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It's time for the Yankees to blow it up

The New York Yankees have played 74 games and won exactly half of them. They sit in fourth place in the American League East, 7.5 games behind the Orioles and eighth place in the AL Wild Card standings, 2.5 games behind the Blue Jays. FiveThirtyEight gives them a 13 percent chance of making the postseason, Baseball Prospectus gives them a 9.4 percent chance of doing the same while Fangraphs’ model gives them a 12.6 percent chance. With that in mind, it’s time for the organization to stop deluding itself into thinking it can compete. It’s time to blow it up

The current iteration of the Yankees is not only mediocre, it’s old. Overwhelmingly old. On a given day, their lineup features Brian McCann, age 32, Mark Teixeira, age 36, Chase Headley, age 32, Brett Gardner, age 32, Jacoby Ellsbury, age 32, Carlos Beltran, age 39, and Alex Rodriguez, age 40. Their best starting pitcher, CC Sabathia is 35 and their best relief pitcher, Andrew Miller, is 31. It’s one thing to keep an older team together if you think it has a chance of winning but this team does not have a chance of winning. In their last 11 games, all against Minnesota and Colorado, two decisively bad teams, the Yankees went 6-5, blowing a chance to make a run at a playoff spot. Had they done well in those 11 games, there would be a reasonable argument to keep this team together and maybe even become buyers at the trade deadline. But they didn’t do well and now their schedule gets much harder with series against the Rangers, White Sox, Indians, Red Sox, Orioles and Giants making up most of their upcoming games.

Keeping this team together is a futile exercise, hurting the future of the team to keep up a charade of a contention to a fanbase that should know better. The Yankees should move Carlos Beltran to a team in need of a DH that has prospects to sell, perhaps Houston if they can continue to pull back into contention. They should trade Aroldis Chapman’s expiring contract to a bullpen-needy Cubs and try to get Kyle Schwarber in return, a young player on a good contract who’s a perfect hitter for Yankee Stadium. If it all possible[1], the Yankees should move CC Sabathia before his home run rate regresses, even if they can’t get all that much for his inflated contract.

It’s probably close to impossible to move more than those three unless they decide to trade Andrew Miller, a potentially regrettable move given that he’s under contract for two more seasons at just $9 million per year. That being said, the Yankees simply need to do what they can to build for the future. It’s overwhelmingly clear that this core isn’t winning a championship and it probably isn’t even winning a division. The organization needs to operate with realistic expectations of what this team is capable of, which means selling off assets and building for next season.

All stats are from baseball-reference.com or fangraphs.com unless otherwise noted

All stats are accurate as of 6/27

 

[1] And I’m realistic to know it probably isn’t.

LeBron James finally did the impossible and lived up to our expectations

In all of NBA history, no player has been discussed, dissected, put down or propped back up more than LeBron James. Christened as the next Jordan before graduating Saint Vincent-Saint Mary’s High School, as the Chosen One to lead Cleveland out of its never-ending misery before he was allowed to legally drink, LeBron James has, impossibly, lived up to expectation

His career has been a bumpy road, but after June 19, 2016 and a Game 7 to finish off a redemption arc that would make Jaime Lannister blush, LeBron James has finally, mercifully stepped above the noise and emerged as one of the titans in the history of professional basketball. Of course, we already knew that LeBron was one of the greatest. We saw it in 2007, when he singlehandedly carried the Cavaliers to the Finals with 48 points in a double overtime thriller in the Conference Finals against Detroit. We saw it in 2012, when he stepped onto the parquet floor in Boston and singlehandedly murdered the crowd, scoring 45 points and leading the Heat to the Finals and we saw it again in the 2012 and 2013 Finals, where he won two Finals MVPs and two championship rings.

Despite that, doubt lingered and the noise continued. The Decision lingered in the minds of many, even after The Return. To some, it was impossible to forgive and forget the 2011 Finals, when LeBron pulled off David Blaine’s disappearing act in the 4^th quarter of multiple games. While a lot of the hate seemed to be grasping at straws, that doubt lingered for everyone. We wondered whether or not LeBron was a good teammate, whether or not he had David Blatt fired so that he could hire his buddy Ty Lue to run things, whether or not his real motive for coming back to Cleveland was so he run the franchise himself and whether or not his prime was past him. Through four games of the Finals, we were vindicated. LeBron wasn’t quite as overpowering as he had been before, his meddling in the front office was a disaster and he would likely orchestrate a breakup of this Cavs team by trading Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving. Or he would save them the trouble and leave himself. The Finals were merely a victory lap for the Warriors.

