Bored with the Playoffs? Try...Cavs vs. Cavs

Former Cavaliers center Brad Daugherty, now a NASCAR analyst on ESPN, stirred the pot this week when he suggested that his Cavs team of the late 1980s and early ’90s could beat the current version.

Did I say stirred the pot? Seems like he was smokin’ it, actually.

Daugherty’s teams were exceptional. There was a sense, in 1989, that they were about to be championship caliber. Daugherty. Price. Nance. Williams. Harper. It was an exciting young team. Magic Johnson called them “the team of the ’90s.” Few disagreed.

But a guy named Michael Jordan had other plans, and the rest is history.

Daugherty joked in an article on ESPN’s “Water Cooler” website that his team would win by “20 or 30” – before admitting that it would be much closer than that. But he still claimed his group would win.

Key reasons:

1. While he admitted there’s no denying LeBron James’ greatness, he suggested that former Cavs Larry Nance and Hot Rod Williams could alter some of LeBron’s shots and thereby affect his game. (My take: Could be. But from what I’ve seen, you can alter one of LeBron’s shots one moment, then be watching as he dashes away from you on an unobstructed path to the basket for a monster dunk the next. In other words, the guy simply keeps coming at you until you break.)

2. Daugherty believes the pick-and-roll play he ran with point guard Mark Price would have given Zydrunas Ilgauskas fits. “If you don’t guard Mark coming off the screen, he shoots a 3-pointer instead of just pulling up and shooting a two or passing the basketball, so that would put a lot of pressure on them,” he said. (My take: Okay, but who would guard Ilgauskas at the other end? Let’s not overlook Z’s ability to step out and hit 15-to-20-footers with ease. I think Ilgauskas would give as good as he got.)

3. Ron Harper. “Ron was a very, very difficult opponent for anyone,” he said. “You can ask Michael Jordan. When we traded Ron, Michael said that’s the best thing we could have ever done for the Bulls. Ron was very good at moving and defending the basketball, he was a good rebounder, and he could score at different angles, outside or inside.” (My take: He’s right about this. I was always a Harper fan, and think things would have been different had he stayed with the team.)

To be fair, Daugherty acknowledged that it’s easy to sit where he does now and claim his team would win. He’s obviously having fun with it. And you can’t blame him for taking pride in that team and believing they could win.

Had Jordan not hit “The Shot,” there’s no telling how history might have treated that Cavaliers team.

But he DID hit the shot, and that’s an important part of this debate. Sometimes, one player makes a difference.

I wrote last time about why LeBron James matters. It’s because he’s a bonafide superstar. He has the same larger-than-life persona that Jordan did.

And that’s what would make the difference if the current Cavs played the team of Daugherty’s era.

I have to admit, I wonder to this day what might have been had Wayne Embry not traded Harper away in 1990. Harper made the All-Rookie team in 1987 and was a 20-points-per-game scorer. Some even called him “Baby Jordan,” because his game so resembled MJ’s.

But he wasn’t LeBron. Nobody on that team was.

LeBron James would give those guys fits the same way he does every team today. His breathtaking combination of speed, strength and court vision more than makes up for any deficiencies in his game. Yes, he has off nights. But he imposes his will on each and every game in which he plays.

And to suggest the overall cast in the ’90s was better, as Daugherty and ESPN’s Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy recently did, is to overlook the quality of the current Cavs team.

Think about it. Daugherty’s Cavs were outplayed in the 1990s by Bulls teams that sported Bill Cartwright and Luc Longley at center. I used to scratch my head over that one. How could the Bulls win championship after championship with guys like that in the post?

Michael Jordan, that’s how.

Likewise, the current Cavs have LeBron James. And that’s why they would beat the Cavs of old.

Farewell, EJ, Kenny and Sir Charles

Ah, the end of the broadcast season on TNT. My basketball viewing will drop off significantly, Finals or no.

That's because, like most other people, I tune in TNT on game nights not for the games, necessarily, but for the pre- and postgame shows, and halftime. There's simply no other studio show on TV quite like that of the NBA on TNT.

Simply put, these guys are great: Ernie Johnson, the traffic cop of a host who knows when to enforce the rules and when to let his guys off with just a warning; Kenny Smith, the straight man who has mastered the art of getting in his observation before all hell breaks loose; and Charles Barkley, the most refreshing voice on television, period. Charles is at once someone to be taken seriously for his basketball knowledge, and a comic relief from all the staid and stuffy commentary that takes place on televised sports.

Spencer Hall wrote a great piece about the trio in the June 2 issue of The Sporting News. It captures perfectly the controlled chaos that is the TNT studio set, and provides more than a few laughs. That's because the things he writes are things we can identify with, things similar to what we've seen and heard while watching the show over the years. And it all revolves around Barkley -- as Hall points out in the last few paragraphs by offering a few of Charles' best lines. (Perhaps my favorite, a reference to the constant stream of promos for "The Closer," TNT's hit series: "If I see Kyra Sedgwyck one more time, my head's gonna explode.")

Kelly Dwyer alluded to the same magic in a 2005 article in Sports Illustrated. As Dwyer pointed out, the TNT show is just fun (unlike ESPN's, which he called "depressing"). No pretense, no maliciousness, just fun. And Barkley's blatant honesty, which has rubbed off on Smith. During this year's Cleveland-Boston series, Barkley complained loudly about the Cavaliers' "crappy offense" and Smith quickly, and enthusiastically, agreed.

The key to Barkley's appeal is his total transparency, his willingness to be honest with himself and with others. As Phil Taylor wrote in the June 3 issue of SI, "Part of the reason Barkley gets away with outrageous statements and acts...is because he doesn't deny, deflect or dissemble, like so many other sports figures do when caught in a sticky situation." It's that singular characteristic that makes Barkley so genuine, so believable, and so successful.

Some critics have lamented the guest appearances by Magic Johnson next to TNT's dynamic threesome over the years, but he's clearly grown as a TV commentator, primarily because the TNT format (and personalities) encourage him to simply be himself. He doesn't have to carry the show; he need only fit in. In fact, Magic now comes across as an elder statesman, and his simple insights add to the show's appeal.

I'll be checking in on the rest of the postseason, obviously. But I won't go out of my way to watch the studio shows, which pale in comparison to the lively banter and honest insights of the guys on TNT.