and-rolls to free Carter up on the block.
Shaq (20-5, 2 blks) had a nice game and was seemingly energized by his feud with Howard about who deserves to have the nickname “Superman.” But with both big men such poor foul shooters, neither team threw the ball inside much in the fourth quarter.
Jamison proved his worth with a nine-point spurt to start the third quarter that gave the Cavs the lead. He’s going to be fine in Cleveland’s offense once he gets comfortable. He’s a tough cover for most power forwards, but as Jeff Van Gundy noted, he’s not nearly as tough to defend when he’s playing small forward. (The same goes for Rashard Lewis, who is far more productive at PF.)
LeBron, coming off of back-to-back losses, seemed especially grumpy today, and was complaining just about every time he took the ball to the hoop and didn’t get the call. I think he has entered what I call the “Kobe Zone,” the convergence of talent and ego where a player thinks he can’t be stopped without a foul, so every failed drive to the basket finishes with some signal to the officials that they missed the call. LeBron took the ball into Dwight Howard twice — once in the first half and once in the fourth quarter — and both times he lit into the refs. On the first play, Howard was planted in the middle of the lane and LeBron clipped him as he went by, and it was a good no-call. The fourth quarter no-call consisted of LeBron taking it directly into Howard’s body and raised arms as Howard retreated towards the basket. The ball got knocked out of bounds and LeBron made his sour pickle face and screamed at the refs.
But if the Cavs want an answer for what went wrong today, they need to look at their backcourt. Mo Williams (1-9), Anthony Parker (1-4) and Delonte West (2-9) combined to go 4-22 (18%) from the field, and that’s not going to get it done.
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