The Cleveland Cavaliers were always going to make the playoffs. There was never a doubt about it. A massive influx in talent – particularly via a certain Akron, Ohio native — does wonders for an NBA team’s playoff odds. Even during the gloomiest, most despondent days of the season, when the Cavs hovered around the .500 benchmark of mediocrity, it was still inevitable that the Cavs would make the playoffs.
Still, until it was actually official — when that asterisk or superscript letter/numeral appeared next to “CLE” or “Cleveland Cavaliers” in whatever version of the standings your rely on* — Cavs fans had to be a little uneasy about removing the “if” when discussing the hypothetical playoffs. After all, they’re going on five years without seeing their team play a postseason game. But it’s okay now. No longer must Cavs fans tiptoe around the playoffs with “If the Cavs are in playoffs, then …” because after their victory last Friday night over the Indiana Pacers, it transformed into “When the Cavs are in the playoffs …”
[*Basketball Reference uses an asterisk to indicate the playoff teams, while ESPN uses a hideously distracting, non-superscript “x” to signify that a team has clinched a playoff berth. Do those monsters have no respect for the aesthetic sanctity of the league standings? I don’t even know what the hell is going on on NBA.com’s standings. Filling out a 1040EZ form for the IRS is easier than following the letters, numbers, and symbols in that mess.]
It’s like Christmas when you were a kid. You always had to obliquely refer to the possibility of getting presents, without openly saying you were going to be given a bunch of presents. “If Santa thinks I was good this year, then I want him to bring me … .” Otherwise, you’d invite scorn from Santa and parents alike. “Look at the hubris on this kid! When I get presents. How presumptuous! On second thought, maybe this kid doesn’t need a $300 machine to play Donkey Kong. Guess who’s getting another ugly sweater from Dillard’s?”
But it’s over now. Now that Cavs fans know they’re opening presents on the morning of April 18th,1 it’s time to start wondering what the loot under the tree will be. Who will the Cavs be playing in their first round matchup? Who should Cavs fans want them to play?
To help answer these two questions, I’ve assessed the threat level of each potential foe for the Cleveland Cavaliers in the first round of the NBA Playoffs, aka as the Eastern Conference Quarterfinals. I’ve rated each team based on how unfavorably they matchup with the Cavaliers, using a system involving the Homeland Security Advisory System, the defense readiness condition system (DEFCON 1, DEFCON 2, etc.), the Richter scale, the Fujita scale, and the National Weather Service warnings. The threat levels are assigned via a nonsensical evaluation of the potential threat, if the potential threat were compared to all potentially dangerous things or occurrences in the known universe, and the conversions were made by a calculator on acid. Do NOT try and make sense of the rating, as the Threat Level Ratings defy logic or objective criteria. It’s all about feeling: evaluate if the Threat Level Rating feels right — and let me hear it if it doesn’t. Anyway, here are the threat level ratings for each of the Cavs’ potential first round playoff foes.
The Brooklyn Nets
Threat Level: Mint Cream Green
The Nets are a non-threat to the Cavaliers in the unlikely event that they play one another in the playoffs. The Cavs are 3-0 against the Nets so far this season, with their last contest of the season loitering in Brooklyn until Friday night — a game the Cavs will most certainly lose now that I’ve written this. But that won’t matter, because the Cavs have already shown they can dutifully dispatch of the Nets.
Simply put, the Nets are a team that’s 12 games below .500 and plays like a team 12 games below .500. The last time the two teams played, last Wednesday, March 18, the Cavs spent the first quarter working off its hangover from its first game at home since the end of a tough four-game road trip. The Cavs were down three entering the second quarter, before turning on the jets and outscoring the Nets 36-21 in the second frame. Kyrie Irving added this sizzling bounce pass.
The Department of Homeland Security’s lowest recognized level of risk corresponds with green in its color-coded advisory system. Accordingly, I tried to find the least threatening shade of green to represent the threat that the Nets pose to the Cavaliers. Wikipedia (or, more accurately the “person who makes it a hobby to define colors on Wikipedia”) describes mint cream as “a pale pastel tint of spring green. The color mint cream is a representation of the color of the interior of an after dinner mint (which is disc shaped with mint flavored buttercream on the inside and a chocolate coating on the outside).” Yea, I’d say that’s a fairly non-threatening shade of green. Anyway … like I was saying, that’s the Nets.
