SAN ANTONIO — After being steadfastly opposed to it during the Cavaliers’ terrible month, coach Tyronn Lue said he would finally make a change to his lineup or rotation after a 114-102 loss to the Spurs on Tuesday.
“I’m gonna make a change,” Lue said, though he declined to say what it might be.
The Cavs’ current starting lineup of LeBron James, Kevin Love, J.R. Smith, Isaiah Thomas and Jae Crowder has a minus-22.8 rating — which means it’s being outscored by that many points on average per 100 possessions. (That’s really bad).
Lue could do almost anything, from swapping out Crowder for Tristan Thompson to give Kevin Love a break against centers, to replacing Smith (who was scoreless against the Spurs) at shooting guard. Lue could even look at giving Isaiah Thomas a breather at point guard. Thomas committed three turnovers and shot 3-of-9 against the Spurs, but fell several times trying to dribble the ball — which further stunted Cleveland’s offense.
Then again, Thomas is a two-time All-Star who was third in the NBA in scoring, and Lue believes the Cavs’ offense will click once Thomas has regained his speed and stamina after missing the first 36 games.
Lue later told cleveland.com he was still contemplating which change to make (there could be more than one).
“When you’re trying to play faster than you’re capable of playing,” Lue said of Thomas. “You’re used to playing fast and turn the corner and your legs are not quite there, he fell four or five times trying to do that. His speed is gonna take a little while so he can’t get down on himself, can’t get frustrated.”
Love said the problem is “all of us.”
“Just stepping out of bounds, throwing the ball away,” Love said. “Just turnovers and extra possessions and tap outs on the defensive end when we’re trying to get a rebound, secure it and go back the other way is stuff that kind of deflates us and kills us. So I think more than anything it’s those plays — some that might not necessarily show up in the stat sheet but are going to show up in the film. So, we feel like there’s times where the game could have gone the other way but we need to have those plays go in the other direction if we’re going to win.”
Backing it up a few steps, Lue has resisted making changes while the team is in a rut. But after a heated team meeting Monday was followed by the details of it spilling into the public, the Cavs showed very little improvement.
Body language was bad. Energy was low. Eighteen turnovers cost the team 21 points.
The Cavs have lost 10 of 13 games and are porous defensively. They’re just a half-game ahead of Miami for third place in the East.
“I mean, if we’re gonna speak out and talk, we gotta back it up,” Lue said. “And I mean we didn’t do that tonight. We talked about it this morning. It could be healthy but you’ve gotta do something about it.”
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