How Cleveland Cavaliers Can Maximize Kevin Love Next Season
Kevin Love removed all doubt about his loyalty to Cleveland by signing a five-year, $113 million extension. Now, it's up to the Cavaliers to better utilize their All-Star forward.
Despite his posting solid numbers across the board and finishing fifth league-wide in defensive rebounding (7.9 per game), Love's fit and usage always seemed to be a hot topic.
Going from a do-everything offensive weapon on the Minnesota Timberwolves to a glorified stretch 4 alongside LeBron James and Kyrie Irving was a drastic change for the 26-year-old star. This is something general manager David Griffin believes the Cavs can improve on, per Jason Lloyd of the Akron Beacon Journal.
"Kyrie was in a situation where he was clearly the one who was taking over when LeBron was out and I think we probably didn't utilize Kevin enough to make Kyrie's job easier. I think we have the ability to put him at the elbow and run offense through him a lot more than we did – some of the things he did really well in Minnesota.
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Despite posting the NBA's best offense from Jan. 21 on, according to NBA.com, Cleveland can be even better by simply maximizing Love.
Don't Abandon the Outside Shot...
Using Love as a stretch 4 at times isn't a bad thing. Quite the opposite, actually.
We know that Love shot an ungodly number of three-pointers last season, at least compared to previous years. A whopping 41.2 percent of Love's total shots came from outside the arc, nearly doubling his Timberwolves career average.
If Love fired these long-range missiles with the accuracy of a Stephen Curry or Kyle Korver, no one would bat an eyelash. The truth is Love is an above-average marksman from deep, but he's far from an elite one.
His 36.7 percent accuracy rate ranked just 62nd among all NBA players, although his 392 total attempts came in 16th. That volume was enough to dwarf all other power forwards, including over 100 more than Dirk Nowitzki.
Obviously, the Cavs want Love to spread the floor. Far too often, however, plays would break down, and Love would find himself wandering out to the arc, hoping for a pass from James or Irving that rarely came. If one did, it often resulted in a rushed, contested percentage-killing miss.
This was especially evident during the early course of the season, when the Cavs tried to mesh 10 new bodies all at once. Coach David Blatt's offense was quickly abandoned in favor of a more freestyle system.
Love struggled to adjust to this new, unfamiliar role, hoping to get whatever shots were available.
As a result, he converted just 32.9 percent from deep over his first 50 games in Cleveland, well below his career mark of 36.3.
So why, then, should the Cavaliers continue to go to Love outside?
Besides the obvious driving lanes that he creates for players like James and Irving, Love quietly became much more comfortable shooting the three ball as he adjusted in Cleveland.
Over his last 25 games, Love upped his accuracy rate to 43.0 percent from deep. In four games against the Boston Celtics in the playoffs' opening round, Love came in at 42.9. The Cavaliers' record during these 29 contests? An impressive 24-5.
Cleveland doesn't need Love to chuck threes at a Curry-like pace, but rather he needs to use this skill sparingly as an additional weapon in offensive packages. An ideal rate would be closer to 33.3 percent of his total shot attempts, a drop from the 41.2 mark last season and closer to the 35.5 mark Love put up in 2013-14 when he averaged 26.1 points a game.
His ability to rebound while still scoring from the outside is one we've rarely seen in NBA history and should be carefully employed.
...But Work on Posting Up More
While Love certainly isn't opposed to the three ball, he's always preferred to initiate his offense inside.
"My entire life I've played the game from inside-out," Love told Chris Haynes of the Northeast Ohio Media Group last October. "So the more touches I can get inside to get myself going, the better. I'm not accustomed to starting out a game shooting a three, so it's just something that I see."
While Love is merely an above-average three-point shooter, he can be simply masterful inside.
Now down to a slim 230 pounds, Love has the combination of footwork and muscle that allows him to create positioning and scoring looks for himself on the block. He brings a soft touch and a variety of post moves that few others in the league can imitate.
To be quite honest, there's no excuse for not getting Love more touches in the paint.
Last season, Love scored 0.98 points per possession on post-up plays. This ranked second in the NBA among players with 200 attempts or more, besting even LaMarcus Aldridge (0.96), DeMarcus Cousins (0.87) and Anthony Davis (0.85).
Although he finished near the top in efficiency, Love ranked 23rd in post-up frequency at just 24.1 percent, well below his three-point volume.
While setting Love up involves slowing down the offense, the Cavaliers are suited to play in the half court just fine. They have plenty of shooters (Irving, Mo Williams, Mike Miller, James Jones) to surround Love, and playmaking won't be an issue with James, Irving, Williams and Matthew Dellavedova.
For Love to get these looks, Cleveland needs to go back to Blatt's original offensive plan, one that drew rave reviews from players.
The difference in Love's offensive game was clear throughout the season—when in Blatt's system and after it dissolved.
At the start of the year in November, Love was taking just 34.4 percent of his shots from deep. By April, he was up to 55.9.
The plan to get Love these touches was in place last October, as he told Haynes: "We've been putting in stuff like different pin-downs, cut-across and cross-screens to get me open in there. You'll see a lot more of that during the season. That's always how I played, and I know that coach wants me to play that way, as well."
For the Cavaliers to take their offense to the next level, they need to take advantage of Love's elite low-post game rather than being overreliant on his above-average three-point shooting.
Rotation, Minutes and Usage
The Cavaliers will have a deep and talented frontcourt this fall led by Love, Timofey Mozgov, Tristan Thompson, Anderson Varejao and Rakeem Christmas.
Love will certainly get his fill of court time and should come in around the same 33.8 minutes he averaged a season ago. He's by far the best offensive option among his peers and arguably the group's best rebounder.
Defensively, however, Love needs protection. He was terrible as a center last season, allowing opponents to post a player efficiency rating of 22.0, according to 82games.com. While at power forward, he was much more respectable, limiting other 4s to a 16.9 PER.
This means the Cavaliers need to keep either Mozgov or Thompson at center while Love is on the floor. While the idea of a small-ball lineup with Love serving as a stretch 5 brings up a plethora of offensive opportunities, it creates a bad defensive mismatch inside.
Even though Love, James and Irving are very good together, it would be wise of Blatt to space their breaks out as well.
For example, playing Love for the first seven to eight minutes of the opening quarter would allow him to establish a rhythm before substituting in Thompson to run with James and Irving. When the second quarter begins, Love could then re-enter the game as the team's primary offensive option, giving James an extended rest. Blatt could use Irving in between, given the 23-year-old's quality backups in Williams and Dellavedova.
There's no reason why the Cavs can't have two-thirds of their Big Three on the court at all times, sparing the offense any major hiccups.
Using Love more as a playmaker on the elbow would be wise as well. He led all power forwards with 4.4 assists in 2013-14 with the Timberwolves.
As Bleacher Report's Frank Cesare pointed out:
"The Cavs need to realize that Love is effective as a passer, and utilizing him that way lessens the burden of LeBron doing everything on offense.
Love isn't just a big man with range, he also has playmaker potential within him.
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For years, Minnesota barely missed out on the playoffs in a tough Western Conference with Love as the offensive centerpiece and little help around him. The Cavs can certainly use him more overall, especially when James and Irving are out of the game.
Love has to continue to work on demanding the ball in his spots, giving teammates no other choice but to feed him consistently.
Despite his drop in stats last season, Love remains one of the game's most unique and talented players.
The Cavaliers have Love's commitment for the next five seasons. Now, they'll have to work together to maximize each other's growth.
Greg Swartz has covered the Cleveland Cavaliers and NBA for Bleacher Report since 2010. Follow him on Twitter: @CavsGregBR
All stats come courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted.
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