Dreams Fulfilled: Colt McCoy defeats Brandon Weeden on Monday Night Football
October 28, 2014Video: LeBron James’ Debut Kia Commercial
October 28, 2014Happy Tuesday WFNY!
That was some sports weekend we had, eh? Well, I always forget that not all of you are Ohio State fans. So perhaps your sports weekend was dramatically different than mine. My Cleveland sports fan existence has taught me that a win is a win and that I should never dismiss any game that puts one more tally in that W column.
But man, what a frustrating pair of wins between the Buckeyes on Saturday night and then the Browns on Sunday early evening. I know beggars can’t be choosers, but I never view Ohio State as beggars, so I’ll start with them.
It’s getting to be awfully old watching OSU offensive coordinator Tom Herman’s offense crawl inside its shell every time they play a tough defense. Running up the score on the likes of Maryland and Rutgers doesn’t impress me much. We saw the same thing last season, running up the score on lesser opponents, and then slowing down against Wisconsin before ultimately being completely shut down by Michigan State in the Big Ten Championship Game.
Look, I get it. Good defenses are hard to score on. You shouldn’t expect to score 50 points against the likes of Virginia Tech and Penn State (even though OSU did just hang 63 on Penn State last season). What I don’t understand is the bizarre playcalling in these close games. Everything seems out of sync. The offense is aggressive when caution is needed and is conservative when trying to open up the field would make more sense.
I know this wasn’t the plan. This was never supposed to be the year of JT Barrett. This was supposed to be Braxton Miller’s swan song. All things considered, I’m pretty happy with the development of Barrett and RB Ezekiel Elliott. The offensive line is young and still needs some development, but there is talent there and time to grow. But having said all that, this team is still a very long way from being an elite college football team again.
As for the Browns, well, I’m just happy to have the win no matter how ugly it might have been (it was very ugly). The Browns are 4-3. This is a competitive football team. They may not be good, but they’re competitive. So far, this has been a step in the right direction and the kind of foundation a rookie head coach needs to build on. So while they may be frustrating to watch, the outcome is the most important thing right now and to be above .500 after seven games is a pretty great feeling.
There seems to be a theme here, though. A theme of winning through frustration. Which leads me to the Cavaliers. The NBA season tips off tonight and the Cavaliers open the most anticipated season in team history on Thursday night. There is so much hope and optimism from fans, and I think it’s great. But I also still believe there is going to be a fair amount of frustration this season. Even in wins. As this team works to find their way, and their roles, and their strengths, and their weaknesses, and their identity, there will be periods of frustration. But again, the ultimate goal is the outcome, not the process.
And with that in mind, I know While We’re Waiting is typically a collection of links and shorter stories, but as this is my last WWW before the start of the season, I would rather spend the rest of our time together this morning talking about the beginning of the season. And so with that in mind, let’s get into Thursday’s game.
The beginning of something new
Every season when I think about the start of the Cavaliers season, I talk about hope. If I were to go back and look at what I wrote on the eve of the last four season tip-offs, I’m sure the word “hope” would be prominently featured. For me, the start of the basketball season comes at the perfect time. I know I’ve written before about what this time of year means to me. The changing of the leaves, the cool and crisp fall air (even though it’s 73 degrees outside in Columbus as I write this), the first cases of Christmas Ale hitting the store shelves. It’s a time of change and limitless opportunities. One thing is ending, and something new is about to begin.
It always felt appropriate with previous Cavs teams. There was real hope, even if it was just a fool’s hope. But in the abstract, what we thought we knew about the Cavaliers was only theory. The start of the season is the first step in the team becoming what they actually are. And so we had hope. Hope that things would be different, that the development of young players would translate into wins. That our beloved Cavaliers would be the story of the NBA.
But then those teams all became their reality. None of the last four iterations of Cavs basketball have been anything even remotely close to good. We tell ourselves that those seasons were still fun. To some degree there is truth to that, particularly among the community of Cavs fans that live on Twitter and other social media platforms. But it wasn’t real fun. Real fun was watching LeBron James dancing on the bench with his teammates as the Cavaliers steamrolled through yet another opponent. Real fun was LeBron dropping 48 points on the Detroit Pistons as he single-handedly willed his team to a most important Game 5 win. Real fun was the scene outside The Q as the Cavaliers beat the Pistons to clinch the franchise’s first trip to the NBA Finals.
