Official Cavs trade rumors/discussions thread (all others will be closed)

[prodigy]

He scored 28 points TODAY!! HE also did nothing else but score :

Well he is a SHOOTING guard lmao!! But hey, if you relay on your SG to get rebounds then ur team prob sucks. We have good rebounders.

BTW- he is avg 2 board, 2 assits a steal along with 16 points on 48% shooting. So he's doing other stuff.

Great start to your career Waiters, keep it up man.

[Melo15]

Also, in regards to Waiters passing, it's clear he's trying to facilitate to his teammates. He's put guys in position to score around the basket but they're either just missing or getting fouled and not being able to convert. It's not like he's not looking for others. He's putting guys in positions to succeed as well and sooner or later those shots will start falling.

[ottograham14]

Also, in regards to Waiters passing, it's clear he's trying to facilitate to his teammates. He's put guys in position to score around the basket but they're either just missing or getting fouled and not being able to convert. It's not like he's not looking for others. He's putting guys in positions to succeed as well and sooner or later those shots will start falling.

Wait so you should watch games to evaluate players and not just look at the box scores and get a feel for the player that way. No wonder this guy is in love with Marcus Thornton, all he sees is PPG and thinks Thornton is the 5th best SG in the league because of it or some number like that.

[Arch Stanton]

Wait so you should watch games to evaluate players and not just look at the box scores and get a fill for the player that way. No wonder this guy is in love with Marcus Thornton, all he sees is PPG and thinks Thornton is the 5th best SG in the league because of it or some number like that.

Looking at Hollingers stat line for SG from 2011-2012 Marcus Thornton was ranked 9th amongst SG with a PER of 17.43.
This year he's ranked 13th with a PER of 18.55 (too early). And Waiters (whose only played 4 NBA Games) is only 18th.
This is Thorntons 5th NBA Season.
Hollinger has Waiters being Thornton-like in a worst case scenario.

[ottograham14]

Looking at Hollingers stat line for SG from 2011-2012 Marcus Thornton was ranked 9th amongst SG with a PER of 17.43.
This year he's ranked 13th with a PER of 18.55 (too early). And Waiters (whose only played 4 NBA Games) is only 18th.
This is Thorntons 5th NBA Season.
Hollinger has Waiters being Thornton-like in a worst case scenario.

You really like Hollinger and that PER dont you ARCH? I'm going to assume you are a fan of Bill James as well. I don't mind the PER but the focus on mainly offensive statistics compared to defensive statistics it takes into account is very vast. If you are a flat out offensive player then your PER should be pretty good. Also it adds value to different units of play which doesn't help.

Listen I have nothing against Thornton but the guy is what he is right now and the same coming out of college which was the reason he was a second round draft pick, a bench shooting scorer. One thing that varies greatly with him and Waiters is the ability to put the ball on the floor and create his own shot something Waiters is able to do. Also I prefer Waiters transition game from what I saw at Cuse and so far this year to Thorntons where he is more of a halfcourt scorer IMO. Thornton reminds me a young Rip Hamilton where is very good at catch and shoot situations, very good shooting with a hand in his face and off pull ups where that is where most of his iso scoring comes from. His defense is very suspect too and he didn't start putting up over 18 PPG until he starting averaging over 34 mpg when moving to Sactown. Highest RPG 4.7 and APG 3.4 in a season were when he averaged 38 minutes in 2011 the second half of the season after being traded to Sactown and playing the second half of the season with them.

So yes I do have Paul George, Demar Derozan and Evan Turner ahead of Thornton because I dont just look at PPG and assume he is more talented. All three of players have better all around games as well as much higher ceilings that Thornton.

[Arch Stanton]

You really like Hollinger and that PER dont you ARCH? I'm going to assume you are a fan of Bill James as well. I don't mind the PER but the focus on mainly offensive statistics compared to defensive statistics it takes into account is very vast. If you are a flat out offensive player then your PER should be pretty good. Also it adds value to different units of play which doesn't help.

