HoopsHype.com NBA Blogs - Peter May

You didn’t hear stories of depressed Ohioans lining up to jump into the Cuyahoga River when it was discovered that Shaquille O’Neal is likely out for the rest of the regular season after thumb surgery.

There are two reasons why the hoop fans of Cleveland aren’t on suicide watch. The Cavs actually play pretty well without O’Neal, as they’ve demonstrated time and again this season. The other reason is that Shaq’s presence in Cleveland – and he once swore he’d never play in a cold-weather city - is for the playoffs in general and Dwight Howard in particular.

And, unless O’Neal suddenly goes on The Wire’s ‘Proposition Joe’ Diet while recovering, he should be ready to play by the time of the presumptive Eastern Conference Finals matchup between the Cavs and the Orlando Magic. Until then? Not to worry.

There was no sense of impending doom in the Cleveland locker room last week when O’Neal had to leave the game against the Celtics with what at the time was being reported as a significant thumb injury. True, there was no definitive word on the severity of the injury. But that game pretty much turned when O’Neal went out and the Cavs rolled the Celtics in the fourth quarter with a smaller, quicker lineup.

After the game, LeBron James admitted that the Cavs’ best defensive unit was one with Anderson Varejao in the middle and JJ Hickson at the power forward slot. That unit is quicker, more athletic, James said. But, he quickly added, the Cavs still need Shaq.

But do they really? What if O’Neal doesn’t get back into shape? Do the Cavs still have enough to win their first NBA championship with O’Neal watching as an expensive cheerleader on the bench?

Yes, they do.

Provided, of course, that Zydrunas Ilgauskas returns (more people believe in the tooth fairy than believe he won’t) and provided that Leon Powe is back to full health and Mike Brown, the Cavs’ coach, gives him some playing time. He can be a beast.

Cleveland has done an excellent job this season of absorbing all that is Shaq, from the outsized personality to the limited playing time. Brown gave him the starting job.  O’Neal has consistently deferred to James, playing the gray eminence role to perfection. Shaq also contributed 12 points and 6.7 rebounds while playing only 23.4 minutes over 53 games. Before the injury in Boston, he had scored 20 points each in the previous two games going 18-of-23 from the field.

All of this was a bonus, for the addition of O’Neal was generally seen as a move for the post-season, when things slow down and bodies fly. In the regular season, he might be seen as a defensive liability (the next pick-and-roll he defends will be the first one) and clogging up the middle on offense. He rarely draws double-teams anymore.

But in the playoffs, where everything supposedly slows to a trench-warfare pace, the thinking was that Shaq would be invaluable, muscling up on the ultra-ripped Howard while serving a reminder as to who, really, was the real Superman. The memories of Howard destroying Shaq-less Cleveland last year in the playoffs are hard to forget, especially the devastating elimination game, where the Orlando center lit up the Cavs for 40 points. Over the six games, Howard averaged close to 26 points and 13 rebounds a game.

The Cavs didn’t have anyone then who could stop Howard then and, realistically, they still don’t. Who does? But Cleveland looks to be a better overall team going into  this year’s playoffs with arrival of Antawn Jamison (who can be a double-figure rebounder in addition to a scoring threat), the emergence of Hickson as a dynamo and the mind-boggling excellence of James, who just won another Eastern Conference Player of the Month award. No one else from the East has won one this season. The Cavs also added depth at the wing positions in Anthony Parker and Jamario Moon.

Right now, and things can certainly change, the Cavaliers and the Magic look to be headed towards a conference final matchup. The Celtics, the best team in the conference in the first two months, look to be grinding to a halt with injuries and age coinciding at absolutely the wrong time. Atlanta is your proverbial wild card. No one else seems ready to crack the top tier.

If the timelines hold true, O’Neal could be cleared to play at the end of April, which would be around the start of the second round of the playoffs. That’s assuming, of course, that all goes well, that Shaq is in playoff shape (as opposed to regular-season shape) and that the Cavs can re-integrate him into the rotation without messing things up. But what if they’re on a roll like last year, when they swept the first two series? Do they still bring back Shaq?

That’s why they brought him to Cleveland in the first place. But if for some reason, the recovery doesn’t go as planned and Shaq has played his last game of the 2009-10 season, fear not, title-starved Clevelanders. The Cavaliers still have enough to get the job done, assuming of course, that No. 23 (soon to be No. 6) doesn’t hurt his thumb and miss two months. He’s the only one Cleveland really can’t afford to lose.

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You have to wonder what Cleveland coach Mike Brown is really thinking when he goes over the game films of the Cavaliers series against Orlando. My guess is that the NBA Coach of the Year is uttering something along the lines of: “Where did my team go?” (There might be a few other words sprinkled in as well.)

The Magic have put Cleveland on the brink of an unwanted and certainly unanticipated May vacation, leading their Eastern Conference Final series 3-1. Only five percent of the teams in Cleveland’s predicament have managed to win the series.

