The Unknown Underdogs: Cleveland Cavaliers

The 2006-2007 Cleveland Cavaliers, led by LeBron James, were an underdog team. Despite having LeBron, they lacked a strong supporting cast. In the regular season, LeBron's impact was evident, as the team's success heavily relied on him. In the playoffs, they swept the Washington Wizards, beat the New Jersey Nets in six games, and defeated the Detroit Pistons in a thrilling series. However, they ultimately lost to the dominant San Antonio Spurs in the NBA championship. Despite the loss, LeBron's performance was remarkable, and he gave the city hope. The Unknown Underdogs. Episode 2. The 2006-2007 Cleveland Cavaliers. Basketball is a weird sport. Unlike all the other major US sports, those being baseball and football, the whole team doesn't need to be playing great in order to come out with a win on any given night. It is very possible for one player to will his team into a win, or in other words, there is never a guarantee that the better team will win the game. This makes basketball a goldmine for underdogs. We've seen players like Jeremy Lin go from a usual NBA bench player to Lin Sanity fame overnight, or UMBC shocking the world and becoming the first 16 seed to defeat a number one seed at the Men's March Madness Tournament. But after that, what else really is there? I mean, Jim Valvano's use of cougars is another story, but is Lin Sanity all that the NBA has to offer for underdogs? Nope. Much like most sports, some of the greatest stories are the ones that are seldom told. And there is one underdog story that the NBA holds that has been tragically forgotten from history, especially after they made a much more recent underdog run. This is the story of the 2006-2007 Cleveland Cavaliers. This is a different kind of underdog story than when I presented in Episode 1 of this series. Unlike Syracuse, this wasn't a team filled with great players and a season no one could have seen coming. This was a team of all right players who, when combined with one of the greatest basketball players of all time, were able to do something special. The player I am referring to is, of course, LeBron James, the greatest basketball player to ever put on a Cavs uniform and arguably the greatest basketball player ever. And I know what you're going to say. How could a team led by LeBron James be considered an underdog? Well, these Cavs weren't like the other teams that LeBron led to the finals. He didn't have a Dwayne Wade or a Kyrie Irving or even an Anthony Davis help take off some of the attention. Nope. This time he had Larry Hughes. I'm sure you haven't heard that name in a while. Larry Hughes was who the Cavs brought in to try and take some of the workload off of LeBron when he started making his rise in the NBA. Hughes was brought in to Cleveland on a five-year, $70 million deal in the summer of 2005, and he started doing his job right away, helping the Cavs in the first half of the 2006 season until a finger injury took him out for a good portion of the regular season. But he was able to return and help LeBron and the rest of the team to their first playoff berth since 1998 and their first playoff series win since 1993. After being eliminated in the second round, the Cavs were ready to come back the next season to make another deep run, especially after another year of development for LeBron and the relationship between him and Larry Hughes. Along with Larry Hughes, LeBron was brought in by players like Drew Gooden and Zodrunas Ilgauskas, who I will from now on be calling Z, and after drafting Boobie Gibson and Shannon Brown, all players who by themselves are not great by NBA standards, were all able to flourish when combined with someone like LeBron James. Before I go into the season and the playoffs, I want to explain one thing. The NBA in 2007 is very different from today's NBA. Instead of games being filled by high-flying dunks and three-point specialists, causing very high-scoring games, 2007 NBA games were slugfest, both great defense and low-scoring games. Games were won and lost in the post. Great players like Tim Duncan and Dirk Nowitzki were ruling the NBA. Even LeBron had been conforming to this. During the 2007 regular season, James averaged only four three-point attempts, as opposed to the eight in the 2021 season. This is all to say that the NBA has changed, and to not go into this story thinking it will be just like the NBA is today. With all that being said, let's get into the season. The 2007 Cleveland Cavaliers were geared up for another great season, and were hoping to make another deep playoff run, where this entire season was dependent on one person, LeBron James. If LeBron were to get injured during the season, or was not to progress as was expected, their season was over. Luckily for the Cavs, though, LeBron did not get injured, and he has, as expected, a great season for the Cavs. LeBron was, of course, the workhorse of the Cavs this entire season. The third-year player led his team in points per game, assists per game, defensive rebounds, along with minutes per game and total field goals for the Cavs. Much like Jeremy Lynn had been doing for the Knicks for about two weeks in 2012, LeBron had done for the course of an entire season. But just to reinforce the fact that this team was an underdog, they were rarely the better team. During the season, they usually had the best player on the court, but after LeBron, there was a huge drop-off in skill on this Cavs team. There is a stat in sports called War, or Wins Above Replacement, and it's usually regarded as one of the best statistics to show the impact a player has on his or her team. This stat answers one simple question. How many more wins did this team get because of this player, rather than just some regular replacement player? On this Cavs team, the player who had the second-highest War, behind LeBron of course, was Zee, who had a respectable War around four. The Cavs in 2007 went 50-32, meaning that without Zee, and in his replacement regular player, the Cavs would have went 46-36, taking them from the second seed in the East to the third seed. LeBron's War was 22 games. 