Then, a switch flipped within LeBron James and we got what we had wanted since christening him and deciding that he would be the one to get Cleveland back to the Promised Land. He pulled off the best three game run in NBA history, both by an individual and a team.

It culminated in a Game 7 for the ages and a majestic, soaring block that didn’t even seem human. The Warriors live off the idea that the ball is faster than the players, but in this case it wasn’t. LeBron James traversing half of the Oracle Arena floor in under two seconds to deny Andre Iguodala at the rim and keep the game tied at 89 was the moment Cleveland fans have been waiting for since December 27, 1964. Kyrie Irving’s 3-pointer a little less than a minute later ended a 52-year waiting period for good. Cleveland waited, on edge for the Other Shoe to drop; only it never did. Kevin Love played some of the best defense of his life to force a miss and stop the inevitable when switched onto Curry the next play and James sank a crucial free throw after missing the first with what looked to be a hurt wrist. Then the buzzer sounded and Cleveland held a trophy in its grasp for the first time since a cold December day a few months after the Gulf of Tonkin. At the end of it all, LeBron James led the series in points, assists, rebounds, blocks and steals, earning a unanimous Finals MVP to match Stephen Curry’s unanimous regular season MVP.

Finally, after 13 years of endless noise and impossible expectation, LeBron James lived up to it and silenced the masses.

All stats are from basketball-reference.com or NBA.com unless otherwise noted

Game 7 Preview: Expect anything and everything on Sunday night

In the 21^st century, sports have been defined by numbers. From Moneyball to Moreyball, we’ve learned that the best way to analyze the game—be it baseball, basketball, football or anything in between—is by the numbers. Three is more than two, walks are equal to singles and adhering by these rules wins you championships. For the most part, gone are the days where coaches make decisions by gut and you can’t understand the game if you haven’t played it.

What makes Game 7 of the 2016 Finals, the most important basketball game since, well, maybe ever[1], so ironic is that none of those numbers really matter at this point. We have 48 minutes to decide who wins the NBA championship and in those 48 minutes, anything can happen. It’s the smallest of small sample sizes. Draymond Green is 7/24 from 3 in the Finals, but remember Game 3 against Portland when Green hit 8/12 3s? That could happen tomorrow night and so could any other normally preposterous outcome.

The last two games have been arguably the two best of LeBron’s entire career, putting up 41-8-11 in Game 6 to follow up a heroic 41-16-7 in Game 5. If LeBron finishes off Golden State with another game of this caliber, he could retire the next day and be universally considered the 2^nd best player of all-time, having engineered the only Finals comeback down 3-1 in history against a record breaking Warriors team. He’s had a complete bag of tricks over the past few games; his jumper that everyone thought was gone returned at the perfect time. Coupled with an unprecedented ability to get to the basket, James is very literally unstoppable.

The Cavs have set him loose with an uptick in pick and rolls where Tristan Thompson’s borderline illegal screening can prevent Andre Iguodala from ducking under or fighting over, giving LeBron space to work with. If LeBron’s jumper is working, there really isn’t an answer to this for Golden State. Normally, you could have Draymond Green play far off of Thompson and tell Iguodala to switch. Knowing LeBron either won’t shoot or will most likely miss, Draymond can wait for his drive to try and swallow it up. But when he hits his jumper, that option is taken away. Without any appetizing ways to defend pick and rolls that feature LeBron, the Warriors will likely mix and match their coverages in Game 7, hoping that works instead.

It’s clear at this point that they can’t switch any action involving Curry, the Cavs have constantly thrown him into pick and rolls for just that purpose with great success. Switching Curry, especially onto LeBron, is conducive to easy buckets and the foul trouble that caused Curry (and his wife) to blow a gasket Thursday night. Golden State will likely trap both LeBron and Kyrie Irving sporadically on pick and rolls to try and slow them down but there isn’t much they can do on a possession-by-possession basis outside of hoping Andre Iguodala can fight through screens and slow down LeBron as he’s done in the past.

