Come on. You're making Bennett sound like he actually deserved to be a #1 pick. That #1 pick is equivalent to a late first/early second round pick. Bennett is more of a filler.
I also hear LeBron is a great teammate that players what to play with. He leads by example with work ethics and is very much a positive reinforcement kind of leader. One player said even if he missed 5 in a row, leBron would be encouraging him and tell him to keep shooting . . . I forget who but he said it was very encouraging when the best player in the league is encouraging and telling him to keep shooting.
Bennett was a late first round pick masked as a #1 pick. He wasn't anywhere near it. Funny though that Cleveland can rid itself of the thought of a horrible #1 pick, while ours is sitting in a holding cell.
This will end up being a terrible trade for Cleveland But that's why they're Cleveland and why LeBron left them in the first place. Just a loser franchise.
If you say so, but their basketball team has been bad because of more reasons than just bad luck. Management completely messed up their stretch between 2003-10 when they had Lebron, but failing to put any sort of decent roster around him. They spent so much $ on guys like Larry Hughes, Antawn Jamison, Szczerbiak, etc and washed up stars like Ben Wallace or Shaq. And in the four years without Lebron, they had the following draft picks: 1 and 4 in 2011, 3 and 17 in 2012, 1 and 19 in 2013, and #1 in 2014 again. So that's five top 4 picks, and seven top 19 picks in 4 years. But still could not come close to even sniffing the playoffs in the weaker conference because they picked the wrong guys, hired/fired/hired guys like Mike Brown, or made stupid trades and free agency moves. Total mismanagement by some very incompetent front office people. As Bill Simmons has mentioned a few times this summer, that franchise absolutely does not DESERVE anything like this. They haven't had bad luck-- it's just a continuous cycle of horrible decisions.
Irving is not Wade. In terms of "fit", Love is not Bosh. It's the Leastern conference, so they will no doubt have an impressive record - but I question whether they will actually be as good as the Heat was.
In terms of offensive fit, Love is much better than Bosh. Love is a much better shooter, a better passer and a better rebounder. However, Bosh was a significantly better defender, so it's a worse fit on that end.
Rubio and Wiggins could be a pretty damn exciting duo. If Bennett turns into anything, this will work out great for Minnesota.
Ya they will be one of my five teams on LPBB next season. Along with them, I'm taking POR (obviously), LAL (Kobe chuckfest while gunning for the scoring record), TOR (decent team, and time zone diversity), and CLE (should be exciting for the few times they're not on national TV).
Now Love is gone, I'm free to like Minny. I always liked Rubio, Pekovic is awesome, I wanted us to draft Dieng, and nobody could dislike Corey Brewer. It's kind of a shame Rick Adelman retired, as this team fits the early 90's run'n'gun (with Pekovic playing the Duckworth role) to a T. All they have to do is unload Kevin Martin...
You may be right, but Cavs fans still might, all those picks were dan Gilbert screwing up, not the fans. And the fans are a very knowledgable base, not like Miami fans at all. I know a handful of cavs fans and they run circles around me in basketball knowledge. Of course there will be a shit ton of Bron fans who don't know squat. But that's par for the course. Any team Lebron went to is going to get some ring chasers and people who just want to play with the most dynamic player of this generation. I hated Miami mainly cause of the braggadocious nature of that team, and it was personified by being in the sun and party world of Miami. But this team is in Ohio. Ooooooo Hiiiiiii Oooooooo. No tax break, no sun, not a city place. Anyway, I'm actually happy cause I get to enjoy this team a little. Not as much as my blazers, but still, it's an east coast team I can root for at times, depending on matchup.
You have a point. I went to college in CLE and lived there for 4 miserable years -- I know first hand how much it sucks. I had WAS (along with POR, NOP, CLE, GSW) last year-- they're really boring and their crowds suck so even the close games have little excitement. Even if I face a ton of blackouts with CLE this year, the 40 times they aren't will be exciting.
It'd be interesting to see how many times they were on National TV when not facing the heat since Lebron left, compared to this year. So glad I don't watch national TV.
Love is also more of a ball-dominator than Bosh. I have my doubts about how he will respond if he feels he isn't getting enough touches. That was never an issue with Bosh. 3 years from now, this may look like a rotten deal for the Cavs. I'd bet LeBron wasn't willing to wait.
