The Cavaliers get a second chance to get their first win of the season in another relatively winnable game agains the Detroit Pistons tonight. The Cavs travel to the Palace at Auburn Hills to face off against the Pistons tonight at 7:30 PM EST.

Song Of The Day: Try It Again - The Hives

The Cavaliers' season opener was pretty unsuccessful, so here we go, let's try it again.

Tonight's Overview:

Cleveland Cavaliers (0-1) at Detroit Pistons (0-1)

Tonight's game features two teams looking for that first win of the season. Both teams lost their season openers and need to get that all important first W. The Cavs and Pistons are quite familiar now, having played their two preseason games against one another. In those preseason games, the two teams split the series with the road team winning each game.

I wasn't able to catch much of the Pistons' first game against the Pacers, but the box score and people who did watch it tell me that they got thoroughly dominated. The Pacers are likely a much better team than the Raptors, but Detroit played pretty terribly in their season debut. As bad as Kyrie Irving may have been on Monday night, Pistons rookie, Brandon Knight, had an even rougher debut. Knight scored 9 points in 17 minutes, but shot 3 of 9 from the field and committed 4 turnovers. It is clear that both of these first round draft picks are much better than they showed in their NBA debuts, so we'll be looking to see how they make a second impression, as their first impressions were kind of weak.

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The Cavaliers made a relatively surprising move on Thursday afternoon by announcing that Manny Harris has been waived and Mychel Thompson will be the 15th man on the roster.

Mychel Thompson and Manny Harris were competing for the last spot as backup SG on the Cavaliers roster throughout the abbreviated preseason. Unfortunately for Harris, he suffered a foot injury and has been unable to participate in training camp and preseason games. From what I hear, he is still a few weeks away from being able to play. I really liked the potential that Manny showed last season and think he deserved a shot. I guess the Cavaliers front office disagreed.

The Cavs roster currently sits at the designated 15 players and will remain that way unless there are further roster transactions. Hopefully we'll get a statement from Byron Scott and Chris Grant to better explain why they chose to go with Thompson over Harris.

Editor Note: I posted this a little while ago and have now given it more thought. I don't like this move at all. Mychel Thompson showed me very little in the preseason games. Granted, I am not at training camp practices to see him, but from what I saw, it was pretty "meh". Manny Harris showed that he could be pretty useful for an NBA team. Don't like this move at all.

The two preseason games are now behind us and we can start to really look forward to the real thing. The Cavaliers open their regular season on December 26th against the Toronto Raptors and various marquee games are scheduled for Christmas Day. In case you're wondering, here are the FearTheSword staff predictions for this upcoming NBA season.

Conrad

Eastern Conference Champion: Chicago Bulls

Western Conference Champion: Oklahoma City Thunder

NBA Champion: Oklahoma City Thunder

Most Valuable Player: Blake Griffin

Defensive Player Of The Year: Dwight Howard

Rookie Of The Year: Kyrie Irving

6th Man Of The Year: James Harden

Cavaliers Overall Record: 16-50

John

Eastern Conference Champion: Miami Heat

Western Conference Champion: Oklahoma City Thunder

NBA Champion: Miami Heat

Most Valuable Player: Kevin Durant

Defensive Player Of The Year: Dwight Howard

Rookie Of The Year: Kyrie Irving

6th Man Of The Year: James Harden

Cavaliers Overall Record: 23-43

(More after the jump)

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All early indications are that Anthony Parker is going to be the Cavaliers starting SG and I endorse that right now. He's a nice veteran presence to have out there along with either Ramon Sessions, who is one of the league's best kept secrets, or young Kyrie Irving.

Parker's role with the Cavaliers is pretty similar actually to Antwan Jamison's. They are in the lineup because they can space the floor and shoot the basketball. Neither can create much offense or has anything that could be considered as an elite skill other than maybe standing and shooting. Just don't throw them the ball at the end of the shot clock like the Cavs used to always do with Mo Williams and tell them to try and get you a basket.

Some candidates to be the primary backup to Parker are Daniel Gibson, Alonzo Gee and Manny Harris. Sure, Ramon Sessions and Christian Eyenga will certainly see time at the SG position this year but I don't consider it their primary spot at this time.

