Cavs defeat Mavs 103-97 to avoid winless preseason

NBA general managers seem to have plenty of faith in LeBron James and the Cavs, but not so much in the defending champions this season, according to the 13th annual NBA.com GM Survey. November? Not such a big deal.

Cleveland has gone 0-6 during the preseason while dealing with several injuries.

Kevin Love had six points and four rebounds in his first game since a season-ending shoulder injury in the opening round of last season’s playoffs, but the Cleveland Cavaliers remained winless in the preseason with an 87-81 loss to the Toronto Raptors on Sunday night.

He rejoined the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2014 after a stint at Miami Heat, who he signed for in 2010.

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg for the Cavaliers.

LeBron James made the trip north of the border, but sat out, as expected, alongside fellow all-star Kyrie Irving (out until at least December after injuring his knee in Game 1 of the Finals) and Iman Shumpert (also out for months). Even if Durant returns close to his 2013-14 MVP level, though, he’s five years older than Davis and may have already peaked. Timofey Mozgov had 11 rebounds. Klay Thompson issued the Warriors’ response to that one, saying he “wanted to play the Clippers a year ago, but they couldn’t handle their business”.

It’s not that coaches want to shorten the preseason itself.

And if they are healthy? He has since been sidelined and from the looks of it, Love is ready for the coming National Basketball Association wars.

“I would say he will absolutely be ready for the season opener”, Cleveland Cavaliers’ head coach David Blatt said of Cavs’ matchup against the Bulls in Chicago on October 27th.

“It will really give us a lift I think, suddenly getting a good part of the team back”.

After all, it’s not like the Cavaliers are a team in search of an identity.

“We know how important he is for this team”, Varejao said. “He got shots and we know those are shots he’s going to knock down”.

The Raptors play the Washington Wizards on Friday in Montreal to cap their pre-season. It’s hard in the preseason when you’re playing and traveling like you do during the regular season. My game notes included “Dionte Christmas checks in for Joe Harris, who has five fouls” and “Quinn Cook breaks a 66-66 tie in the fourth quarter with a three” so just to be clear this was an exhibition game. “You can see it on his body, you can see it on the way he moves”. “When we won the championship in Dallas [in 2011 when he was an assistant], our training camp was average”.

Obama then turned toward James, who wore a blue T-shirt with “We Are Family” – one of his foundation’s slogans – on the front and reminded the kids that he was once one of them.

“[And] I’ve had great training camps and sucked once the regular season starts”.