These aren't basketball reasons. Just "well, things like this happened last year, so they'll happen again!" I get the appeal of that and would buy right in if it made sense. But it doesn't. They added Kevin Durant and we did nothing to counter. Things are completely different. Oh well. We will see how it plays out in June. But if they win and keep those four together, I don't think you see us keep this same core together.
I think that the Cavs have two of the best finishers/penetrators in the league and I don't believe in GSW's current teams ability to defend them. I think in a playoff series, with the way those games normally play out, Durant's "rim protection" will be massively compromised in similar fashion to the way it was when Bogut got hurt (and LeBron and Kyrie proceeded to tear them apart). Green is STILL walking the suspension tightrope on a regular basis.
I don't know if the Cavs can afford to drop a home game like last year though and win TWO at Oracle. If we don't hold serve at home for all 3 games in Cleveland, I think we'd be in trouble. But if we just need to steal ONE game, I ultimately believe we can have the two best players on the court for that one game at least.
There's not much analysis coming the other way either
"I don't think we can beat them because we can't counter them adding Durant"
The Warriors have not done anything to show me for CERTAIN that they are remarkably better than the even were last year. They went 73-9 with a +10.8 differential. This year they're probably gonna win what, 68-70 games with maybe a 12 or so point differential?
They may have the POTENTIAL to be remarkably better than they ever were last year, but I don't think they've gotten there yet. I think they have a fundamental crunch-time problem, and that stuff often takes more than one year to properly sort out, no matter how much more talent you have at the top of your roster compared to the rest of the league. Remember, their new make-up has NOT been fully battle tested in a playoff series together, and as theoretically awesome as it might be, it is just THEORETICALLY awesome for now. Curry has already shown signs of sulking and they're on pace for 70 wins. What kind of prima-donna BULLSHIT is that? What happens if they get down 2-1? or even 1-0? Or what happens if they go up 2-0 and then blow the next two with crunch-time blunders and then have a gigantic game 5 against a guy who has had a couple pretty fucking good game 5's in the playoffs at different points of his career.
How many times does Steph have to be a shell of himself in the finals before we start talking about him in the Finals like we talk about Kyle Lowry in the playoffs?
He got outplayed by Dellavedova for half a series which was embarrassing and couldn't even beat Iguodala out for MVP of the series, and then he got outplayed and beat by Kyrie. He was supposed to be the MVP BOTH years too. Are we marking Steph down as "good steph" or "bizarro NBA finals Steph" when we evaluate the match-up?
We all know that the playoffs and the regular season are two completely different animals. The pace is different, the physicality is different, the pressure is different, the rules are even different. And obviously injury potential is a given. A series can flip in a split second, we've seen it happen so many times to so many teams including the Cavs and to a lesser extent GSW.
My point: I keep seeing "there's no way we are beating them with Durant"....but there's definitely PLENTY of ways we can beat them with Durant.
Any team can crumble under the right circumstances and we have a team that can create some pretty damning circumstances, in my opinion. Not perfect, of course.
Also that's assuming we actually play the Warriors. It's 2017. Isn't there some old joke about Popovich and the Spurs during odd years? Hell, that's assuming we make it and don't get blindsided by Boston or Toronto.
Maybe I'm wrong on every point. Maybe none of that is realistic at all and it's wishful thinking or whatever. But I definitely can't sit here every single night trying to enjoy the Cavs season as reigning world champions if all I can say anytime we look bad is "Damn, more evidence that we can't match-up against Golden State with Durant". That sounds depressing.