The Cavaliers are entering a different kind of season, and that’s the point.
This group has talent. It has experience.
It has players who know how to win. But it does not have the one thing every great Cavaliers run in the LeBron James era had at its center: LeBron James.
And that changes the whole math of how Cleveland has to survive the regular season.
Chris Fedor, cleveland.com’s Cavs beat reporter who is now in his 13th year covering the team, has spent the offseason circling that same reality. On the Wine and Gold Talk podcast, he put it bluntly.
“I think it’s a chance,” Fedor said. “That’s what it comes down to for me is that this franchise has never made the NBA Finals without LeBron, ever.”
That history matters because it shaped the way Cleveland used to operate. James-led teams could afford to drift through stretches of the regular season, knowing they had a late-game rescue plan built into the roster.
October and November didn’t have to look perfect. The switch could still get flipped later.
This version of the Cavs doesn’t get that luxury.
“I just don’t want to feel like I’m watching a team throughout the course of the regular season, Ethan, that that is coasting and feels like it can flip this proverbial switch because they’re not that team,” Fedor said. “Because they haven’t accomplished anything, because they haven’t proven it to that level.
They don’t have LeBron James. They haven’t been to the NBA Finals four straight years like LeBron did in Cleveland his second time around.”
That’s the edge of the conversation now. Cleveland can’t rely on pedigree to carry it into April. It has to build the habits that make April matter.
And the personalities in the room only add another wrinkle. Donovan Mitchell brings urgency, professionalism, and a deep desire to win, but his natural instinct is optimism.
Evan Mobley is known for being laid-back. Jarrett Allen has his own distinct personality.
None of that automatically creates the kind of sharp-edged mentality that keeps a team on high alert every night.
The departures of Max Strus and Dennis Schröder matter here too. Both were among the more abrasive, hard-nosed voices in the locker room, and that kind of presence doesn’t just disappear without a trace.
There’s also the broader NBA environment, which leaves even less room for sleepwalking through the schedule. With tanking less of a factor, the league has fewer soft spots than it used to. Fedor pointed out that Milwaukee may be the one team that remains tough to judge, but otherwise the East doesn’t offer much in the way of easy nights.
That’s why the questions for Cleveland start now, not later. Are they fighting through screens?
Are they guarding 94 feet? Are they bringing a real level of competition every night, even when the calendar says the game doesn’t matter yet?
“Are they building the right kind of championship habits throughout the course of the regular season?” he asked.
That’s the issue for this Cavs team. Not whether they can summon something in April. Whether they’re doing enough now to make April possible in the first place.
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The generational gap around him keeps getting harder to ignore. A number of notable players already in the NBA, or on the rise toward it, were not even born when James made his debut in 2003, which is the kind of detail that turns an otherwise routine season-opening note into something much bigger. And with James still adding to that ledger, the question is less about whether he has outlasted his peers than how much longer this unusual run can keep stretching the leagues timeline. [Read more 🡒]