The Magic could just as easily be chilling in Hooterville, awaiting the Western Conference champion, had not LeBron James hit his spectacular buzzer-beater at the end of Game 2. But the Cavaliers are going to need more than James’ heroics to pull this one out. If it’s not already too late, they’re going to need to return to the style of play they showed over 82 games in the regular season and the first eight of the post-season.

They’re going to need to defend.

That is what champions do. That’s what the Celtics did last year and that’s what the Spurs did in winning their multiple titles. That’s what Cleveland indisputably did over the course of the regular season, when the Cavs were arguably the best defensive team in the league. That’s what Cleveland did in the first two rounds of the playoffs, suffocating the Pistons and the Hawks.

But, as James himself noted after the Game 4 loss to Orlando, “we have broken down in areas that we haven’t broken down in all season.” And, amazingly, “we got to get one stop.”

That wasn’t much of a concern for the Cavs – until they ran into the three-point firing Magic, who are shooting with impunity when not dumping it into Dwight Howard. Orlando thus far has managed to do what no one else has managed to do this season – turn the Cavs into Warriors East on defense.

During the regular season, the Cavs led the NBA in points allowed, surrendering 91.4 a game. That was almost two points ­ahead of No. 2 San Antonio. Cleveland finished second in defensive field goal percenage at 43.06. (The Celtics were at 43.05.) History has shown that these types of teams, as long as they play a little at the other end, tend to do very well in the postseason.

Cleveland then continued its stranglehold ways against the Pistons and the Hawks. Detroit averaged 78 points a game while shooting 41 percent. Atlanta averaged 78.3 points a game while shooting 38.5 percent. Both the Hawks and Pistons went down in four.

That was Cavs Basketball, version 2008-09. Until now.

Orlando has treated the Cleveland defense as it was some mere impediment at a county fair booth. The Magic are averaging 104 points a game – or 26 more per game than Detroit and Atlanta. The Magic are shooting 49.3 percent from the field and 43 percent from three-point territory. Those are numbers that, if maintained, will make Orlando a very, very tough out.

“We’ve tried everything,’’ lamented Zydrunas Ilgauskas.

Cleveland looks confused on defense, which is surprising given that Orlando’s preferred style of play is not exactly a trade secret. The Magic like to go inside-out with players who can score at every position. Howard is a certifiable beast who the Cavs have not decided needs to be double-teamed or not. You can book him now for a double-double; he’s had 26 in 31 playoff games.

Orlando’s titular power forward (Rashard Lewis) is shooting an astonishing 58 percent from three-point territory, his last being the dagger at the end of Game 4. The Magic’s so-called “small” forward is the 6-10 Hedo Turkoglu, who, when’s he on his game, is the Turkish Larry Bird. Both present major mismatch headaches.

Joined by starters Rafer Alston and Courtney Lee, that gives Orlando four outside shooting threats to go with Howard’s inside presence. Reserves Anthony Johnson and Mickael Pietrus also have three-point range. Heck, Stan Van Gundy hasn’t even bothered to use JJ Redick (10 minutes over four games) and shooting is what Redick does.

What can Cleveland do to counteract this? One possibility is the Cavs elect to fight fire with fire and go to a smaller lineup, with James as the power forward and three shooters to spread to floor. That would mean eliminating offensive anchors like Anderson Varejao and Ben Wallace in favor or more scoring. That would also mean that Cleveland is playing to Orlando’s strength.

Putting points on the board hasn’t been Cleveland’s problem, however. Stopping Orlando from putting points on the board has been Cleveland’s problem. Stopping teams is how the Cavs got this far and it’s had to envision Brown throwing the baby out with the bathwater at this point.

And, as Brown noted, the games have been close at the end, despite some wild swings. The first two were decided by one point. Game 4 went into overtime (thanks to a questionable call against Orlando) and was decided by two points. Even Game 3, a 10-point Magic victory, was close.

Something that sometimes gets lost in the discussion is that Orlando plays defense too. Pretty well, in fact. The Magic were among the top five teams in the league in both points allowed and defensive field goal percentage. Howard is the Defensive Player of the Year.

And ever since Orlando was pistol-whipped by the Celtics in Game 2 of their conference semifinal series – the Magic played like total wimps in that game – it has shown a toughness and a resiliency that now has it on the precipice of what would be a surprising, and network-cringing, victory.

Cleveland still has James, the human embodiment of “anything is possible.’’ He’s averaging a stunning 42.3 points a game in this series and his team is still down 3-1.

But, contrary to what you may see, hear or read, this series has not been All About LeBron. It’s been about the Magic’s ability to play at both ends a little bit better and about Cleveland’s inability to be the defensive team it was and has been all season.

“Where did my team go?”

Brown better find it – and soon.

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If the NBA is, indeed, a players’ league, then the New York Knicks’ front-office transformation this year will amount – to coin a phrase – to putting lipstick on a pig.

