Things are looking very dire for the Cleveland Cavaliers right now.
After a series of great games, the New York Knicks lead the Cavaliers 3-1 in the opening round.
That means that despite a very promising regular season, the Cavs are on the verge of being eliminated from the postseason.
There are many reasons for what has gone wrong with Cleveland but Brian Windhorst succinctly summed it up on Tuesday: the team has a very thin roster.
“They can’t score. They can’t score because they don’t have a bench. JB [Bickerstaff]’s only got six players. He’s got six,” Windhorst said on ESPN Radio in Cleveland.
“There’s 3 guys on the Knicks bench that are sitting that in my opinion would instantly get 15 minutes if they were traded to the Cavs tonight,” – @WindhorstESPN.
Is Koby Altman getting enough blame for the #Cavs situation? pic.twitter.com/IJgy5YQTqh
— ESPN Cleveland (@ESPNCleveland) April 25, 2023
“There’s three guys on the Knicks bench that are sitting that in my opinion would instantly get 15 minutes if they were traded to the Cavs tonight,” Windhorst added.
Windhorst is saying what so many other people feel: this Cavaliers team has serious talent but just not enough of it.
After Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland, Evan Mobley, Jarrett Allen, Caris LeVert, and Cedi Osman, the team becomes very lacking.
This “very thin roster”, as Windhorst put it, might cost them their spot in the playoffs.
He said that Allen and Mobley aren’t doing well lately either, which only impairs the Cavaliers even more.
This is the worst-case scenario that many Cavs fans feared all year long.
The team was having a wonderful regular season and looked like one of the best teams in the East.
However, there were numerous fans who feared they’d fall apart when the playoffs started because the roster just wouldn’t support them in the long run.
They are on the brink but can the Cavaliers rebound and somehow claw their way back into the playoffs?