For most of Game 6, Iguodala looked like a grandmother walking through a church aisle. He couldn’t run comfortably, nor could he stand up straight. Although he played through it, he clearly wasn’t his normal self and it didn’t help that he had to guard LeBron James at his absolute best. Iguodala won the 2015 Finals MVP by forcing LeBron into inefficient shots with great 1-on-1 defense and he continued doing that over the first four games of these Finals. Then an internal switch flipped within James and he became Zeus reigning down thunder onto mere mortals. If Iguodala’s back isn’t healthy enough that he can at least make things tough for LeBron, the Warriors are in a lot of trouble.

Though Klay Thompson and Draymond Green have both done solid jobs guarding LeBron off switches and in cross match situations during the series, having one of them match up against him permanently leaves holes in other parts of the court. Thompson is needed to subdue Kyrie Irving; if he guards James then that job is left up to Curry, which is exactly what the Cavs want. If Draymond does it then it’s up to Iguodala to keep Tristan Thompson off the offensive boards, a job he isn’t up for when fully healthy, let alone when he’s gimpy. If Iguodala gets to the point where he can’t play, things get even worse. The Cavs have targeted traditional centers like Festus Ezeli and Anderson Varejao in pick and rolls with great success , Leandro Barbosa is a defensive liability  and while Shaun Livingston is a decent option defensively, he does hurt their spacing offensively so it would be tough for the Warriors to have him on the floor during crunch time.

Harrison Barnes’ confidence is another x-factor for Golden State. After an abysmal 2/14 showing in Game 5, the Cavs decided to treat Barnes like Tony Allen. Despite him having shot fairly well over the season, he was 0/8 in Game 6 on mostly wide open shots. That doesn’t even count the number of looks Barnes passed up when there was no defender near him. Golden State’s Death Lineup is so good because all five players can shoot at least passably well and, most of the time[2], they can switch anything. If Barnes isn’t knocking down wide open 3s, then the Death Lineup goes from one of the best five-man groups ever to fairly average.

The biggest thing for the Warriors in this game is the most obvious: they need their superstars to play at their highest level. Curry hasn’t shot poorly in this series, he’s at 43.1 percent from 3, but he also hasn’t been quite at the level he was at during the regular season. If Kevin Love is on the floor, the Warriors need to go at him in pick and rolls until Ty Lue decides he can’t be on the floor anymore.[3] When there are pick and rolls involving Tristan Thompson, Curry needs to take advantage of the Cavs switching. Thompson has done a great job containing Curry so far in the series and that can’t continue if Golden State is to win. All season, Curry has taken advantage of big men switching with stepback 3s and easy drives to the hoop. He should be able to do both against Thompson. If Curry still can’t get going with Thompson switched, the Warriors should go to Draymond Green in the post with Kyrie Irving switched on him. From there, they can get into some of their signature sets, such as Curry and Klay Thompson getting open off of split cuts[4] or Green can simply back down a bad defender in Irving.

It’s also been floated that Steve Kerr should isolate Curry on Irving more often. While this has been successful during the series and Kerr should go take advantage of the matchup, the Warriors should avoid reverting back to what the offense they ran under Mark Jackson. They got here by passing, cutting and screening and they shouldn’t go away from that in their most important game of the season. Even if they isolate Curry more often than they have been doing, the Warriors need to be moving and screening for each other off ball, even if they know the ball isn’t coming to them. A big part of the reason their offense has looked out of sorts is in the past few games is a lack of movement off the ball. If nothing else, it will keep the defense occupied so they struggle to find help when Curry drives.

Strategy aside, there’s always a chance that Curry or Klay Thompson go nuclear. If one or both of them does, there’s nothing Cleveland can do. Klay saved Golden State’s season in Game 6 against OKC by hitting shots that most players couldn’t dream of. While both have seen heat checks in this series, neither has carried the Warriors to a win. It may come down to something as simple as Curry just being due for an insane performance.

This could also be the game for Draymond Green. In addition to turning into a pro wrestling villain[5], Green has also struggled for a lot of this series. Tristan Thompson has dominated him on the boards and he hasn’t been able to get downhill in transition, distribute or do any number of little things that he excels at. In December, when I was at the Warriors-Celtics double-OT game, what stood out to me was the way that Draymond just wouldn’t let them lose. He went for 24-11-8 with 5 steals and 5 blocks that night, keeping Golden State in it when they were on the road with a raucous crowd, Klay Thompson was out and Stephen Curry wasn’t really hitting his shots. He was not letting them lose that game no matter what. It was the quintessential alpha dog performance. If that Draymond shows up, the one that says “F**k you, we’re not losing this basketball game and I’m going to make sure of it”, the Warriors are going to win.