Let's take a look at Gibson, Gee and Harris to see who should be given the first chance to play behind Parker after the jump.

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Baron Davis, who was recently waived by the Cleveland Cavaliers, has reportedly agreed to sign with the New York Knicks. The Knicks are relatively desperate at the point guard position and are apparently willing to sign the veteran guard who has been diagnosed with a bulging disk in his back. The original time table suggested that Davis would be out for 8 to 10 weeks, but that could change.

The Knicks used their own amnesty clause on veteran guard, Chauncey Billups. As far as I know, the Cavaliers will still be responsible for the remainder of Baron Davis' contract, but it will not count against their salary cap. As I said when Davis was cut, I wish him nothing but the best. He was a class act during his time in Cleveland and it would be great to see him get healthy and play for a playoff team this year. The Knicks signed Davis to a one year, $2.5 million contract.

The Wine and Gold scrimmage takes place at Quicken Loans Arena today. It's open and free to the public, so if you're in the area, head on down to the Q to get an up close look at the Cavs before they official tip-off on December 26th. I'm not sure if it will be streaming online anywhere, but if I find out, I'll let you guys know. It doesn't mean anything, obviously, but it's still interesting for hoops addicts like ourselves.

Head out to the Q at 1 PM and check out Kyrie Irving, Tristan Thompson, and the rest of the young Cavaliers.

If we do find an online feed of the scrimmage, we'll be discussing the action here.

Baron Davis is a Cleveland Cavalier no longer. According to multiple reports out of the Cavaliers' training camp, the team decided to use the amnesty clause to release the 32 year old guard on Wednesday evening. This means that Davis' contract does not count against the Cavaliers' salary cap. He was previously under contract for the next two seasons and owed roughly $14 million for each of those years.

"We want to thank Baron for his professionalism. This move gives us additional flexibility this year and next year." -Chris Grant

If you have been following this blog since the lockout ended, you know that I would have preferred for them to hold on to Baron Davis. He provides veteran leadership and has been nothing but professional since joining the Cavs. Although his contract does not count against the salary cap, the Cavs are still obligated to pay him for the next two seasons. Davis had not yet practiced with the team in training camp as he was seeking a second opinion on a nagging back injury. The doctors diagnosed the pain as a bulging disk and it was reported that he would be out indefinitely. This development was undoubtedly something that factored into the Cavaliers' decision to waive him.

By waiving Davis the Cavaliers are now roughly $8 million under the salary cap and would have about $20 million in cap space next summer. This certainly gives the front office some more flexibility to pursue other trades and free agents.

In my opinion, this speaks volumes about what the management thinks of rookie, Kyrie Irving. He will likely get much more playing time than he would have if Baron Davis remained on the team. It also makes a Ramon Sessions trade rather unlikely as he is the only other point guard on the roster.

In his brief stint in Cleveland, Baron Davis quickly became one of my favorite players. He gave 100% each and every night. He was instrumental in beating Miami on March 29th and for that, I am forever grateful.

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We all know the 2010-2011 Cleveland Cavaliers were a very bad basketball team. In Byron Scott's first season with the franchise they finished with the second worst record in the league at 19-63.

While the team was on its way to such a poor record they also proved to be equally as bad on both ends of the court. The Cavs finished the season ranked 29th on both offense and defense based on their points scored and allowed per 100 possessions. They ended up scoring 102.2 points (ahead of only Milwaukee) per 100 possessions and surrendered 111.8 (ahead of only Toronto).

In doing more deep research on the team, I found the something that they actually did well was get to the free throw line and keep their opponents off the stripe. Today, we'll take a look at the offensive end of that.

In some important offensive statistical categories, the team finished 25th in offensive rebound %, 15th in turnover %, and a lowly 28th in effective Field Goal percentage. For those of you who are new to those statistics, ORB% is the percentage of your own misses that your team grabs, TO% is the percentage of your possessions which end in turnovers and eFG% is a percentage that adjusts to show that a 3-pt FG is worth more than a 2-pt one.

But, the Cavaliers did finish above the league average in something! They ended up 11th in FT/FGA at .233 when the league average was .229.

Let's take a look at the players who got decent court time and see how they contributed to the team finishing so high in this category. (After the jump)

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