Basketball operations boss Donnie Walsh is universally well-respected. New coach Mike D’Antoni is universally well-respected. They are the lipstick – and the rouge, blush, mascara and everything else new and attractive about the Knicks. Neither, however, will play a minute for this year’s Knicks who, on paper, look an awful lot like last year’s train wreck.

A quick scan of the Knicks’ roster the week before training camps opens reveals only three departures from last season’s unremarkable and hapless cabal on 33rd and 8th Avenue: Freddie Jones (an unsigned free agent), Randolph Morris (a free agent signed by Atlanta) and Renaldo Balkman (a 2006 first rounder – taken one pick before Rajon Rondo – traded to Denver for a 2010 second –rounder.) Doesn’t exactly look like a house-cleaning, does it? In their places are free agent Chris Duhon, lottery pick Danilo Gallinari and Patrick Ewing, um, Jr.

So how good can the new-look Knicks be when virtually all of the old-look Knicks will still be around? Well, that voice of gravitas, Shaquille O’Neal, weighed in last week and said D’Antoni alone could result in 15 more wins for the 23-win juggernaut of a year ago. Then again, Shaq was also the one who offered that Kevin Garnett was not a legitimate MVP candidate last year and added that KG didn’t play any defense.

We know this much. As a coach, D’Antoni historically is probably somewhere in between Hall of Famer Larry Brown, who won 23 games in 2005-06, and franchise destroyer Isiah Thomas, who won 33 games in 2006-07 and, after being given an extension, won 23 games in 2007-08 with the league’s most underachieving and overpaid roster. So would 35-40 wins would be a realistic goal?

The 2008-09 Knicks will test the long-held theory that a coach in the NBA can make only so much difference. There will be a different style, for sure, and there will be an air of stability and possibly even tranquility that was absent (and unimaginable) a year ago. But unless there is a roster overhaul, it really is lipstick on a pig.

But, Knicks fans, have patience. (I know, that’s been the operative phrase for a while, but now it really means something.) Walsh and D’Antoni don’t really care a whole lot about this season, at least in terms of the Grand Vision. They’re better off in the short run making incremental progress while assembling low-salaried assets so that they can have a decent roster and a low payroll in the summer of 2010.

That is not only when payroll anchors Stephon Marbury (who could be – gulp – the second highest paid player in the NBA this season), Malik Rose, Jerome James (who still has a picture of Thomas over his bed) and Quentin Richardson will all be off the books. (Marbury, mercifully, comes off after this season, when he presumably will move to Salerno. The others will be off after the 2009-10 season).

That also is the summer that LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh all could become free agents. New York is New York. D’Antoni is a renowned players’ coach. The Cavs, Heat and maybe the Raptors will be going nowhere. You already know this story. But, for now, it is only a story, even though there are fewer people who actually knew the identity of Sarah Palin a month ago than who think James will be a lifelong Cav. He’s a Yankees fan. One of his buddies is Nets’ minority owner Jay-Z.

So look for 2008-09 to be your basic weed-out season, sort of like “running a lice comb through the budget process,” to quote ‘The West Wing’s CJ Cregg. With many of the big-salaried players near the end of their contracts, Walsh might find some takers who actually might desire ‘So and So and His Expiring Contract.’ Marbury would fall into that category if anyone actually wanted him.

Until then, try to imagine Zach Randolph and Eddy Curry playing in D’Antoni’s free-flow offense. Not an easy thing to do. At the other end, however, they’ll thrive in D’Antoni’s ‘Let The Opposition Wear Themselves Out Scoring’ defense. There will be a lot of interest in Gallinari and even in newcomer Duhon, a somewhat curious offseason signing given the number of guards, big and small, on the roster.

But what there is now in New York, undeniably, is hope. Walsh has a proven track record and is anxious to rebuild the team. In D’Antoni, he has a coach who loves offense, is easy on his players, and also can be viewed as a valuable recruiting tool. But hope is not a short-term thing. It’s a long-term thing. It isn’t going to be vocalized or used as any kind of sales pitch (Come See The Knicks: Back on the Way to Being Relevant!) because that’s bad form. Season ticket holders are paying too much money to have that message drilled into their heads, even if they’re smart enough to know. Which they are.

Instead, look for messages of “change” – there’s a concept! – and some form of restoration of dignity and respect around the league. That’s a big and important step. At this time last year, the Knicks and Madison Square Garden were a public relations disaster and a league laughingstock – and that was before the basketball team even played a game. Mercifully, those days are gone.

But with the roster still pretty much intact – and, apparently, not a lot of takers out there – it’s going to take time for the team to be competitive and back in the water-cooler dialogue again. Walsh and D’Antoni are a start. But the rest of the group doesn’t look all that promising, at least not for 2008-09.

The NBA a players’ league? The Knicks sure hope not.

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