All stats are from basketball-reference.com or NBA.com unless otherwise noted

 

[1] I was trying to think what could be arguably more important than this and here’s what I came up with: Game 6 of the 2013 Finals (LeBron’s legacy on the line), Game 7 of the 2010 Finals (Lakers/Celtics, Kobe, Pierce, KG, Ray Allen legacies on the line), Games 6 and 7 of the 2002 WCF (Kobe, Shaq, David Stern and C-Webb with legacies on the line), Game 7 of the 1984 Finals (Bird and Magic’s legacies on the line, league’s popularity grows immensely as result of series), Game 7 of the 1974 Finals (If Milwaukee wins, Kareem is the defacto 2^nd best player ever and it isn’t close), Game 7 of the 1969 Finals (Russell’s undefeated Game 7 streak on the line, Wilt tarnishes his legacy by getting benched in the 4^th quarter by Butch van Breda Kloff, West’s best chance to beat Boston in the Finals) and the 1950 game between Fort Wayne and Minneapolis that ended 19-18, leading Danny Biasone to invent the shot clock. That being said, I don’t think any of those are definitively important than this. I have it as a 3-way tie between this game, 1984 Game 7 and 1969 Game 7. Fort Wayne-Minneapolis and Game 7 1974 would make it a 5-way tie, but it didn’t directly lead to Biasone inventing the shot clock, it was only the largest in a number of contributing factors and Kareem was the only top-10 player or borderline top-10 player whose legacy really would have been affected by the outcome of the ’74 Finals given that Havlicek was 33, Robertson was 35 and Cowens is pretty far outside the top-10.

[2] Except, of course, in this series.

[3] Love being pulled early in Game 6 after getting into foul trouble hurt the Warriors a lot. Love’s defense has been terrible and given his uninspiring offense, I would start Richard Jefferson in Game 7 if I was Ty Lue. I also can’t believe I’m writing that because 2 months ago I was tweeting about how dumb it was that Ty Lue was playing Jefferson at all.

[4] With Thompson on Curry, this action will take him out of his comfort zone. The Warriors should go to it regularly when they get that switch.

[5] It’s somewhat shocking that the Warriors lasted as long as they did without people finding a reason to hate them. They’ve been juggernauts for 2 seasons and it took until this year’s Western Conference Finals for people to start hating them. I’m pretty sure that’s a record in the Twitter Era.

David Ortiz is 40 and he still scares the hell out of me

The aging curve is supposed to be a given in baseball. From Ruth to Mays to Jeter, when stars get old, they decline. Ruth hitting six home runs for the 1935 Boston Braves, Mays languishing in the outfield for the 1973 Mets and Jeter hanging on by a thread during his retirement tour are all images we’d like to forget but we also get it. After you get to a certain age, it becomes a lot harder to get around on a major league fastball.

Even in the rare instance of a player defying the aging curve, we can usually see why. Mariano Rivera had one of the best singular pitches in Major League history and that didn’t change too much as he got older. Barry Bonds had a .480 on base percentage with 28 home runs at age 42 because he’s the best hitter of all-time and he had some chemical help. Same goes for Roger Clemens winning four Cy Young Awards after hitting age 34.

The thing about David Ortiz being as good as he’s been this late in his career is that there isn’t really an explanation for it. Based on him already having been caught for steroids and vehemently denying years ago and increased drug testing now, he’s probably not using any PEDs. He’s not in good shape, he can’t run and he hasn’t played over 200 innings in the field since 2004 because of both those reasons. When his case is brought before the BBWAA, he’ll probably get into Cooperstown eventually but it probably won’t be on the first ballot either because of a combination of the steroids, Ortiz being a DH and his career numbers being on the borderline of entrance anyway[1].

Ortiz is an outlier in a game that so often gets boiled down to a line of best fit. What he’d done this year, unsustainable as it may be, is practically unprecedented for a 40-year old this side of Bonds. He’s hitting .340/.423/.708, leading the league in doubles, on base, slugging and OPS. Even more than that; as a Yankee fan, Ortiz still scares the hell out of me.

 Since I’ve been watching baseball, no player has consistently made me as nervous as David Ortiz[2]. Even before anyone tells you “Hey, this guy is really good and he also destroys the Yankees with regularity”, you know it just because of his demeanor. Even through a television screen, Ortiz is physically imposing when he steps in the box to the point where you almost don’t want to go inside on him. He hits the ball low exceptionally well with his sweet spot being low and away (where he’s hitting .370 since 2007 according to Brooks Baseball). A full chart of his batting average by pitch location shows that Ortiz hits the best when the ball is thrown to places pitchers like it the most.

