Cleveland Cavaliers point guard Isaiah Thomas has heard all those criticisms about the team’s defense since he’s returned — and he’s tired of it.
On Saturday, Thomas launched into his own defense, pointing out that the Cavaliers have been poor defensively all season and that the team is united as one to improve.
“We’ve been a lowest five [rated] defensive team in the NBA the whole time [this season],” Thomas said Saturday, via Dave McMenamin of ESPN. “So when I come back, it’s my fault now. Which, life isn’t fair, but that’s not fair, bro. At all. I just laugh at those things because I know in this circle and this team, everybody believes in each other, and everybody’s in here for it to work and for us to be playing in June. That’s the ultimate goal.”
Thomas also shot back at a reporter who asked whether anyone in the organization had spoken to him about his shot selection, as the guard is shooting 35.7 percent in his last seven games.
“If they’re worried about my shot selection, they must not have seen me play the last few years,” Thomas said. “That’s all I can say about that. If somebody’s worried about that, what did you trade me here for? To not shoot? To not find my rhythm? To not be Isaiah Thomas? I can’t be anybody else. So whoever’s saying that, I don’t know what I’m here for if I’m not here to score the ball and make plays after being off seven months.”
Thomas also strongly disputed reports that he had been the primary party in the aggressive questioning of Kevin Love over his absence against Oklahoma City last week.
“To be real, I didn’t call him out,” Thomas said. “I asked him why wasn’t he at the game during the game supporting his teammates. And then after the game, I didn’t [get to] ask him because he wasn’t there. So I was seeing where he was. So I didn’t call him out any. So those reports that whoever is saying that, there’s no bad blood between me and him. We go back to fifth and sixth grade [as AAU teammates]. I asked him a question where he was and it was never clarified. And that’s all it was.
“Whoever reported that it was, and we was bashing Kevin Love, there was nothing to bash him about. We just wanted to know where he was and why he didn’t play.”
The Cavaliers are just 4-7 since Thomas made his Cleveland debut. The questions are only going to be natural after a stretch like that.
