NBA: The Cavs are... kinda good again?
After three straight losing seasons, Cleveland is back in the playoff picture for the first time since LeBron's departure.
Over the last few years, the Cleveland Cavaliers have created one of the wonkiest lineups in the NBA.
Including injured guard Collin Sexton, the Cavs boast a roster with five guys 6’4” or shorter, and seven guys 6’8” or taller. Their only true wings are Isaac Okoro and Cedi Osman, and beyond those two, head coach J.B. Bickerstaff is working with a lineup almost entirely comprised of big men and guards.
And yet, heading into their matchup with the Pelicans (12-22) on Tuesday night, the Cavs are 20-13, good for fifth in the East. We’re more than a third of the way through the season and Cleveland is one of only nine teams league-wide with 20 or more wins, and they’re still keeping pace with the best of the East—Brooklyn (23-9), Milwaukee (22-13), Chicago (21-10), and Miami (21-13). As a result, it’s no surprise that Cleveland announced on Christmas day that they had signed Bickerstaff to a multi-year contract extension after the
This year’s Cavs have already tied the win totals of the ‘18-19 and ‘19-20 teams. They’re just three wins away from guaranteeing the best Cleveland record in the post-LeBron era, and they have a chance to make the playoffs without LeBron for the first time in over 20 years.
The Cavs have the second best defense in the NBA, behind only the Warriors. Their offense is middle of the pack, but their defense has brought them up to the fourth best net rating in the NBA. They’ve held opponents to the second worst shooting from deep, the fifth worst shooting overall, and they’re in the top half of the league for turnovers per game while staying in the bottom half for fouls.
And unlike the other teams at the top, the Cavs have had the fifth-hardest schedule in the league—only the Magic, Raptors, Kings, and Blazers have faced a tougher slate of teams. The teams above Cleveland in the East have all had some of the easiest schedules in the league so far while the Cavs have had one of the hardest, so it’s hard to imagine them going anywhere any time soon.
So how did they get here? A combination of a weird three-big starting lineup, two solid wings, and two point guards 10 years apart from each other. While there’s definitely plenty to talk about with Okoro and Osman, I’m going to focus on the big and the small of the new-look Cavs.
Cleveland Is Really Darn Big.
Jarrett Allen, who is on his way to his first career All Star selection, was Cleveland’s reward for participating in the four-team frankentrade that finally sent James Harden to the Nets.
For those who don’t remember, Allen made a name for himself in Brooklyn prior to the arrivals of Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving. The young Nets squad that Allen was a key part of shocked everyone by earning the franchise’s first winning record since Hall of Famers Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce were on the team.
The 6’ 11” center excels at playing within the flow of an offensive system, evidenced by the fact that nearly 82% of his twos came off of assists during his time with Brooklyn. He shot 73% within three feet of the basket with the Nets, and was making a career best 81% of those attempts when he was traded to the Cavs in January.
Even though his finishing rate declined after the trade, Cleveland decided to take a chance on Allen in the offseason, signing him to a five-year, $100 million contract in August. That’s a serious bet to take on a 23 year old who can’t shoot, but so far it’s paying off—this year, he’s been better than ever.
In 28 games this season, Allen is shooting 70% overall, and is making a career best 83% of his tries within three feet, where he attempts nearly two thirds of all his shots. On defense, he’s sixth in the league in estimated plus/minus and third among guys playing 30 or more minutes per game.
The Cavs lost all three games that Allen missed, and after he returned (prior to being placed in health and safety protocols for the last two games) they went 10-4 and outscored their opponents by an average of 13 points per game. Their only losses in that stretch came against some of the best teams in the league—Brooklyn, Phoenix, Utah, and Milwaukee. That included a five game stretch where the Cavs went 4-1 while Allen averaged 24 points, 12 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 blocks while shooting just over 80% from the floor.
Overall, Cleveland is 1-4 when Allen doesn’t play and 19-9 when he does. Their net rating goes from +8.4 when he’s on the floor to +3.7 when he sits, and he makes the Cavs better on both offense and defense when he hits the court.