The Charlotte Bobcats, err, Hornets
Threat Level: Winter Storm Watch
The Hornets will do their best to provide some inclement conditions for the Cavs should they meet in the first round, hoping to slow down the Cavs offense and eventually freeze it. The Hornets have a top 10 defensive rating and play one of the 10 slowest paces in the league.2 In his third year out of Kentucky, much-improved Michael Kidd-Gilchrist told Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer he wants to be the “best defender this league has [ever] seen.” Hornets Center Al Jefferson is a consummate professional who accumulates 16.9 points and 8.6 rebounds per game. The Hornets offense would dump it down to Jefferson as much as possible, trusting that he’ll find open shooters when the Cavs inevitably double him. Guards Mo Williams and Kemba Walker are an offensively talented combo that combines for 37.2 points per game, and both are capable of scoring 40 points in a game. Cavs fans know that Mo Williams is comfortable in Quicken Loans Arena.
But the Hornets are simply outmatched at every position except center.3 The Cavs will allow Jefferson to score his share of points, concentrating on stopping the perimeter players and scoring 110-120 points on the Hornets. The Cavs went 3-0 against the Hornets this year, and annihilated them 129-90 (leading 33-13 after the first quarter) in one of the Cavs’ most complete games of the season and the teams’ only matchup After Bowling. What passes for a winter storm warning in Charlotte, North Carolina, doesn’t stop Cleveland folks from going where they please. It takes more than a light dusting of the white stuff (I mean snow, ya degenerates) to shut down the city and all in the National Guard, unlike those Southern folks. Unless the Cavs hit a patch of black ice and spin off the road, the Cavs should win a series against the Hornets 4-0.
The Milwaukee Bucks
Threat Level: Lanky, Hormonal Teenager
The Bucks have a wonderfully anonymous quality about them. The casual NBA fan knows little to nothing about them. The strategy in assembling the Bucks roster is quite obvious: 1. Find a bunch of young guys with ridiculous wingspans that can defend multiple positions; 2. Play good defense; 3. Annoy the hell out of everyone. The Bucks have a very bright future, but still need an education from the older, more experienced Cavaliers. The average age of the Bucks roster is 24.54, while the Cavs’ is a full four years older, an eternity in NBA terms.
The Bucks can give the Cavs fits for stretches with their length. Seriously, everyone on the Bucks is tall with vast wingspans — they’re like playing a team of pterodactyls. When the Cavs played the Bucks last Sunday, the heights of their starting lineup were 6-6, 6-7, 6-11, 6-9, 6-11, and the rangy group held the Cavs to 44 points with 10 turnovers in the first half, until the Cavs cranked up the defense in the second. But then the Bucks turned around and — down 59-65 heading into the period — held the Miami Heat to NINE points in the fourth quarter on Tuesday night on 3-of-15 shooting. Yowza.
The 6-11 Giannis Antetokounmpo (aka The Greek Freak) is a future star, but as a team the Bucks are still young, growing into their bodies, and learning how to play two-way basketball for 48 minutes. Their pants don’t fit right, their faces are pimply, and it’s hard enough trying to get the cute saxophone player to talk to them after class to work on winning first chair in the band. The Cavs would send the Bucks offense to its room, and make point guard Michael Carter-Williams (who runs an offense as responsibly as a hormonal high schooler) hand the ball over like the keys to the family car. Uncle Drew and the rest of the Cavs would give a four or five game lesson to the youngin Bucks on getting buckets, but the Cavs better have their way now before the Bucks finish going through puberty.5
The Boston Celtics
Threat Level: A Bunch of Bananas
It’s almost miraculous that the Celtics are even in contention for a playoff spot, even in the lowly Eastern Conference. On January 20th, the Celtics were a dismal 13-26, in third-to-last place in the conference, and separated by three games and five other teams from a playoff spot. And because Danny Ainge treats his roster like he’s building a franchise in 2K15, the Celtics have had 19 different players play over 100 minutes this season. But an 11-8 record since mid-February has boosted them back into the race, as coach Brad Stevens continues to kill himself to drag his cast of nobodies into the seventh or eighth seed.