Listen I have nothing against Thornton but the guy is what he is right now and the same coming out of college which was the reason he was a second round draft pick, a bench shooting scorer. One thing that varies greatly with him and Waiters is the ability to put the ball on the floor and create his own shot something Waiters is able to do. Also I prefer Waiters transition game from what I saw at Cuse and so far this year to Thorntons where he is more of a halfcourt scorer IMO. Thornton reminds me a young Rip Hamilton where is very good at catch and shoot situations, very good shooting with a hand in his face and off pull ups where that is where most of his iso scoring comes from. His defense is very suspect too and he didn't start putting up over 18 PPG until he starting averaging over 34 mpg when moving to Sactown. Highest RPG 4.7 and APG 3.4 in a season were when he averaged 38 minutes in 2011 the second half of the season after being traded to Sactown and playing the second half of the season with them.

So yes I do have Paul George, Demar Derozan and Evan Turner ahead of Thornton because I dont just look at PPG and assume he is more talented. All three of players have better all around games as well as much higher ceilings that Thornton.

PER is an efficiency rating. It's not just points per game it factors in defensive rebound rate, rebound rate, offensive rebound rate, usage rate, turnover ratio, assist ratio, true shooting percentage, minutes per game, and games played.
Kyle Korver has a higher shooting percentage (.600 in 2011-12) and assists (18.5) than Marcus Thornton but is rated far less than him. So it's not just offense.
That being said... Marcus Thornton has been in the top ten over the past two years.
I hate to agree with GregOdenBust but Marcus Thornton is rated higher than all those guys. Two (Turner, George) of which are SF not SG. Paul George is not far behind and is younger so he could certainly emerge as a better player.
And I agree with you that Thornton has hit his ceiling. And will think that Waiters will be a better player.

[ottograham14]

PER is an efficiency rating. It's not just points per game it factors in defensive rebound rate, rebound rate, offensive rebound rate, usage rate, turnover ratio, assist ratio, true shooting percentage, minutes per game, and games played.
Kyle Korver has a higher shooting percentage (.600 in 2011-12) and assists (18.5) than Marcus Thornton but is rated far less than him. So it's not just offense.
That being said... Marcus Thornton has been in the top ten over the past two years.
I hate to agree with GregOdenBust but Marcus Thornton is rated higher than all those guys. Two (Turner, George) of which are SF not SG. Paul George is not far behind and is younger so he could certainly emerge as a better player.
And I agree with you that Thornton has hit his ceiling. And will think that Waiters will be a better player.

Where are you guys getting your player positions. First Tyreke Evans with another poster and now George and Turner. They all are hybrid SG/SF's but they all start the games at SG and as rotations change they alter. Evan Turner has started playing SF though more this year with Igoudala gone so I see that but Evans and George are still starting at the 2. George might start playing more 3 with Granger out for a while now but even then they might just turn to Gerald Green at the 3 who is another 2/3. I guess apples and oranges.

I agree with you on the PER and I didn't mean to say it didn't take in only offensive statistics but that is where most of the formula comes from compared to defensive statistics like taking into account someone like Bruce Bowen who never got a lot of rebounds or blocks which are the two main defensive statistics in PER so of course he would have an awful PER in his career but that doesn't mean that he wasnt important to his team or not one of the best perimeter defenders of all time. Its apples and oranges really again.

[rufo4100]

You guys should have tried to package some of your young players to attempt to get James Harden. Kyrie and Harden in the backcourt would be sick!