The other key piece of the 7 foot puzzle is rookie Evan Mobley. Mobley, the number three overall pick in the 2021 draft out of USC, is the leading candidate for rookie of the year. He leads all rookies in blocks, and is top ten in minutes, field goals, free throws, rebounds, assists, steals, points, and shooting amongst qualified players.
In his 25 games so far, Mobley has proven himself to be ready to play NBA caliber defense, something not a lot of 20 year olds can say. He is in the 99th percentile for defensive plus/minus (behind only Draymond Green and Gary Payton II, who leads the league), and he has the fourth best defensive RAPTOR rating behind only Nikola Jokić, Alex Caruso, and Rudy Gobert. He’s also top-ten in the league in total blocks, even though he’s played in fewer games than anyone in front of him.
He can also guard guys at almost every position, as you can see in this video. He’s held his own against everyone from 7’ 3” Kristaps Porzingis to 6’ 2” Damian Lillard—there aren’t many seven-footers not named Giannis with range like that.
On offense, Mobley is developing. Despite his inexperience he’s still averaging 13.8 points, 8.3 rebounds, 2.5 assists, 0.9 steals, and 1.8 blocks per game while shooting 50% on twos and 33% on threes. Plus, the fact that he’s hitting one of every three attempts from deep means that it doesn’t destroy Cleveland’s ability to space the floor if Mobley and Allen play alongside each other. That’s part of why the Cavs have outscored their opponents by 91 points in the 500-plus minutes that the two bigs have played together this year.
Finally, we have offseason addition Lauri Markkanen, who arrived in Cleveland via a three-way trade with the Bulls and Trail Blazers in August. The third of the three seven footers starting for the Cavs, I guess Markkanen is technically a small forward now?
After languishing on losing Chicago teams for the last four years, the hope is that the 24 year old is going to benefit from a change of scenery. The other issue is that Markkanen was being asked to do a lot in Chicago over his first three seasons. In a more limited role with the Bulls last year, he shot 48% overall and 58% on twos while coming off of the bench for the first time ever and taking the fewest attempts of his career.
Over his first eight games, Lauri averaged 13 points, 6 rebounds, 1.5 assists, 1.3 steals, and 0.9 blocks on terrible shooting numbers. He has had three of his five worst streaks from deep have come in the last calendar year, but two of those were with Chicago, so maybe things will turn up.
And they kind of have! After missing nine games to health and safety protocols, the last 14 games for Markkanen were much better. He’s shooting 36% from deep, and scoring 14.1 points per game. His return to the rotation also coincided with Allen’s, and since the two have returned the Cavs have been one of the best teams in the league.
That said, Markkanen is owed $55 million through 2025, so I would imagine that Cleveland is still hoping to get some more out of the young forward. Even if they don’t, the Cavs have still outscored their opponents by 74 points in the 300-plus minutes that the Allen-Mobley-Markkanen trio has played together. That’s not incredible—it puts that trio as the 59th best three-man combination in the league in terms of net points—but it’s still pretty darn good.
The Point Guards, Old and New.
The point guards that Bickerstaff has been sending out deserve just as much attention as the cluster of bigs that he’s been working with.
Of Cleveland’s top-10 players in minutes per game, one of them is Sexton and five of the other nine are bigs—Mobley, Allen, Markkanen, Dean Wade, and Kevin Love. Without Sexton, only two of the most-used Cavs are guards. And yet somehow it’s working.
The Cavs were 6-4 when Collin Sexton went down with a left meniscus tear that ended his season just 12 minutes into the 11th game of the season. It seemed like a serious blow to a team already uncertain about the future of the Sexton-Garland (or SexLand) backcourt pairing.
