The Cavs are feasting on an easy schedule right now. As for Mo...I think the jury is still out on him. He's not really shooting well from the floor...granted it is only 11 games in, I still wouldn't mind seeing his FG% higher than 43%. I'll say he has been solid, but I wouldn't say much beyond that.
yet according to hollinger before the detroit game they had played the 9th toughest schedule in the league(found by taking the average winning percentage this season of the opponents played). the jury is not still out(and never was) on mo williams being a better scorer and creator than delonte west and daniel gibson.
I was making no comparison to either of those...you shouldn't assume things. I was saying that the jury is still out on whether or not Mo can be a consistent and reliable #2 guy. The guy can score, there's no doubt about it, but he's never been consistent...and that's what I want to see out of him.
i didn't mean to suggest that you were. the whole point i had in bringing up mo williams was that it has been very evident that he is better than those guys(though it was before this season as well) when before the season people were arguing that he wasn't much of an upgrade. i agree that so far he hasn't been quite as good with his shooting as the cavs wanted him to be, but really he's just a couple of percentage points off and i bet after tonight's performance his percentages are pretty good.
I think a lot of people are forgetting two very important things: Firstly, this is a Cavs team that has changed a lot in the past year. In fact, of their basic 8 man rotation (LeBron, Z, Ben, Mo, West, Boobie, Varejao, Szczerbiak) four were not Cavaliers before the February trade deadline, so most of these guys have only been with the team for half a season, and Mo has only been there since the offseason. It takes teams time to gel together, and they're playing well (albeit with a relatively easy schedule) in spite of that. The team has shown signs of great play on both ends of the court - they give up the fewest rebounds per game in the League, the have the most points per 100 possessions, they give up the 4th fewest points per game, have the 2nd best points differential per game, they have the 3rd best FG%. I don't care who they've played - they're still NBA quality and those are still good numbers. Bear in mind also that they are playing a new offensive system this year (new to all players, though it is just a tweaked version of the previous offense) so that ought to take some getting used to. Secondly, they have Wally Szczerbiak's expiring deal to play with. The names I've heard talked about with regard to who they might acquire are Michael Redd, Vince Carter. Either of those would be great options and really put the Cavs up there to really contend for the Championship this season. Basically, over at RealCavsFans there is a Cavaliers insider (definitely genuine) and here is what he said (slightly paraphrased to condense it, but trust me that this is what he implies) http://www.realcavsfans.com/showthread.php?p=317707 It's not immediately clear who this could refer to with salaries, but if we assume that this is true, the Cavs could get a lot stronger in the near future. However, unless Ferry knows that he won't be able to re-sign Varejao when his contract expires, I would be hesitant to trade him unless what the Cavs receive is really good. Regardless, though, I have no doubt that a trade will be made involving Szczerbiak in return for a star player who would really be the #2 to LeBron. Again, if this happens and they gel with the team and offense, why shouldn't the Cavs be a genuine title threat, alongside Boston in the East? Just for kicks, because it was discussed earlier in this thread, here's my breakdown of LeBron's weaknesses: He's inconsistent from the line, which makes him shy away from the paint, as said above. If he can get comfortable and consistent from the line (shoot ~80-85% more or less night-in-night-out) then it should give him even more confident about the other aspects of his game. For a guy his size, his post play is pretty poor. If he is just shying away due to his foul shooting, that's understandable, but it is a demon he must conquer. If he needs to improve his foul shooting before his post play, that's fine, so long as he does it. And when the time comes for him to post up, we could enter a new era of dominance. His jump shooting is pretty inconsistent, too. There have been times (Detroit, Game 5) when he's been on fire, but there have also been times (such as the first couple of games this season) where his shooting has been atrocious. That could be due to his increased strength and it might just be something he has to get used to, so hopefully he can. However, the other way of looking at it is that he's showing that he doesn't need to be a great jump shooter to be dominant at the moment, but in the future he will need to be. So it's a big concern, but one which will hopefully get rectified by evolution rather than revolution. Defence and LeBron are an interesting mix. I think he is capable of being one of the better defenders in the League but so far when playing for the Cavs he has had to shoulder so much of the burden on offence that he can't also be a lock-down defender for 40+ minutes per game. Hopefully with the addition of Mo Williams and, hopefully, more to come, we might see him try his hardest for more than just the final 5 or 10 minutes of the egame on defence. Then we can truly see how good he can become.
You make predicitions based on the assumption that players will not get injured, so why not make assumptions based on trades that are seemingly inevitable? (Not the exact trade, but it does seem to be inevitable that there will be a trade - the question is when, who the Cavs will get back and who will be packaged with Wally, though it appears as though it will be Varejao plus a first round pick.)