[Arch Stanton]

Concerned face: TT from cavstheblog


There’s a Jewish deli about a mile and a half from my apartment that I can still walk to because the sidewalks are snowless, and the maple tree outside my kitchen window doesn’t quite yet resemble a cluster of black spider legs. It’s too early to worry about Tristan Thompson, but then I divide my activities into two discrete categories: Things I Do While Worrying About Tristan Thompson and Things I Do Before Going Back To Worrying About Tristan Thompson. I was hoping to allocate more time toward the latter category this year, but a mere four games into the season here I am collecting shed cat fur on the bottom of my bare feet as I wander circuitously through my apartment trying to make sense of the lanky Canadian with a broad smile and a flat jumper.

I’m not concerned that Tristan Thompson doesn’t look like a second-season phenom. If developing into a great player is indeed “putting it all together,” TT is is possession of too many disparate talents to assemble them all in one offseason. I didn’t expect him to show up this season with a Rasheed Wallace-like 15-footer and a coach’s understanding of defensive positioning. What concerns me is that it appears he hasn’t added anything but an additional fifteen pounds on his frame. He still rebounds well, defends just okay, and is intermittently painful to watch on the offensive end. There’s not a facet of his game that I can discern as markedly improved.

Further concern: he supposedly worked extremely hard in the offseason. Whenever coaches were asked in training camp who was the most committed to getting better over the summer, and who would impress in 2012-13, they invariably named Thompson. After four games (one good, three pretty dreadful), I can’t tell what he worked on. He’s still a step slow on defensive rotations, still tries to block shots he has no chance of affecting, still reads five pages of Faulkner aloud between receiving a pass and attempting a shot.

We can contrast him (sort of unfairly) with Blake Griffin, who thoroughly outplayed him Monday night. Griffin doesn’t always do this, but when he caught the ball last night, he was instinctive. On the perimeter, he either set himself and took a jumper or swung the ball to the wing. In the paint, he put a move on his defender or kicked the ball back out to the perimeter. He didn’t, as he is sometimes wont to do, dribble through his legs 16 feet from the basket or jab step repeatedly like a broken choreography robot. Griffin was decisive, which makes him difficult to guard he’s so much quicker and stronger than a lot of the players that try to check him. If he moves swiftly, chances are high that his defender lacks the athleticism to stay in front of him, and they’re forced either to foul or allow a high-percentage shot.

All we have to fall back on with Tristan Thompson is how athletic he is, but you wouldn’t know it from watching him on the offensive end. He almost never catches his defender off-guard—despite, most of the time, being a superior athlete—because when he receives the ball, he often brings it to his hip in order to gather himself before going up for a shot attempt. This is an open invitation for guards to collapse from the perimeter and attempt to knock the ball free, and it allows the big man guarding him time to position his body or attempt a block. How often do you see TT hunched over in the post, trying to get a shot up with a big man standing over him, and a wing trying to slap the ball out of his hands? Thompson might be “quick” in the sense that he’s more agile than most power forwards, and he can probably jump over impressive-looking stacks of crates, but his slow mechanics negate his athleticism, unlike Griffin, who on his best day exploits the athleticism gap between himself and his opponent.

On the defensive end, TT’s problem lies chiefly in poor positioning. There has been some backlash against the league’s best shot blocker, Serge Ibaka, recently. He’s frequently out of position on defense because he: a.) goes out of his way to pad his blocking stats by needlessly chasing down shooters and b.) doesn’t yet fully understand the whole five-players-on-a-string principle that guides the NBA’s best defenses. Sounds something like Thompson, right? But the things that redeems Ibaka are that he’s even more of a physical freak than TT, and that he seems to be a preternaturally gifted shot-blocker. When we see Thompson’s 35-inch vertical, we daydream about a guy who can average three blocks per game, but blocking shots has never been his forté nor do I think any coach has ever told him his primary role on defense should be helping into the lane and attempting to alter the shots of penetrating guards. He has neither a shot-blocker’s instincts nor a shot-blocker’s training. It’s something he needs to learn how to do.