He’s seen more pitches in the three zones where he has the highest batting average (low and away, low middle and outside middle) than anyplace else. Unless you can get him to chase somewhere, which is unlikely considering his surprisingly good plate discipline [3], there isn’t really a safe spot unless you’re comfortable leaving the ball up.

It doesn’t help that, of all teams, he does the best against the Yankees. Among American League teams[4], Ortiz has a higher batting average against the Yankees than any team except one. His career line against New York is .307/.395/.576 with 52 home runs. Obviously he was the 2004 ALCS MVP as well with a 1.199 OPS in the series and the two most important hits in Boston’s franchise history.

He’s in that rare class of players that performs twice as well when it counts. He’s got three World Series rings and plays at his highest level in October. In high leverage situations, Ortiz has a career .940 OPS. With 2 outs and runners in scoring position, he has a .950 OPS, in late and close games he has an .875 OPS and in tie games he has a .965 OPS. If you ask someone to pick a player from the last 15 years to bat in a pivotal moment during a Game 7, there’s a damn good chance they’d answer Ortiz.

As he’s gotten older, Yankee fans have been waiting for that inevitable decline so we can point and laugh when the Red Sox insist on hitting Ortiz cleanup just like the Boston fans did when the Yankees insisted on having Derek Jeter’s corpse at the top of the order. Instead, at age 40, Ortiz is going to be intentionally walked this postseason so opposing teams can face Hanley Ramirez instead. That makes his Hall of Fame argument better than any number can.

All stats are from baseball-reference.com or fangraphs.com unless otherwise noted.

 

[1] According to Jay Jaffe’s JAWS system, Ortiz falls well short of the average benchmarks for a first baseman to make the Hall of Fame. Of course there are no reference points for a full-time DH as Ortiz is, Frank Thomas had a significantly higher JAWS score than Ortiz and made the Hall of Fame as did Edgar Martinez who has not yet made the Hall of Fame.

[2] Other players who came close: Kyle Farnsworth, Manny Ramirez, Jaret Wright, Cliff Lee, A-Rod during the postseason, Javier Vazquez and Kyle Farnsworth a second time. The guy on the complete opposite of the spectrum: Tim Wakefield.

[3] He has a 12.2 percent career walk rate which is high for any player, let alone a power-hitting DH.

[4] Not including the Astros because they were in the National League for the vast majority of Ortiz’s career.

Finals Preview: Expect a Warriors romp

This NBA season has seen 1,309 games played[1]. Between four and seven games are left and we’re on the brink of history. If the Warriors finish things off, then they become the consensus Greatest Team Ever. If Cleveland pulls off the upset, LeBron James becomes the guy who ended the city’s walk through misery. As nice as that second option sounds for the city of Cleveland[2], let’s face the truth here: the Cavs have no shot in this series.

That’s right, no shot. You have a better chance of seeing the Vermont Lake Monsters hoist the Commissioner’s Trophy than the Cavs do of winning this series. Hell, there’s a better chance of the Atlanta Braves hoisting the Commissioner’s Trophy than the Cavs do of winning this series[3]. The Cavs are a good team, but they can’t match Golden State. They simply don’t have the personnel. Try putting yourself in Tyronn Lue’s shoes and answering some of these questions.

Question 1: Who guards Stephen Curry?

There’s no right answer to this for the Cavs. Conventional wisdom says to leave Kyrie Irving on him but Irving isn’t a good enough defender to stay with Curry. Among Cavs players in their regular rotation, Irving has the worst defensive rating in the playoffs. That’s not inconsistent with what we already know about Irving as a defender. If he guards Curry, the MVP will have free reign to roast Kyrie in pick and rolls or even just in isolation where Irving has allowed 1.15 PPP these playoffs.

If not Irving, then who? J.R. Smith has improved vastly on the defensive end this season, but if you put him on Curry than Irving is on Klay Thompson. Lue could really roll the dice and go with LeBron, hiding Irving on Harrison Barnes, but that would mean LeBron expanding lots of energy on defense. We saw the adverse effects of that when Curry guarded Russell Westbrook in the Conference Finals, plus there’s no guarantee that Curry wouldn’t treat LeBron the way he does all other big men and shake him off with ease.

