CLEVELAND, Ohio — The Cavs have been saying all the right things about being a defense-first team, but their actions on the court tell a completely different story.
In the latest episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast, cleveland.com Cavs beat reporter Chris Fedor delivered a blunt assessment of the team’s fundamental problem after their 114-110 loss to Detroit.
“I just think there’s an organizational identity crisis. I do,” Fedor declared on the podcast. “I think the Cavs want to be a certain kind of team, and I don’t think they have the personnel to do that.”
The podcast conversation zeroed in on the stark contrast between what the Cavaliers say they want to be versus what they actually are. The irony? They’re trying to emulate the very team that just beat them.
“The Cavs say defense first, defense first, create turnovers, get out in transition. That’s who Detroit is. That’s what they do. That’s how they’ve gotten to this point where they’re the number one team in the Eastern Conference,” Fedor explained, highlighting how the Pistons have successfully executed the exact identity that Cleveland claims to embrace.
What makes this identity crisis so problematic is that the Cavaliers simply don’t have the right pieces to play the style they’re attempting to adopt. Detroit can be Detroit because they have the personnel — physical, bullying players who can make games tough and gritty. Cleveland, despite their aspirations, doesn’t have that same makeup.
“They don’t have bullies, because they don’t have these burly, physical dudes on the inside, because their interior players have a different makeup,” Fedor pointed out during the podcast discussion.
This disconnect between aspiration and reality is reflected in the numbers.
For a team that preaches defense as its cornerstone, being 12th in the league defensively simply isn’t good enough.
As Fedor bluntly assessed: “If you say that defense is your identity and you’re 12th in defense, what does that get you? Are you competing for titles like that? Are you competing for Eastern Conference crowns like that? It’s just hard for me to see that.”
The podcast hosts also discussed how this identity crisis extends beyond just personnel issues. It’s about consistency and commitment to that identity — something the Pistons demonstrated by holding the Cavs to just 28 points in the third quarter, while the Cavs allowed Detroit to explode for 47 points in the second quarter.
Wine and Gold Talk podcast host Ethan Sands added context to this identity discussion, noting that “an identity is something that you’re supposed to be able to go to even when you don’t have necessarily the players you want on the floor. It’s an identity of the team.”
The most concerning aspect of this identity crisis is that it’s happening with the Cavs sitting eighth in the Eastern Conference standings — far from where a championship contender should be positioned.
As the podcast makes clear, something has to give.
Either the Cavaliers need to fully commit to becoming the defensive team they claim to be, or they need to pivot and establish a different identity that better suits their roster construction.
Want to hear the full breakdown of the Cavs’ identity struggles and what it means for their championship aspirations? Listen to the complete episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast for more insights from Chris Fedor and Ethan Sands on Cleveland’s pressing need to figure out who they really are.
Here’s the podcast for this week: