Nick Wright reacts to Kevin Durant and the Warriors’ 99-92 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers

– For the Cavs to beat the Warriors LeBron has to be great. And yesterday not only was LeBron not great, that was the worst game Lebron’s played all year. If you care about game score– that’s a basketball reference metric– it was his worst of the season by far.

A more traditional metric field goal percentage was the second worst. He had seven turnovers and all LeBron turnovers are not created equal. Sometimes he has high turnover games because he’s trying to thread perfect passes to get guys open shots. Yesterday he was jumping without a plan. He dribbled the ball off his leg once.

LeBron played poorly. The Warriors had an extraordinary defensive game plan against LeBron particularly because they knew the Cavs didn’t have another shot creater out there. Kyrie gone. Isaiah Thomas not playing yet.

And their plan was pack the paint, make LeBron hit outside shots. And LeBron yesterday didn’t shoot free throws well. Didn’t shoot threes well. Didn’t shoot his jumper well. For all those reasons, I’m not surprised the Warriors won.

The only thing I’m surprised about is that it was tied 92 apiece with two minutes left. That speaks to how good Kevin Love was, and aside from Kevin Durant, how mediocre the rest of the Warriors were offensively yesterday. Because the Cavs actually had a chance for the first time in four years to beat the Warriors when LeBron wasn’t excellent.