Joe was solid for us but when you think about what he actually did he only gave us 8 and 5 thats decent but not irreplaceable. Given what we saw in summer league I dont think  7 and 5  is too much of a stretch Is it? I know someone will mention veteran experience or leadership or whatever and thats a worthy point but JJ also gives us athleticism that joe couldn't. He doesn't have to be as good as Joe he just has to be better than Andy which isn't hard.

Strength and athleticism is fine and dandy but it does you no good if you're sitting on the bench.

 

JJ's going to have to defend and he's going to have to do it without getting into foul trouble.  That was Dwayne Jones' problem getting minutes.

Yeah, I remember some games where Dwayne would check in and in a matter of 2 minutes he already racked up 2-3 fouls.

The Cavs already have more invested and more confidence in J.J. than they ever had in Dwayne IMO. I anticipate J.J. to play a lot, and his defense will improve over time. Offensively once he works out a few kinks, I think he'll be just what the doctor ordered for our team.

What we will miss most are Joe's jump shots. He had such a pretty jumper and it fell most of the time. But to finally have a post player that has slick looking moves downlow is a good tradeoff. Not to mention the 16 year age difference! With Z and Ben being the starters, we definately need some youth of front. I expect to see a lot of J.J.

Yeah against the celtics in some games Joe's jump shot was ridiculous around 70%.  Even if it is just a few points, such a clutch performance is hard to replace.

See I disagree.  JJ will get enough playing time to match Joe's numbers because Joe never got that much playing time.  One year later he would probably get less, so JJ will have no trouble matching the minutes Joe would have gotten.  I think JJ will look to take more shots than Joe, but will shoot at a lower percentage, so they'd have about the same ppg.

JJ will not replace Joe for at least the next two seasons.  Partly because JJ will not get enough playing time to match Joes numbers or the fact Joes been in the game for over 10 seasons and knows how to win in the NBA.  We will miss Joe Smith a lot more than anyone realizes right now.