You can read the tea leaves as to whether this is a good or a bad sign for Thompson’s defensive prospects. On the one hand, he might improve as a shot-blocker because he’s still new to that role, and on the other, he doesn’t seem to have the same knack for blocking and altering shots that the Serge Ibakas and DeAndre Jordans of the world possess. His sense of where he is on the floor and where he needs to be at any given time in a defensive set will likely improve, if only because I think Byron Scott will have him deported if he doesn’t. Plus, for whatever reason, learning the workings of effective NBA defense usually takes players a long time. Even great defenders usually spend their first few years in the league learning from frequent mistakes.

* * * * *

I went to the release party for the Onion’s Book of Known Knowledge a few weeks ago and left at intermission. One of my favorite comics, Dan Telfer, was performing at the end of the night, but I had been battling a sense of displacement all day. I hadn’t meant to come alone, but I spent the hour and a half before the show flipping through a copy of The Reader with my head down at a table in a secluded corner of the overcrowded bar. I wandered around Lincoln Park for about forty-five minutes before the warm rain soaked me. I hopped a train north. There has been a lot of construction on the red line over the past few months because the many of the stations have 30-year-old wood platforms and reek of piss. The new ones aren’t much better. They’re very bright and their floors recall a vehicle showroom from the ’70s. I had probably ruined my own night. You can only see so far when you’re inspecting the floor and the city is painting over its mold.

I don’t think Tristan Thompson will excel or even be particularly good. There are more objective reasons for concern delineated above, but my fears for him are like bacteria procreating in a petri dish. They need no fuel or host. From the moment the Cavs passed on Jonas Valančiūnas to draft a player I was unprepared for them to draft, TT’s been a vessel for my anxiety. He’s a foundling, and I resent him in a way that’s wholly unfair. I’m strung too tight: the Cavs have to do everything perfectly in order to build a contender, and that includes not picking someone who might kind of suck with the fourth pick in the draft. It’s not Tristan’s fault. He’s onstage, and I’m in the rain muttering to myself. It’s hard to dream when you’re inspecting the floor and your team is painting over its mold.

[ottograham14]

Nice read Arch. If TT can be around 12 and 9 then sadly even for a #4 overall pick I would be happy. Last years draft just had way too many question marks and unkowns. Hopefully he can develop a 15 footer and continue to bring the energy and hustle he usually does. Good thing is he is still very young and has time to grow with the team during the youth movement.

[ottograham14]

Anderson Varejao's right knee injury is "not considered serious."
We're listing AV as questionable for Friday's game vs. the Suns. The Cavs oft-overlooked center has been on a tear early in the season, averaging 14.0 points and 15.0 rebounds through four games.

Tyler Zeller (concussion, fractured cheekbone) is doubtful to play on Friday, but he could return for Sunday's game in Oklahoma City.
The Cavs may fit Zeller with a mask and he'll need to pass the league's mandatory concussion testing before being allowed to return to the court.

http://www.rotoworld.com/playernews/...ll-player-news

[Arch Stanton]

Both Varejao, Kyrie expected to play tomorrow vs. Suns. CJ Miles and now Dion Waiters hurting, too. #Cavs

Varejao practiced today and said his right knee feels better. Irving did not practice, but coach Byron Scott said it was to preserve his strength for tomorrow's game. Both are expected to play.

CJ Miles and Dion Waiters are questionable, however. Miles missed practice with the food poisoning that struck yesterday. Waiters has a deep thigh bruise in his right leg. He did not practice today, either.

[Arch Stanton]

Sounds like Waiters is probably out tomorrow nite against the Suns.

[Auto4short]

Hopefully Waiters will be able to play against OKC.

[ottograham14]

Dion Waiters (thigh) will be a game-time decision on Friday against the Suns.
The rookie reportedly couldn't put weight on his leg, so there is a legitimate concern here. Waiters might be licking his chops to face Phoenix, which has allowed the most 3-pointers so far this year. The 9 PM EST start time might make it tough for daily owners to start him on a busy 13-game night.

http://www.rotoworld.com/playernews/...l-player-news/