If you’re an NBA League Pass kind of person (there is a 400-hour club for those who have watched more than 400 hours of League Pass this season), there’s a good chance you saw more than a handful of Cavaliers games.
There’s always reason to watch LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love try and gel with the Cleveland Cavaliers.
And if you’re an Australian fan, you probably watched a few Utah Jazz games to see Dante Exum and Joe Ingles play, along with a couple of Spurs games for Patty Mills and Aron Baynes later in the season, and definitely Andrew Bogut with Golden State.
Watching Matthew Dellavedova get serious minutes with the Cavaliers during junk-time or as first-change for Irving was always just a bonus.
And the thing is, if you’re honest, you probably didn’t see that much when you watched Dellavedova get more minutes that anyone expected.
‘Delly’ was and always has been respected for his hustle as a second-year guy.
In October, he was praised for his hilariously undersized defensive effort on Dirk Nowitzki:
You can see the same no-quarter-given approach from Delly then. But he wasn’t exactly setting the world on fire in terms of NBA’s tangibles points, rebounds, assists. Plenty of people didn’t see much in him.
The glorious thing about the Internet is that these things are always traceable.
There were plenty of articles (“David Blatt’s devotion to Matthew Dellavedova not paying off for Cleveland Cavaliers”), forum comments and tweets sent which basically said the same thing: what does David Blatt see in Matthew Dellavedova? Why is he getting so many minutes, even in junk time? Why don’t the Cavs have a third point guard? Who is that white guy?
Fans of his all said the same thing: great energy, works hard, shoots a three-ball well, good team man, Cavs aren’t paying too much, not prone to injury.
Yet most of those fans would also have said: he’s no All Star but he tries hard.
There was also an undercurrent suggesting Blatt sees himself in young Delly. Blatt consistently said he appreciated his approach and was always very safe in that belief. He never doubted.
The Playoffs and Finals have proven Blatt’s faith was right. The head coach took the time out after Game 3 to jokingly harass Cleveland NBA beat reporter Chris Haynes, where Blatt, in very good spirits referred to him, as an “asshole”.
That reporter, to his credit, apologised after the current Finals run for shunning Dellavedova in an earlier column.
There are few who can say they were Delly hipsters. He’s caught even his biggest fans by surprise. His efforts have been sublime.
Dellavedova needed an IV drip and a trip to hospital to recuperate after Game 3, and with Game 4 just a day away, his efforts may well need to be superhuman to continue at the pace he is showing.
Many were despondent after Kyrie went down in a cruel blow to the Cavaliers chances. But in the NBA Finals, anything can happen, especially when at least one team is playing like their lives depend on it.
The flicker of hope that was almost snuffed out when Kyrie went down and the Cavs were slaughtered in overtime of Game 1 is now a roaring flame.
Cavs playing as if their life is on the line G.S playing as if they have more #NBAFinals down the line #ThisIsNOW #competitionIsEverything
— Kobe Bryant (@kobebryant) June 10, 2015
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