Lets face it, before the season started nobody, and I do mean NOBODY expected the Atlanta Hawks to be leading the NBA East. We all had a feeling, whether you admit it or not, that the Cleveland Cavaliers would be among one of the better teams not only in the east, but the entire league.
Well things haven’t gone quite as expected with the addition of key veterans LeBron James and Kevin Love. The Cavaliers are a mediocre 4 games over .500 with the all-star game looming in the balance, and now some players have began speaking up as to why that may have been.
Reports via Cleveland.com indicate that some players are beginning to speak out on what the “real” issue may have been, under the condition on anonymity.
We’ve all heard various speculations by various analysts and experts as to why the Cavaliers were struggling. Turns out the Cavaliers as constructed at the beginning of the season merely needed a batch of fresh faces, and to rid themselves of others. Hence the early January trade that brought in J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert, and Timothy Mozgov, shipping Dion Waiters to Oklahoma City.
Just like that the Cavaliers added much needed depth to a roster that was severely lacking such.
The lack of depth seemed to have caused some players to mentally check out during vital moments of some games. One player went as far as saying, “it was never Coach [David] Blatt’s fault.” While another stated, “unbalanced roster probably contributed”.
After the Cavaliers rocked the Hornets Friday night, Tristan Thompson went on the record.
“I think our confidence has definitely gone up and guys now believe that we are a team that can get stops, I think our mindset wasn’t there before. I felt like people never felt us on defense. They knew we were good offensively, but defensively teams thought they could have their way against us. We’re changing that.”
Apparently this isn’t just cliche talk to the press as well, being that the Cav’s have run off five straight wins since January 15th. They face a stark opponent in Oklahoma City on Sunday, which will prove a viable test from the west.