FanPost

LeBron no longer has to play point guard and the results are great

Lebron James, for most of his career, hasn't played with a Point Guard in which you wanted handling the ball a lot. He had Eric Snow and Mo Williams, who worked mostly as an off ball shooter, in Cleveland before he left. Then, he had Mario Chalmers and Norris Cole in Miami, who were not only really young and inexperienced, but not exactly promising young point guards who you wanted to facilitate your offense in the playoffs. This made coming back to Cleveland to play with Kyrie Irving, one of the most promising young guards in the league, and an already established all-star and Team USA player, all the more inticing. So far, it's looking like making this decision is not only going to help Lebron in the long run, but it's helping him now as well. Let's take a closer look.

(Stats courtesy of basketball-reference.com)

Lebron's Usage is Down

In the 2009 NBA playoffs, in which the Cavaliers lost to the Orlando Magic in the Eastern Conference Finals (thanks steroids), Lebron James had a usage rate of 36.4%, with the next highest usage rate being Mo Williams all the way at 21.9%.

In the 2014 NBA playoffs, in which the Miami Heat lost to the San Antonio Spurs in the Finals (yay), Lebron had a usage rate of 31.6%, with Wade being the next highest at 27.4%.

So far in the 2016 playoffs, Lebron's actually 2nd on the team in usage (not counting Jordan McBae's 93% Usage in his 1 minute), trailing Kyrie's 29.2% usage to his 28.8%. That's the lowest USG rate lebron would have in any season, besides his rookie year. It's his second lowest playoff usage, with the 2011 playoffs in which they lost to the Mavericks (yay) being his lowest. In the playoffs last year, where Kyrie and Love were hurt, his usage rate was over 37%! That's a drastic drop from last year.

Lebron Doesn't Have to Facilitate (all the time)

Like I said before, Lebron hasn't played with a point guard who you wanted to put the ball in the hands of. Although Wade could absorb some of Lebron's usage, Lebron was still often forced into running the point in Miami. There weren't any years at Miami where Lebron had a player average 5 or more assists per game in the playoffs. There weren't any years at Miami where Lebron had 2 teammates with both over 4 or more assists per game in the playoffs. In the 2007 NBA playoffs, in which the Cavs got swept by the Spurs in the finals, the Cavs 2nd leading assist man in the playoffs was Larry Hughes with 2.4 a game (compared to Lebron's 8).

In the 2016 NBA Playoffs, despite Lebron still getting 7 APG, Kyrie has 5.1, and Delly has 4 per game (impressive, considering it's in 16 minutes). This has allowed Lebron to play a lot more off ball, and has allowed him to get a lot of his assists in ways other than setting up the offense and having to play with the ball in his hands most of the time. Delly and Kyrie both allow Lebron to operate as the roll man in the PnR, and when you place shooters around Lebron, good things happen.

This is all well and great, but is it actually helping that we're taking the ball out of Lebron's hands? It seems like you'd want the ball in your best players hands.

The Results are Fantastic

The Cavs are scoring 122.2 points per 100 possessions in the playoffs, an insane number that is 7.4 points per 100 better than an also ridiculously good Spurs offense. Lebron is playing some of his lowest minute totals he's played in the playoffs, while being able to rest more on offense due to having more players you can put the ball in the hands of to set up the offense. This is not only allowing him to save energy for the defensive end, but it's allowing him to save energy for later rounds.

Now, Lebron very well might have to kick his usage up in the Finals in order for the Cavs to win. What is good about this is that the point guards he has around him are allowing him to expense much less energy on the offensive end, and with Lebron only getting older, it's extremely important to make sure Lebron isn't exerting more energy than needed before the NBA Finals. It'll be much more palatable now for Lebron to play over 40 minutes in the Finals because of this. Lebron not having to play point guard all the time, or even most of the time, allows you to use the full arsenal that he is capable of deploying on offense, and so far, it looks incredible.

This is a Fan-Created Comment on FearTheSword.com. The opinion here is not necessarily shared by the editorial staff at FearTheSword

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