Cavs Roll Out Video Game Lineup with Harden and Mitchell
Lineup alert: Cavs will start Harden, Mitchell, Watson, Mobley, Allen on Thursday.
The are officially rolling out a starting five of Harden, , Peyton Watson, , and Jarrett Allen this Thursday against the .
This is the exact kind of lineup that sounds like a late-night video game simulation where the salary cap is turned off and the user just starts mashing the trade override button.
Seeing Harden and share a backcourt is going to be a fascinating social experiment in usage rates. Mitchell is already coming off a stretch where he posted career highs with 6.1 assists and 5.1 rebounds, proving he needs the ball to dictate the offense.
Now you add Harden, a guy whose entire 17-year career is built on dominating possession, into the mix. Figuring out the prop markets for these two is going to require a whiteboard, an abacus, and a deep understanding of body language.
The frontcourt is where this gets terrifying for the rest of the . is bringing his 18.6 points and 9.3 boards per game to the table, while Allen remains a walking double-double waiting at the rim.
Slotting Watson in at small forward gives them a glue guy who quietly boasts a 56 percent effective field goal rate. He does not need to demand touches, which is a minor miracle given the backcourt pairing.
The real test comes Thursday night in . If this group figures out how to share the basketball, the Cavaliers are going to be an absolute nightmare to defend.