Back to Earth
There is a point in every superhero movie where the hero must look vulnerable. You have to believe that losing is a distinct possibility. That possibility is what propels the protagonist to in the end overcome. Aided by the Toronto Raptors historic collapse, the Cleveland Cavaliers have gotten past that moment and are now staring at the distinct possibility of sending LeBron James to the NBA Finals for the sixth straight year.
If you’ve never seen the sacking of the Bastille in real life (and you probably haven’t unless you’re goddamn Bran Stark and have time travel abilities, in which case “GODDAMIT BRAN!”) you can pretty much play the replay of last night and see the utter devastation and destruction that I’m assuming took place. The Cavs systematically dismantled the Toronto Raptors piece by piece using pretty much one play. Of course it helps to have someone who is basically Captain Fucking Planet on your roster, but the efficiency with which the Cavs run their best schemes is Tywin Lannister level devastating.
If you watch the game closely, although who can blame you if you didn’t last night (at one point I basically contemplated doing taxes) you’ll notice that the Cavs dagger play starts with the LeBron handling the ball on the extended elbow. They then run a simple hand off PnR with whichever guard is punching the clock at the time forcing Raptors to choose how to cover the rolling thunder that is James going full steam to the rim. Generally, this kind of choice involves a lot of praying and possibly help D sagging off the corner shooter. The problem is, that corner shooter for Cleveland is usually pretty good and he then shifts up to extended free-throw line eliminating the optimal close-out angle for the help-defender. Which means should the guard choose to swing the ball Cavs get an open three. So the Raptors were really choosing whether to die by taking a pounding from LeBron on his rolls or by Kevin Love/Channing Frye threes.
What makes that play successful is the subtle off-ball movement and cuts that throw the defenders in disarray. The Raps are forced to move and deny at least three threats off-ball at any given time or face giving up easy baskets. This makes it hard to trap or hedge aggressively off screens forcing everyone into one on one situations. Compare this to what the Raps are doing.
Toronto offense was about as dynamic as the crowd at a Red Lobster Early Bird Special in say Maine. While we do run a lot of PnR action at the top, the rest of the team acts as if they’re out for a stroll, moping about not having the ball in their hands. Neither guard on the wings does a lot in terms of motion to or from the ball, meaning Cavs defenders never really have to stress about chasing the off man for the risk of giving up an easy open basket. What that lets them do is Chinese finger-cuff the ball handler in pick and roll situations. A smart player, noticing his defender has gone to double would then re-position his body on the court (by use of common sense, legs and simple motor functions) to present the man being trapped with a simple outlet. And seeing how two men are now covering one, logic dictates someone is open, which forces Cavs to scramble, rotate and break their defensive trapping scheme. Unfortunately, neither DeMar, Carroll, nor Ross were smart enough to take two steps to the left to make that happen which allowed the Cavs to simply suffocate the ball handlers into terrible passes.
The Raptors are creative and stale on Offense on the best of days, but when their two start players can’t get going and get mopey with their off ball movement things get even worse. Cleveland took huge gambles on aggressively doubling both Kyle and DeMar and it paid off because none of the other players were particularly interested in helping their teammates escape double teams. This lead to a pretty much insurmountable lead by the half. Seriously, towards the end JVG and Marc Jackson got so bored with the game they started talking about life. They basically invented their own Buzzfeed quiz on air trying to figure out who Marc Jackson would be in Hawaii Five-O based on, I assume, his preference in sugary soda and type of burger.
Take care out there.
