Oct 30, 2012; Cleveland, OH, USA; Cleveland Cavaliers point guard Kyrie Irvng (2), center Andrson Varejao (17) and shooting guard Dion aiters (3) celebrate in the fourth quarter against the Washington Wizards at Quicken Loans Arena. Mandatory Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports
CAVS AREN’T CHAMPIONSHIP READY
While the Cleveland Cavaliers current roster is probably already better than their 2007 NBA Finals roster, we actually don’t know how good they’ll be with LeBron James on it.
The 2007 NBA Finals Cavs & Next Year's Potential Roster with LeBron James pic.twitter.com/CJjsGqcELT
— Eric Rosenthal (@ericsports) July 9, 2014
If we go by this comparison below, I guess we can compare the Cavs’ and Heat’s rosters.
The question we have to ask is basically this: how many more better players would the Cavs have on their roster than the Heat’s roster? Based on ESPN’s roster projections, the answer is probably 1.
Kyrie Irving is probably better than both LeBron James and Chris Bosh at this point? I’m not sure if that’s a slam dunk, but we’ll say yes.
Andrew Wiggins isn’t better than Dwyane Wade at the moment, we don’t even know what the former is yet. We can’t disrespect Wade that much.
Tristan Thompson has a 14.96 PER; Josh McRoberts‘ is 13.82. Both will be better with LeBron on their teams, so it doesn’t really matter.
And Chris Bosh is easily better than Anderson Varejao. That’s 2-1 in favor of the Heat. In 3-4 years, sure, the Cavaliers roster is going to look extremely good if they all stay together and continue to develop. They may even be championship ready. However, to say that the Cavs have a better roster than the Heat right now is false. LeBron knows that he has an opportunity to win a Championship every year that he’s in Miami. That isn’t a given in Cleveland.
Is LeBron willing to waste his prime years on waiting for his teammates to develop?