Yo, Dan Gilbert:
The Washington Generals called. They want their team back.
But seriously, folks. ... How can anyone take the Cavaliers seriously?
They don’t take their games seriously. They don’t take their coach seriously. They don’t take their team seriously. They certainly don’t take their fans seriously, and they obviously don’t take their careers seriously.
Most of them, anyway. Anderson Varejao and Luol Deng have proven track records as being thoroughly professional basketball players playing agenda-free basketball.
The rest of them? That’s open to question after watching that embarrassing unconditional surrender that unfolded on national television in Madison Square Garden Thursday night. Final score: Knicks 117, Cavs ho-hum.
TNT’s studio analysts and game announcers spent most of the evening laughing at and ridiculing the Cavs for their astonishing disorganization and complete lack of interest in competing.
Playing on basketball’s biggest stage, in the world’s most famous arena, on national television — the Cavs mailed it in. Actually they didn’t mail it in, because mailing it in would take some effort, and the Cavs aren’t real big in the effort department.
Two games ago, their coach tried to publicly embarrass them into giving more effort by stating what has been obvious to anyone who has seen them play this season: “Our competitive spirit was non-existent.”
Those are fighting words, or should be, to any professional athlete with a scintilla of pride. But the docile Cavs responded to that insult by (yawn!) giving up 38 points in the first quarter Thursday night — most of those coming on uncontested 3-point shots and a conga line of uncontested layups and dunks.
It was like the Knicks were scrimmaging against their ballboys.
The NBA. Where payday happens. No matter what.
At the other end of the floor, the Cavs’ offense was what it usually is: five guys playing one-on-one. The Cavs have ceased being a team. They are a collection of independent contractors. I’m guessing none of them car-pool to work.
It’s hard to recall when, if ever, a Cleveland sports franchise has ever completely shut down competitively like this in the middle of a season. There is nothing going on with Cleveland’s professional basketball team. Nothing. The season is slipping away, and the team is dead in the water. Nobody seems to know why, nobody seems to know what to do, and, judging by how long it has lasted, nobody seems to care.
How bad is it? The Cavs would have to rally to be a trainwreck. And there is plenty of blame to go around:
The owner: Gilbert is Cleveland’s most popular professional sports owner, mostly because he behaves like a fan, making emotional, knee-jerk pronouncements, and he spends money freely, which all fans like in their owners.
Lately, however, Gilbert has gone underground. As his team’s season circles the drain, he has been strangely silent, perhaps left speechless by the growing realization that he’s headed for the lottery again in a season in which the playoffs were seen as an achievable goal.
As the owner of the team, the buck stops with Gilbert, and Uncle Buck has a lot of it soiling his doorstep, because he hired all of those responsible for this mess.
The general manager: The reclusive Chris Grant finally spoke last week — you wonder if he wasn’t ordered to do so by the owner — and while acknowledging that his collection of independent contractors probably isn’t going to win an ESPY for NBA Team of the Year, he offered little in the way of explanation for how it happened or any vision of how to make it stop.
Of all the architects of this sinkhole, Grant seems to be on the shakiest ground of all, starting with his complete whiff on the first overall pick in the draft, a calamitous air ball that will haunt the Cavs for years to come.
The coach: This just in: The Cavs’ record in Byron Scott’s last 46 games as coach: 16-30. The Cavs’ record in the first 46 games of Mike Brown Part II: 16-30. So the coaching change has had no effect whatsoever. Some would argue that Brown has lost the team. I would argue that he never had the team.
There is no evidence anywhere to suggest that from day one the players were buying what Brown was selling. Shame on both of them.
The point guard: There is more to being a franchise player than making TV commercials. “He has as much talent as anyone in the league playing that position,” said TNT analyst and former point guard Greg Anthony, “but he doesn’t make his team better.”
The rest of the players: It has never a good sign when the fans care more about winning than the players