Yet for all of the fun, it never led to Championships. And the fun collapsed into itself like the gravitational collapse of a dying star as the LeBron tore off his jersey following the Game 6 loss to the Celtics in the 2010 playoffs. For many fans like myself, this led to an almost existential identity crisis as a fan. What is important in sports? Why do we watch these games and these teams? Was it better to have those seven years of fun with LeBron only to have the heartbreak of The Decision, or would it have been better to never have had him at all?
Watching LeBron win his first NBA Championship with the Miami Heat answered that question for me. I felt nothing watching LeBron win that title. I didn’t care anymore. All I knew in that moment was just that I missed having LeBron on the Cavs. I missed watching fun basketball and winning a lot of games. Yes, I still desperately want to see a Cleveland team win a title in my lifetime, but I also gained a sense of appreciation for just having fun with sports.
That is the perspective with which I find myself entering this NBA season. Yeah, I guess “hope” is still part of it, but it’s not near as important as it was in previous seasons. I hope Kyrie Irving, Kevin Love, Anderson Varejao, and LeBron all stay healthy. I hope the Cavaliers live up to their Vegas odds and win the Championship this season. Those are things I hope for. But I don’t have to hope this will be a good basketball team.
The 2014-15 Cleveland Cavaliers are going to win a lot of games. They are going to score a lot of points. They are going to be a formidable team to deal with. They are going to be fun. Yet as with the start of any new season, they are only those things in the abstract. Right now, they are nothing more than an idea that exists in the ether, a primordial soup of pieces brought together by the force of gravity pulling a superstar back to his home. Thursday night, this team becomes something real, something tangible, something quantifiable by stats and W-L record.
What will this team become? Will this be the preview that I write that finally precedes a Championship? The fans are confident to the point of bordering on arrogance. I get it. As Cleveland fans we have been conditioned to expect the worst. For so long we’ve waited for the next bad beat and the next heartbreak. But LeBron did something that goes completely against the mold when he decided to come back. And now, fans are trying to do the same. We are breaking the mold and embracing a mindset that is tangential to brashness and arrogance.
For the players, I hope they embrace confidence while keeping their distance from arrogance. The difference is slight, but arrogance is loud while confidence is quiet. The LeBron James we are about to watch is not the same kid who left Ohio in 2010. That LeBron managed to have arrogance without confidence. The LeBron I have seen return has confidence without arrogance. LeBron learned so much from his time in Miami, valuable lessons that he now brings back home to try to transform the culture of the team, the franchise, the fans, the city, and the state of Ohio.
I don’t know what the future holds, but I could not be more excited to start a new journey no matter where it leads. I have my beliefs on what is about to happen. I’ve seen a lot of basketball in my life, but I have never seen a trio of players with as much offensive ability and complementary skill sets as LeBron, Kyrie, and Love. I think we’re in for something special. We begin to find out on Thursday. So here’s to discovering what’s next together with all of you, our faithful readers of WFNY!
Have a great rest of the week, you guys. We have Cavaliers basketball again!
9 Comments
For what it’s worth, no one at SI picked the Cavs to win the championship, but most pick them to make it there. I’m not sure I disagree with them. But it’ll be fun watching the journey! So much excite!
SI has it as a 5-team race from the jump. Every single writer picked Bulls v. Cavs in the ECF and some variation of Clippers, Spurs, Thunder in the WCF. I think that discounts the Raptors and Wizards in the East and the Rockets, Blazers, and possibly even Mavs and Peli’s in the West.
As of today the Wizards more then the Bulls and Raptors would concern me as a Cavaliers fan. I think just like the Cavs the Bulls are going to take some time, not that long, to gel. But even when they do I don’t see them having enough offense to stay with the Cavaliers. It will most certainly have to be a defensive game to better suit Chicago.
Now Washington on the other hand I feel like they have guys who can bother the Cavaliers particularly in the frontcourt. The good news here is Beal is out for awhile with the broken hand.
In the West you named all of the true contenders except for Dallas who I think will be tough especially if they play any kind of defense.
I mentioned the Mavs.
Barely. I think they’ll represent better to warrant more then a last mention.
Renovations at Progressive Field courtesy Jordan Bastian on Twitter:
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Perhaps. I don’t think that Chandler solves all their issues, but it worked the last time that LeBron switched teams!
Quickens Loan Arena getting ready!
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He’ll help the defense but with Dirk, Parsons and Ellis plenty of offense.