I understand that the Bid is a Cavs fan but his assessment of almost everything in this series seems wrong.
First of all, the Cavs offense is so bogged down because they have players that whose strengths dont particularly mesh well. Hughes (though I will give him a break for playing hurt) needs movement on offense to be effective but is the only starter that wants to play that type of game. Gooden looked effective burying the baseline jumpers but he is wildly inconsistent and Detroit failed to adjust and force him deeper where he is not effective. Ilguagksas is only effective in as a post player when he gets the ball on the block or as a catch and shoot spot up player with 18 feet as the limit to his range. He can not run at all. Marshall is a soft spot up 3 point shooter who if he is off gives you almost nothing. Gibson is a good player, slasher type that shoots well. His problem is on the other end where he is simply too small to match up with Detroits guards. Snow has never been a good offensive player but he can matchup with stronger guards. But his offense is so poor and his foot speed is so slow it is a crime that they are paying him like $9million a year. (I think he is signed through next year too
) Pavolvik is a streaky shooter who can create problems with his athleticism and size but make a lot of bad plays. On d he is caught gambling alot. Verajo has pretty much no offensive strength other than offensive rebounding though he is a good, active defender who seems to get his hands on alot of balls.
One problem I have with Mike Brown is his insistence on playing Damon Jones at all. At least Snow can play effective defense and knows not to shoot. Jones is an awful player. No positives on either side of the ball.
Detroit has so much focus on Lebron that they have left Gooden almost unguarded the whole series. They seem to get discouraged by Cleveland not falling into the trap of running with them which will open the lanes up for Detroits slashers.I cant for the life of me understand how Prince isnt scoring 30 points a game. Cleveland has no answer for him on defense. It is the best match up advantage that Detroit has on Cleveland. Force the Cavs to play Lebron on him and run him from baseline to baseline. But they keep letting Lebron off the hook by not going after him on D. He is constantly resting on D and there is no way he can play big minutes and do what he needs to do on the offensive end and chase Prince all over the court too. When Gibson was on the court there was no excuse for Hamilton to not post him and make Cleveland go to a zone. Gibson was getting torched by Billips early until they changed up and had him shadow Hamilton. But Hamilton is too big for Gibson to handle . THAT was bad coaching by not continuing to abuse the rookie.
Cleveland is quicker than Detroit and they are getting to more loose balls and rebounds and that has really been the reason that this series has been so close. Webber has done almost nothing, Rasheed has been playing in spurts, Billips has been inconsistent (though no where near as bad as the announcers have made out) Hamilton has not been the focal point of the offense despite seemingly favorable matchups with Gibson and a hurting Hughes. Prince was not hitting anything the first 2 games but has been under utilized. Maxiel is a quicker, athletic front court player that matches up well with Clevelands front line guys but is a raw player on both ends. Mcdyess has been strong at times but seems to be out of the game for long stretches.
I cant understand why anyone would be upset wih Mike Brown, Lebron James or the Cleveland Cavs. They are a very limited team playing a better, more experienced team straightup. If Marshall wasn't a stiff they would be up 3-1.
Is there a worse announcer than Doug Collins? No wonder MJ hated him.