Grantland founder/basketball connoisseur/Boston homer Bill Simmons has repeatedly called the Celtics a team of role players or rotation players. It’s an accurate epithet if one infers that the roles played by the Celtics player don’t include the most important role of all: a star player. It’s a team of third, fourth, and fifth-through-twelfth bananas, without much meat on the roster.6
Isaiah Thomas is a legitimate point guard who averages over 20 points per game, who may even be able to lead a legitimate playoff contender someday. Brandon Bass is an adequate but not overpowering big man in the low post with a consistent jump shot who single-handedly sustains the Celtics when their offense stalls. Without Bass, the Cavs could end a lot of games in the first or second quarters. Evan Turner is a Swiss Army knife who’s a triple-double threat when he’s not demonstrating terrible shot selection or turning the ball over, and Kelly Olynyk and former Cavalier Tyler Zeller are stretch-fives who can attempt to lure Gov-zilla out of the paint.
The Celtics play at the fifth fastest pace in the league and are in the top half of three-point field goal attempts, but don’t really have the personnel to excel at it (e.g., a Kevin Love). They don’t have an athlete who can dominate a game, and their perimeter defensive stoppers don’t have enough of an offensive game to lure defenders away from the better shooters. Although Avery Bradley and Marcus Smart are good perimeter defenders, they can’t impede LeBron James and Kyrie Irving at the same time, and the each of them would feast on the Celtics easily digestible and potassium-laden (I presume) bunch of role players. The Cavaliers would likely have the two best players on the court at all times, and the Celtics style is exactly the type of up and down series the Cavs should want to play.7 The Celtics may steal a game, but the Cavs win this series handily as long as they don’t slip on the banana peels on the ground, and in so doing would avenge a lot of playoff heartache against the hated Celtics.
Indiana Pacers
Threat Level: One of the Klitchscko Brothers (the Good One)
The Indiana Pacers are the scariest team for the Cavs in the first round for purely basketball reasons.8 The most obvious reason the Pacers are a fighter to fear is that they’re going to be strongly underseeded. After All-Star forward Paul George fractured his leg in a scrimmage for the U.S. Men’s National Team, the Pacers were morbidly depressing to watch at the beginning of the season, starting a cringe-worthy 7-17 from the opening bell.
The Pacers spent the rest of the season rediscovering their selves without George. They took their hits and kept climbing back into the ring, rounding into fighting shape. They went 9-1 from the middle of February through March 12, resembling the lean team that made the Eastern Conference Finals the preceding two seasons. Since then, they’ve gone on an inexplicable six game losing streak.
The Pacers, like a heavyweight boxer, simply don’t go down easily. Like a heavyweight, they’d rather tie up their opponent, landing body blows at their opponent’s kidneys until the ref breaks it up. David West has a wet elbow jumper and is one of the toughest guys in the league, even if he can’t jump rope all that well. George Hill is an unexplosive yet crafty and even-keeled point guard who makes baskets near the hoop through contact. CJ Miles, CJ Watson, Solomon Hill, and Rodney Stuckey round out a solid rotation. The enigmatic Roy Hibbert protects the paint better than anyone in the NBA when he’s performing at his peak.
Although their recent losing streak suggests they’re not as powerful as once feared, there’s the lingering possibility (probability?) that Paul George will return, giving the prize fighter his right hook back. Even with their present struggles, the Pacers gave the Cavs hell last Friday in Cleveland, forcing them to earn their playoff berth. The Pacers know LeBron’s moves and countermoves, and defend him as well as any team in the NBA. Ultimately, the Cavs would likely tap dance and run circles around them in the ring, allowing the Pacers to punch themselves out, delivering a knockout punch once the Pacers tired. But unlike the Hornets or Nets, the Pacers won’t throw in the towel after a few glancing blows. The Pacers are a team that could ding the Cavs noggin with a few hard hits, and the Cavs would rather not be dazed heading into round two, or risk taking one on the chin.
Miami Heat
Threat Level: F-4 Hurricane
Here it is. A Cavs-Heat matchup is simultaneously the most intriguing first round matchup possibility and also the most potentially calamitous. It would undoubtedly generate the most national attention of any first round series in recent NBA history. The idea of LeBron James and his former, now-current team facing his other former team with the highest of stakes is enough to send the national sports media into a frenzy.