22 games! That was the best in the entire NBA by two games, and for those of you doing the math, yes, that means the Cavs, without LeBron, would have gone 28-54, taking the Cavs from the 2 seed in the East to the 14 seed. This is why the Cavs were such huge underdogs. Without LeBron, this team went from championship contenders to one of the worst teams in the NBA. And for LeBron to be doing all of this and keeping up for an entire season is nothing short of unbelievable. I can understand if people still wouldn't view these Cavs as underdogs in the regular season. Now, single players can lead their teams to results like these, though we haven't seen anything like LeBron did. But once they were in the playoffs, it was a different story. Players can win games, but teams win championships. And this team is not made for a championship. As the two seed in the playoffs, they received home court advantage for the playoffs until at least the conference finals. They started their playoff campaign against the Washington Wizards, led by Gilbert Arenas and Antoine Jameson. But something was different for the Cavs now. They had gotten Larry Hughes back from injury just before the playoffs had started, and he was able to come back for the playoffs, a welcomed addition for the Cavs. And this was huge because teams couldn't expend every resource they had to stop LeBron. They also had to worry about Larry Hughes. And the Cavs made quick work of the Wizards in the four-game sweep. The Lizards were never able to overcome the defense of the Cavs during the series, and were only able to get over 100 points once in the entire series. Something unheard of in today's NBA. So this would lead to another series against the New Jersey Nets. The New Jersey Nets this season were led by Jason Kitt, who had another year of being one of the league's best passers. And along with Vince Carter and a surging Richard Jefferson, this Nets team would prove to be a challenge for the Cavs, taking them to six games and keeping them under 90 points for five of those six. But whatever you can do, LeBron will simply outdo it. The Nets never crossed the 100-point threshold, which the Cavs did once, and with the offensive power of LeBron, he was able to drag this team into another playoff series, this time against the Detroit Pistons. The Pistons this season were the kings of the East. They were the only team that were able to outdo LeBron's Cavs in the regular season and were the one seed in the East. They have been a powerhouse in the NBA for the past five seasons, winning the championship in 2004 and making the championship in 2005, only to lose in seven games to the San Antonio Spurs. The Cavs had also lost to the Pistons in six games the year prior, and as a big test for LeBron to prove himself against tough competition, he was determined to get payback. The series started out with a slugfest, with both games ending in a score of 79-76, both in the favor of the Pistons. This would take the Cavs back to the Q looking to stay in the series. LeBron led the Cavs in these next two games to victories, leading both teams in scoring and taking the series to a pivotal Game 5 in Detroit. Game 5 is an incredibly important game in a seven-game series in the NBA. The team that wins Game 5 goes on to win the series about 75% of the time. So both teams were looking to take this game. In front of a sold-out Palace of Auburn Hills, the greatest game of the series and perhaps the entire playoffs took place. The game ended 109-107, the only game where either team finished with over 100 points, and went to double overtime with the game tied 100-100. LeBron scored all nine points for the Cavs in that overtime period and led his team to yet another victory. And after a victory in Game 6 where LeBron had a near triple-double, the Cavs team was in the NBA championship. Do you remember when I said that players win games and teams win championships? Well, that had finally caught up to the Cavaliers. After defeating the Pistons, the Cavs matched up against the San Antonio Spurs, perhaps one of the greatest teams of all time. Led by the big fundamental Tim Duncan, these Spurs were heavy favorites in the series and showed exactly why, sweeping the Cavs in four games. There was little LeBron could do to stop the Spurs this series, but he had done his job. He gave the city, which hadn't seen a professional championship since 1964, a glimmer of hope that this basketball player could lead the team to the promised land. Even though it wouldn't happen for another nine years. Sometimes, right-under-dogs don't always win, but still make their presence known. These Cavs were an example of this. They might not have defeated the biggest opponent and conquered all odds, but they still made it incredibly far, especially for who their team was. Did this team have one of the greatest basketball players of all time on their team in just its third season? Yes, they did. But still, this team should not have been able to accomplish what it did, and they created an incredible underdog story. It's just a shame that it's covered up by another great underdog story, by the same team, led by the same player, just nine years later. But that's a story for another day. Thank you for listening, and I hope you tune in later.