The other option is to start Iman Shumpert or Matthew Dellavedova, having either Kevin Love or Tristan Thompson come off the bench depending on what Lue prefers. Those are the Cavs’ best two options in terms of defending Curry but there are drawbacks. While both Shumpert and Dellavedova are solid offensively, neither brings a lot to the table and both are easy for the Warriors to help off of. Additionally, it would require LeBron to start at power forward which he may not want plus it would create a media frenzy if Love were to come off the bench.

Ultimately I think the last option, with Shumpert starting for Love, is the best chance for Cleveland, especially if they need to match up against Golden State’s Death Lineup. Shumpert can guard Curry, Smith can guard Klay and Irving can hide on Barnes or Iguodala if the Warriors start him. Love coming off the bench also makes sense. He would be more involved and better utilized playing against Golden State’s bench units plus he would be less exploitable defensively. That being said…

How are the Cavs going to guard a pick and roll involving Irving, Love or Channing Frye?

Those three players have been great for the Cavs this season and even better in the playoffs. Irving is averaging 24.3 points and 5.1 assists these playoffs and Love is averaging 17.3 points and 9.6 rebounds. Frye is shooting the lights out off the bench with an 81.8 effective field goal percentage and 23.9 PER. The Cavs need that production, badly. Without it, they’re stuck in the same spot as last season’s Finals. However, none of those three players are reliable defensively. Remember how the Warriors went out of their way to exploit Enes Kanter against OKC, rendering him virtually unplayable? They’ll try and do the same with Kevin Love and Channing Frye knowing that Cleveland stands no chance switching a pick and roll with either of them. The same goes for Irving.

Defensively, it’s going to be tough for Cleveland to weather the storm with any of those three on the floor. Offensively, it’s going to be impossible to score without any of them. The Cavs may have to win a shootout with the best shooting team in the league and maybe ever to win this series.

Those questions aren’t the only things crippling Cleveland’s chances in this series. They’ve shot incredibly in these playoffs with a 43.4 percent mark from 3 that would have led the league in the regular season but that’s close to impossible for them to keep up. Simple regression theory says that Cleveland’s going to have a rude awakening in terms of shooting given that they shot a comparatively low 36.3 percent from beyond the arc over an 82-game regular season. Channing Frye can’t keep shooting like Larry Bird in the ’86 3-point contest and Iman Shumpert can’t keep shooting like Glen Rice[4].

That’s not to say they’re a bad shooting team either. Frye is going to shoot well and be a solid offensive player, as are Irving, Love and J.R. Smith. But they can’t keep it up at the level they’re currently shooting.

Cleveland’s best lineup in the playoffs by Net Rating has been Dellavedova/Shumpert/Richard Jefferson/LeBron/Frye. While that’s a solid combination and the Cavs are at their best when LeBron is at the 4, that lineup isn’t sustaining a +46.6 net rating against Golden State. Jefferson and Frye are going to be exploited defensively and there isn’t enough shooting on the wings. That lineup also dominated Toronto by running the exact same play over and over[5].

 

In Game 6, the Raptors finally stopped this play by going under on Matthew Dellavedova. The Warriors’ coaching staff is smart enough to avoid getting fooled by the same play time and time again.

Golden State has every advantage in this series. They crushed Cleveland with the Death Lineup last season and after revitalization in Games 5-7 against the Thunder, it’s going to wreak havoc again. Whether the Warriors start Barnes, Iguodala or both is an interesting dilemma, but it’s not going to decide the series. Kerr likely going to go with whichever option allows Iguodala’s minutes to match up with LeBron’s the best. Iguodala worked wonders  last season defending LeBron and although James is going to average 35 points and win a game by himself for Cleveland, that’s not going to faze Golden State. This is a battle-tested team that just won an all-out war against the Thunder. Cleveland’s toughest competition thus far has been Toronto in a series that never felt close, even when it was tied 2-2. This series won’t even be as close as that one.

Warriors in 5.

All stats are from basketball-reference.com or NBA.com unless otherwise noted

 

[1] Assuming my math is correct.

[2] The thought of winning this series might be the 5^th greatest sports moment in the history of the city.

[3] Okay, fine. That’s impossible.

[4] Shumpert shot 29.5 percent from 3 in the regular season and is shooting 47.4 percent from 3 in the playoffs. It’s close to impossible that his playoff shooting is sustainable.

[5] Picture per HalfCourtHoops on Twitter.