I’m not sure what to make of the Cleveland Cavaliers right now. Literally one week after the team’s most inspiring win of the season visiting the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Cavs put forth one of the worst weekends of the year.
The team had a nine-point lead with six minutes left against the Toronto Raptors, and proceeded to hand the game away. The hope was that losing in such a painful way would put a pep in the Cavs’ step as they faced a subpar Washington Wizards team a couple days later. Sure, LeBron James was sitting out for rest, but still, Cleveland is talented enough to beat Washington without him, right?
False. A Cavs team with two max players – and one “almost” max player – got its doors blown off by the Wizards. It was without a doubt an alarmingly bad loss full of minimal effort, less defense and a lot of finger pointing by the media afterwards.
Right now, point guard Kyrie Irving has been receiving the brunt of the blame after yesterday’s disgraceful defeat. Despite scoring over 20 points in three of the past four games, Irving is being called out for a lack of leadership, a continuing inability to not make the players around him better and just being generally disconnected with the rest of the team.
Today, Stephen A. Smith of ESPN doubled down on the latter issue, claiming he’s heard for a while now Irving is unhappy in Cleveland. Whether or not this is true remains to be confirmed. However, all of this is adding up to a question fans and media have found themselves asking today: Is Kyrie Irving becoming a problem for the Cavs?
It seems like an out of nowhere claim, as Kevin Love is typically the guy involved in all the “he’s not on board with the team” rumors. The last time we heard anything regarding Irving wanting out of Cleveland was about two to three months before he signed his max deal in 2014. After getting his new contract, you just assumed all was well.
It really makes all the recent reports that much more confusing. However, looking at the results of the past couple weeks, you’re definitely seeing some issues with Irving on the court.
For one, Irving’s defense has been an atrocity lately. Opposing teams are going right at him, and the results are overwhelmingly successful. Toronto’s Kyle Lowry (43 points) and Wizards guard John Wall (21 points, 13 assists) both seemed thrilled to go one-on-one with Irving, and they aren’t the only ones who’ve enjoyed the matchup.
Additionally, the knock on Irving has always been the fact he’s just way too ball-dominant of a point guard. None of that seems to have changed lately, especially when it comes to him and Love sharing the court.
It doesn’t seem to be a coincidence that Love’s best games this year almost always came when Irving wasn’t on the floor. Whenever these two are sharing the court, Love either doesn’t have a good game or puts forth a quality first quarter and only gets a handful of shots for the rest of the night.
But is Irving becoming an issue both on the court and off now? Was all the talk about Love being the main cause for chemistry problems being directed at the wrong star? If so, what’s behind all of it?
Quite frankly, I can’t seem to think of a solid reason why Irving would be causing issues in the locker room. My best guess is a problem with James. We all remember last year when, after Irving contributed zero assists in an early-season loss to the Utah Jazz, James bluntly told him such a thing could never happen again. The Cavs had been Irving’s team for a couple years, so having James come in and take the reins might be something he still has a problem with.
If this is the case, my advice is simple – get over it. James joined this team and turned it from a walking disaster into a championship contender overnight. If this is still something Irving can’t get on board with, then it might be an issue that can’t be solved.
We’re sure to find out more about Irving’s feelings on everything soon enough, as he’ll likely get asked about the Smith report after tonight’s game against the Indiana Pacers. Still, whether or not he’s unhappy in Cleveland, it’s all pointing to the fact this team is dealing with way too many problems as the playoffs get closer.