The Heat do have a very solid core that can give any team a run in a one-game scenario, especially after the addition of Goran Dragic at point guard. They’re on a nice run of late, going 7-5 in the month of March and handling the Cavs at home early last week in the worst Cavs loss After Bowling. Dragic is the first above average point guard the Heat have had since Tim Hardaway in 1999.9 Hassan Whiteside has been a revelation, averaging a crazy 2.5 blocks per game to add to 11 points and nearly 10 boards. Whiteside crosses the lane quickly enough to deflect James and Irving layups sight unseen, discouraging them from taking it to the hoop. Luol Deng (with an axe to grind against Cleveland) knows how to defend LeBron James one-on-one better than anyone in the NBA beside Spurs forward Kawhi Leonard and Paul George.
Wade will catch fire two or three games, and play like this is the most important series of his career. I would be legitimately astounded and suspicious if Wade can carry the Heat to more than two wins, considering he hasn’t played great through an entire playoff series since 2011, and was a ghost in last year’s Finals. After all, Wade does have the best job in the NBA: he’s the only star in the NBA who’s asked to play at his best for no more than 30 nights out of the year.
But this is still a series that the Cavs should ultimately win. The Cavs loss in Miami was an aberration, the second half of a back-to-back and after a long and successful road trip. The Cavs are fortunate the injured Chris Bosh would not be playing in a series, because with him the Heat would have a top-five starting lineup without question, capable of beating any team in the leauge. Without the injured Chris Bosh, the Heat likely don’t have enough offensive energy to win four games. The Cavs need only to stock up on bottled water and batteries, board up the windows, and wait out the F-4 hurricane the Miami Heat would bring. As long as the house the Cavs have built is on a solid foundation that can withstand the torrential downpour of public scrutiny and the blistering winds emanating from every blowhard in the country, the series should be over in five or six games.
But if the Heat were to steal a game in Cleveland, then go up 2-1 in Miami? Then the Cavs could be looking at the NBA equivalent of five Katrinas. The Cavs could be washed away in the flood of negativity that would come rushing over the levees like a clogged Municipal Stadium toilet. No high water pants would be able to stop Cavs fans from being drenched up to the crotch, and they would be stuck looking on in catatonic fear like a post-Katrina Mike Myers, as all that the Cavs had worked so hard to build eroded away, powerless to stop the oncoming flood.
This series would bring out the most raucous basketball crowds Cleveland has seen since the Miracle of Richfield. Should the Cavs win in any number of games, it would be one of the most satisfying victories in the last 50 years of Cleveland sports. The possibility of watching Dwyane Wade walk off the floor with his head down or watching Heat team president/vampire Pat Riley turn into a bat and fly off after the Cavs clinched the series would give Cavs fans a joy of the tastiest variety.
But the 10 percent chance that this is a natural disaster for the Cavs on an epic scale is too much to risk. This matchup becomes more and more likely everyday, however, and it’s seemed preordained since early February. The levees protecting the future of the Cavaliers better hold if they’re to make it out of the first round in their quest to win a championship.
The Cavs won’t be playing in the morning except for those on the West Coast. And the Cavs might not actually play on the 18th, but instead open on the 19th or 20th. And there won’t be any actual presents, but the presents are just a metaph- okay okay, you get it, right?
Notably, The Cavs are also play at a slow pace, at 94.78 possessions per game.
Don’t tell Maz-erati I said this. Mozgov is more important on the defensive end for the Cavs, but there’s no comparing Mozgov on the block with Jefferson. I LOVE YOU MOZ!
Using the rosters from Basketball-Reference.
And before rookie Jabari Parker returns form his season-ending injury.
I will not make a Jared Sullinger joke.
But don’t often enough.
For a team that the Cavs should fear for many reasons having nothing to do with basketball, see The Heat, Miami infra.
Seriously. The only Heat players to average more than 15 points and five assists since Tim Hardaway are Dwyane Wade and James. Heat point guards over the last 10 years include Mario Chalmers, Norris Cole (CSU Vikings represent!) Jason Williams, and Gary Payton. None were as potent as Dragic, who was third team All-NBA last season.
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