After a great performance in the ‘20-21 campaign, Sexton was averaging a career-low 16 points and fewer than 14 attempts per game. He did drop 33 points in a loss against the Hornets in the second game of the season, but he was posting the worst offensive plus/minus of his career and couldn’t make a three to save his life. So losing him for the rest of the season wasn’t just frustrating for Sexton personally, it meant that Cleveland’s front office was losing their last chance to see what he could do before hitting free agency this coming offseason.
Meanwhile, 22-year-old Darius Garland is playing the best ball of his life in his third year in the league. He’s averaging 19.5 points, 3.0 rebounds, 7.3 assists, and 1.4 steals per game while shooting a career-best 48% from the field. While he’s taking fewer shots inside the arc than ever before, he’s in the top 4% of all point guards for midrange shooting, where he’s knocking down a career high 54% of his attempts. All that has led to his best ever offensive plus/minus, and a career-best RAPTOR rating.
Prior to Sexton’s injury, Garland had been averaging 15.4 points per game, and was lights out from three, knocking down 44% of his attempts from deep. Since then, his shooting from beyond the arc has dropped to 36.6%, but he’s been averaging 21.1 points, 3.3 rebounds, 7.2 assists, and 1.4 steals on 48% shooting overall. He’s making a powerful case that if SexLand gets split up, the third-year point guard should get a chance to guide the team into the future.
Plus, in the combined 400-plus minutes that Garland has been on the court with Allen and Mobley, the Cavs have outscored their opponents by 100 points. That’s top-35 in the league among three man combinations, and it’s the tenth best trio among guys not on the Jazz, Warriors, or Suns.
Cleveland’s other key point guard is ten years older than Garland, but has been just as important to their success. Ricky Rubio, who is on his fourth team in the last four years, has been Bickerstaff’s most-used bench player. After years as a full time starter, it seems like Rubio has found new life as a role player for the Cavs.
He’s not lighting up the scoreboard, but he has been a crucial playmaker for the second unit, assisting on 35% of all Cavs baskets when he’s on the floor.
Rubio has basically always been a below average shooter, but that’s not always what you need from your backup ball handler. That said, he still opened the season with some above average shooting from deep, making 39% of his attempts and averaging almost 15 points over the first 15 games of the season. That included a 17 point win over the Knicks where he had a career-high 37 points including eight threes, plus 10 assists to top it off.
Unfortunately, in the 22 games since that explosion, Rubio is shooting below 28.8% from deep and below 35% overall. He’s also only made more than two threes in just three of those games, and he’s shot below 50% from the field in all but two of them.
However, the playmaking is still there, even when his shot isn’t. Over the last five games, Rubio is averaging 8.2 assists with an average plus/minus of 13.6 points. That’s pretty good compensation for not being able to make shots.
Additionally, his knowledge of the game makes Rubio a plus on defense. His ability to read offensive and defensive schemes is what makes him a good playmaker, but it also lets him get in passing lanes, which is why he leads the Cavs in both steals and deflections per game. It’s why he’s averaging almost three steals per game over the last five contests, even though he’s coming off the bench.
Backing up Garland, Rubio’s skills and expertise have allowed him to feast on the lesser players coming off the bench for Cleveland’s opponents. Plus, in the more than 500 minutes that the two guards have played together, the Cavs are outscoring opponents by 14.7 points per 100 possessions.
And, forgiving the small sample sizes, there are two different lineups with Rubio and the three bigs (plus either Garland or Cedi Osman) where the Cavs are outscoring their opponents by more than 40 points per 100 possessions.
Overall, in the time that the starting lineup of Garland, Okoro, Markkanen, Mobley, and Allen have been on the floor together, the Cavs are plus 14.8 points per hundred possessions against their opponents. With experienced players like Rubio, Osman, and Kevin Love all playing backup roles for Bickerstaff, the lineup that once looked like a total mess is instead taking the league by storm.
The moral of the story? Keep an eye on Cleveland.
READ MORE: If Cleveland wants to add pieces going forward, veteran Kevin Love could be an important contract to move in order to free up cap space. He’s been thriving in a reserve role, but where could he go if the Cavs decide they want to move on?