As I said, the ‘other’ Cavs players are good. They have the best record for a reason. They are dominating right now and playing with focus. However, I do think that they are overwhelming inferior teams and the reason for that is LeBron. I’m not taking anything away from the team. However, I do think they struggle against really good teams because those teams have a enough collective talent to neutralize LeBron’s amazing skill.

I think the Cavs have a tough time getting past a healthy Celtics team or the Lakers. Hopefully we’ll get a chance to see this latter scenario play out in a few weeks.

everyone here is really upset about yao, but there are loads of chinese basketball fans drawn to the nba for reasons other than yao. they’ll keep watching, and the tv channels will keep playing the games (i heard the nba gives them the broadcasts for free in hopes of promoting the league to such a huge market).

i’m loving the intensity seen from the lakers in response to the game 1 loss. the cavs and nuggets worry me, but what would the playoffs be without other great teams to fear?

“Kobe wants it more. Lebron thinks he wants it more, but he doesn’t yet.”

Interesting comment. It almost feels like LBJ and the Cavs are saying too much of the right things to be a champion. It’s like they learned how to from a textbook but doesn’t really know what it really means. Is this what you gathered or something else?

actually given his reception in beijing i doubt it will till the lakers win the championship..

That said, I think it’s a bit off to say they’re winning on his talent alone. I remember a specific stretch where the Cavs reserves (Wally, Gibson, etc.) outplayed the Hawks starters , and the Hawks starters (at the time, with Joe Johnson) are individually very talented. To me, that shows that right now the Cavs have a different mindset and chemistry than they ever did before. It’s not all Lebron, at least not directly. Lebron is the galvanizing force, and likely played the biggest role in creating that team mindset. But when Sczerbiak and Gibson and Pavlovic and Smith are outplaying All-Star level talents in Josh Smith and Johnson (albeit in a short stretche), I think it’s a little off to suggest Lebron is doing everything. That particular sequence may have been an extreme example, but overall that entire team is very focused, and even if not individually talented, those players are doing a great job of executing within their system.

On top of that, that entire team is constructed to perfectly complement Lebron. We get so used to giving Lebron credit for everything, but why didn’t he make Hughes (a previous All-Star) or some other players better? This year, the front office brought in players that ease the burden on Lebron as much as he eases the burden on them. Our habit is to analyze how these players would fare on different teams (“Wally would be worthless on half the teams in this league!”) but it’s more accurate to look at how they function in their team system (and especially team defense), and on that account I think Lebron’s supporting cast is vastly underrated.

On the LeBron discussion. I am a huge Kobe fan, but you can not take anything away from LeBron. The guy is amazing. He deserved MVP. He is such a force that he is no match for a mediocre team. Cleveland is killing people based purely on LeBron’s talent. The rest of the guys are good, but not great by any means. I think LeBron’s talent is somewhat neutralized by a good team, hence the less than stellar record against good teams (Boston w/out KG does not count as a good team). Sadly, I don’t feel there are many good teams in the playoffs this year. San Antonio, Boston and Orlando have had signficant personnel losses (Houston has joined their ranks). That leaves only the Lakers (maybe Orlando) as top flight teams (I’m not sold on the Nuggets yet.)

In the ECF and Finals we will see how good the Cavs really are (I don’t think they can beat the Lakers though home court may be huge)- there is no question how good LeBron is.

I believe you have a point. Yao being out takes away our advantage of pushing the tempo with him on the floor. Plus, Landry will get more minutes now, and he’s been giving us problems.

Deep down no Rocket likes to pass to Yao, so they must be secretly “excited.”

Still, I expect the Lakers to come out focused.

Regarding the Cavs or Denver seeming better. Who cares how great the Cavs look, or who they play? Remember when the Celtics were “struggling” in the East, ad we walked through the West? None of that matters when you’re facing the team in the Finals. Unfortunately, we proved that last year.

Denver is still the same Denver deep down, and we’ll be against us. They are better than the teams they have played. I’ll give them that. But we are a different beast.