INDEPENDENCE: The fact J.R. Smith wandered off the floor during Tuesday’s embarrassing loss to the Milwaukee Bucks, then compounded matters by wearing a ski mask afterwards and playing dumb about it speaks to a larger issue facing the Cavaliers’ title defense.
Coach Tyronn Lue is trying to fight off complacency within the defending champions. Realistically, there is no team in the East that can prevent them from making a third consecutive trip to the NBA Finals provided they stay healthy, so the motivation must come from within. In early December, when the Cavs have already raced out to the best record in the conference, that can be difficult.
“When you have a team that’s a championship team and you went to two straight Finals, you’ve been doing the same thing for three years, it gets redundant,” Lue said. “But you still have to do the drills, continue to get better, you still have to go through offensive sets you’ve been working on, continuing to work on execution, and the guys know it, so they get bored with it sometimes. Rightfully so. We’ve got to continue to work on those things, you’ve got to continue to get good at those things, and it’s going to help us down the road.”
The Cavs have done plenty of unusual things together, from World Series games to a Kanye West concert and the White House visit. Team Fun did not practice Saturday so they could attend the Ohio State-Michigan game, then Lue was forced to cancel Monday’s practice after he played the starters extended minutes in Sunday’s win over the Philadelphia 76ers. The end result was a poor effort Tuesday that resulted in Lue yanking his regulars off the floor late in the third quarter because he was upset by the lack of physicality.
By then, Smith’s blunder was all over the internet. He walked off the floor late in the second quarter to give Jason Terry a hug on the Bucks’ bench. He was supposed to be guarding Tony Snell, who instead enjoyed an easy dunk while Smith’s Cavs teammates looked on bewildered.
He didn’t make things any better when he wore a ski mask in the locker room and refused to take accountability for the gaffe, instead saying he didn’t know he was in the game. His reaction irritated Lue, who addressed it with him on Wednesday.
“I said it more in a joking manner because you can see what happened,” Smith said Wednesday, sans ski mask. “Obviously, I wasn’t paying attention. For me to just sit there and tell you I wasn’t paying attention makes it plain and boring somewhat, especially when you’re asking a question you already know the answer to. But at the same time, I still have to give that boring answer, for whatever reason.”
Smith is mired in a 3-for-29 shooting slump in his past three games, but said that slump did not play into why he chose to wear the ski mask and take the unconventional route in answering questions.
Smith maintained this was his first slip-up since arriving in Cleveland, which is a matter of opinion. He was, after all, suspended two games for punching Jae Crowder during his first postseason run here. He also had a police report filed against him in New York for allegedly choking a man at 4 a.m., although police closed the case without bringing charges.
“This is the first mental error that I’ve had since I was here,” Smith said. “I mean, I think that’s just one of the reasons why it’s so big because it hasn’t been seen yet here.”
Lue said he has addressed the behavior with Smith and they are moving on. He will not be disciplined for any of it.
“It was [an] embarrassing moment,” Lue said. “We had a discussion about it, he felt embarrassed about it, it was an embarrassing play. We talked about it. We’re moving on.
“It wasn’t something intentional. … It’s not something that he was doing that was a negative motive or something negative toward the team. It was a play that happened. They inbounded the ball. And he’s over there giving a guy a hug. It’s embarrassing. We’re not happy it happened.”
Lue also wasn’t pleased with the ski mask stunt.
“It wasn’t right. I talked to him about that also. There’s no need for that,” Lue said. “Just address the media in the right way, move on. We got our butts kicked [Tuesday] night. Give Milwaukee credit, they came out, they attacked us, they beat us. Now we’ve got to move on.”
The larger issue, at least in Smith’s mind, is fighting the complacency that has set in and finding ways to ease the load off the Cavs’ stars. LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love have combined to score 63 percent of the Cavs’ points in their past five games. Part of that burden should be eased beginning Thursday when Channing Frye returns.
Frye, one of the top 3-point shooters in the league, rejoined the Cavs on Wednesday following the death of his father.
“Guys like myself … we have to be those ‘worker ants.’ We have to put that work in even more and have their back even more,” Smith said. “Obviously, they’re going to score the majority of our points, but they’ve done even more than what they’re accustomed to. We have to do a better job of helping them out from a playing side as well as a serious side as well.”
Jason Lloyd can be reached at jlloyd@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Cavs blog at www.ohio.com/cavs. Follow him on Twitter www.twitter.com/JasonLloydABJ.