The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
Schudel gives his Cavs season prediction
From here, the Cavaliers look like a 36-46 team. That’s five games better than the betting line in Las Vegas. Plus, Breshard Perriman is eager to help Browns pass offense against Buccaneers.
The Cavaliers are going to give their fans thrills, leave them groaning, make them feel encouraged and exasperate them this season if the first two games are an indication of what to expect in 201819.
Sometimes the Cavs will give their followers all four emotions in the same night and sometimes in the same quarter.
The Cavaliers are 0-2 heading into their home opener at 6 p.m. Oct. 21 against the Atlanta Hawks at Quicken Loans Arena.
The schedule maker did the Cavaliers no favors in the post-LeBron James era by sending them to Toronto and Minnesota for the first two games. The Raptors are arguably the best team in the East and the Timberwolves could be a power in the West if Jimmy Butler stops whining about a trade and plays like he did on Oct. 19 when he scored 33 points on 12 shots to lead the T-Wolves past the Cavs, 131-123.
Kevin Love is embracing his leadership role with James now playing for the Los Angeles Lakers. That’s all well and good, but the first two games showed the Cavaliers need a finisher late in the final minutes. James was that player in his first go-round with the Cavaliers and again the last four seasons. Even when he didn’t take the final shot, he would make a pass to the teammate he thought could make a game-winner.
Just as a closer in baseball will finish off a game or Aaron Rodgers can lead the Packers on a fourth quarter comeback, the Cavaliers need a player who wants the ball when the game is on the line.
The key to being that player is not being afraid to fail. That player has yet to be identified with this version of the Cavaliers.
Cedi Osman scored 22 points in 35 minutes against the Timberwolves. He was 4-of-7 on three-point shots. He could grow into that finisher role.
Collin Sexton did not look like a 19-year-old rookie in his second game. He came off the bench, played 23 minutes, and was 6-of-9 shooting in Minnesota. He had only one assist against the Timberwolves, but that was one more than he had in 17 minutes of the opener when he scored nine points on 2-of-7 shooting. He was 5-for-5 from the foul line in that game.
Sexton has the temperament and confidence to eventually be that finisher. He wears “2,” the same number Kyrie Irving wore before being traded to the Celtics in August of 2017. Irving would happily take the ball in a tight game. If not at some point this season, then next season Sexton will be ready for that role.
*It seems to me the Cavaliers will be better the second half of the season as this group gets more experience playing together. Coach Tyronn Lue did not agree with that assessment.
“I don’t think we’re going to wait until the second half of the season to be good,” Lue said. “We have a chance to be good now. It’s about our approach, our mentality. We have a good team, good mixture and nucleus of older guys and younger guys.
“We have very versatile guys that can play multiple positions. Being in good shape early on is good, especially against good teams because they’re usually not in the best of shape. We have to try to take advantage of that if we can.”
From here, the Cavaliers look like a 36-46 team. That’s five games better than the betting line in Las Vegas. The Charlotte Hornets finished 36-46 last season and were 10th in the NBA East, two rungs from a playoff spot..
*My first reaction after James signed with the Lakers was the Cavaliers should tank this season for the obvious goal of getting a better draft pick. That was a knee-jerk reaction and the wrong one. Tanking rarely is successful.
The Cavs went that route, even if it wasn’t always by design, when James left after the 2009-10 season. They were 19-43 in 2010-11, 21-45 in 2011-12 despite drafting Irving and Tristan Thompson in the first round in 2011, 24-48 the next season and 33-49 in 2013-14. James re-signed with the Cavaliers in July, 2014 and they were on their way to four straight NBA Finals.
The NBA is a star-driven league. That’s what makes it enjoyable for the fans that have one of those players on their team, and why teams that don’t have a star have almost zero chance of getting past the second round of the playoffs.
The Cavs have too many young, promising players – Osman, Sexton, Larry Nance Jr. and Jordan Clarkson – that can be key contributors in the future to blow the team up and start over. They along with Love give the Cavaliers a solid starting point on their rebuild without James. Still, the Cavs need to add a star in the offseason before they will be serious contenders again.
Perriman to the rescue
The Browns traded their leading rusher, Carlos Hyde, to the Jacksonville Jaguars two days before their Oct. 21 game with the Buccaneers.
The Browns leading receiver, Jarvis Landry, caught 20 passes in his first three games and 11 in the last three. He was targeted nine times and caught two passes last week against the Chargers.
Three of the wide receivers that will suit up with Landry — Antonio Callaway, Damion Ratley and Da’Mari Scott — are rookies.
What could possibly go wrong against the Buccaneers?
An unlikely hero at wide receiver might be Breshard Perriman. The Browns signed Perriman roughly 24 hours before they played the Los Angeles Chargers on Oct. 14. It was too late to help them last week, but Perriman says he is ready to contribute against the Bucs.
Perriman, a first-round draft pick by the Baltimore Ravens in 2015, has the worst reputation a wide receiver can have; he is unreliable because he drops passes. It is worth noting he had tryouts with the Eagles, Jets, Bills, Jaguars and Vikings after being cut by the Ravens on Sept. 1 and none of those teams signed him. He was with the Redskins for four days but did not make it to a Sunday.
“Everybody has a reputation that precedes them,” Coach Hue Jackson said after practice Oct. 19. “Since he’s been here, he’s caught the ball. Obviously, he hasn’t played a game for us yet. He has to go do it in a game, but he looked pretty good out there catching passes this week.”
The Browns could decide to make Scott or Perriman inactive if they choose to go with four receivers against the Buccaneers. Since Tampa Bay has given up 16 touchdown passes (they have also scored 16 touchdowns through the air), the pass offense figures to be a major part of the Browns game plan. Perriman, 25, says he’s ready.
“I’m a lot more comfortable than when I first got here last week,” Perriman said. “I’m back out there in front of moving bodies.
“I’m feeling like this is a fresh start. I’m grateful for the opportunity to be here. I don’t know how much, but I’ll definitely be involved in the offense. Whenever I get in there, I’m going to make the best of my opportunities.”
Perriman is the fastest among the Browns receivers. Mayfield likes to throw the ball deep. The combination could prove very beneficial — if Mayfield gets enough time and if Perriman could shed his reputation of having the dropsies.
I didn’t know that
… Until I read my Snapple bottle cap
Removing all the space between its atoms would leave Earth the size of a baseball…The deepest place in the ocean is about seven miles deep…Cats have more than 100 vocal cords…In Denmark, people have to select a name for their baby from a list of 7,000 government-approved names…Giraffes have the same number of vertebrae as humans: seven…You can identify a turtle’s gender by the noise it makes; a male grunts and a female hisses.