Cavs finding it tough in the early part of the season…
READ MORE:
Duncan leads Spurs to win over Cavaliers: (Video) San Antonio pick up road win.
Wizards defeat the Cavaliers: (Video) Cavs struggling to break out of early season funk.
LeBron won’t let Blatt coach: (Video) James taking team-talks at time-outs.
Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James concedes that the team is “fragile” right now after their loss to the Toronto Raptors on Saturday dropped them to 5-7.
Cleveland saw an 18-point first-quarter lead turn into a 19-point fourth-quarter deficit against the Eastern Conference leading Raptors (11-2).
James compares the Cavaliers’ struggles to those that he suffered when he initially joined the Miami Heat back in 2010/11, but he conceded that they are not dealing with adversity well at this stage.
“We’re a very fragile team right now,” James said.
“Well, we were a fragile team from the beginning. Any little adversity hits us, we just shell up. That’s something that will come with experience.
“This is not even the lowest it’s going to get for us. You guys know, the lowest it can get is up 17 in the fourth quarter of Game 2 of the Finals and losing. It can get that low. Or being up 2-1 and going to Game 4 and lose three straight in the Finals. That’s very low. So, I’m very optimistic. I’m very positive. More positive than I thought I would be right now, so, we look at what we did wrong, things that we did well and get ready for Orlando coming in on Monday.”
The two-time NBA champion insisted that he is prepared for it to get worse before it gets better for the Cavs who have now lost four games in a row with the last two coming against direct rivals in the East.
Cleveland committed 20 turnovers leading to 22 points for the Raptors, which makes it 72 turnovers leading to 94 points for the opposition through their four-game skid.
Meanwhile, they are also struggling to match up with the opposing team’s bench, with Toronto outscoring their reserves 51-19 while the Wizards had a 40-9 advantage.
While the early struggle was predicted for Cleveland given the number of new faces that joined the franchise this summer, it is a worrying start for James particularly who is being criticised for various flaws at this early stage. The 30-year-old was also picked out for taking over team-talks last week, and so it remains to be seen if coach David Blatt can gain control of his team and get them working as desired.
COMMENTS