After watching the Washington Witnesses run their mouths and throw punches for six straight games, I so desperately wanted to see some back-talk from my Cavaliers. Seriously, I wanted to see Dwayne Jones come in off the bench, kick Brenda Haywood's knee from a side-angle, and stand over him doing that obnoxious "can't see my face" bullshit.
The league would have suspended Jones, but he's our 14th or 15th option off the bench. That's why God made the Scot Pollards of the world.
Alas, my Cleveland Cavaliers have way too much class for all that. They did their damage on the court, and while some fat guy kept getting shown on TV wearing a crybaby shirt, all Clevelanders could do is laugh at the perennial bitches we have made the Washington Witnesses into.
This morning, I was happy that LeBron and the rest of the Cavs took the high road. Leave the sorry attitude in DC and move on to the elite teams of the NBA. But last night, I wanted to see some REAL payback (and you KNOW I wanted that....hell, I'm the guy who makes videos based entirely on mocking Michigan, Texas, Michigan, Iowa, Chad Henne, Michigan, and Michigan). My emotions were running high and I wanted vengeance. But like the title says, the Cavs are much classier than I am. Kudos to them for proving it.
About the game itself, the Cavaliers put together a beautiful performance. Any NBA team that puts together a stat sheet like this....forget it, you won't beat them on that given night.
- 50 percent shooting from the field (40 for 81)
- 46 percent shooting from 3-point range (11 for 24)
- 29 assists
- 6 turnovers
- 32 points off the bench (to Washington's 16)
Eight Cavaliers played meaningful minutes in the game. Six of them shot 50 percent or better. The other two players? Delonte West, who did what point guards are supposed to do....7 assists, 0 turnovers, and LeBron James. Yeah, he shot under 50%. He scored 27 points, grabbed 13 rebounds, and dished out 13 assists. But he only hit 47 percent of his attempts. What a jerk, huh?
In the end, the Cavaliers are a great team. Washington ran their mouths, hoping somebody would mistake them for a good team. They are not.
I wonder if Gilbert Arenas regrets the following statement;
“I think everybody wants Cleveland in that first round,” he said. “They’ve
been a .500 team ever since they made that trade and everybody wants a chance at that matchup. We want Cleveland for our own reasons, we don’t think they can
beat us in the playoffs three years straight. It’s hard to beat a team three
years straight. We want to try our luck.”
No, Gilbert....maybe it's hard for YOU to beat a team three years in a row. It's not so difficult from our perspective.
So thank you Gilbert Arenas for waking up the Cavaliers. Thank you for reminding us that it is playoff time, and you are merely worthy of being the answer to our annual trivia question.
Thank you Brenda Haywood for consistently trash-talking and not backing it up with anything but a closed fist. Dude, you're 7 feet tall and you barely got 6 rebounds per game. 27 boards for the whole series? LeBron had 35 rebounds in the past three games. Remember that.
Thank you eShawn Stevenson. Thank you for showing us what an overrated player can do when he's challenged. The guy just AVERAGED 29.8 points, 9.2 rebounds and 7.6 assists against you. Thank you, eShawn (yes, I said eShawn....because there's clearly no D).
But Arenas was right about one thing. The Cavaliers, after the trade that brought Ben Wallace, Wally Szczerbiak, Delonte West and Joe Smith to our building, were a struggling team. Prior to the playoffs, they were 14-13 with the new players in uniform. This was a team that you could have knocked off, based on our record.
But have you forgotten, Gilbert? Have you forgotten that it was YOUR Washington Wizards who faced us the day before those players got into uniform?
Four players in street clothes, having arrived during the game. Three more shipped off to other teams. Hell, we had to sign two players from the NBA developmental league just to keep from forfeiting the game. Eric Snow was in the fucking starting lineup.
And we BEAT you.
So maybe we were only .500 down the stretch. But YOU certainly were not going to be the team capable of pulling off the series win.
But you did wake us up. Boston or Atlanta might want to have a word with you about that.
