Kevin Love’s injury amplifies the Cavaliers’ mess

Through all the fire and fury surrounding the last few weeks of TV’s greatest drama, the National Basketball Association, the Cleveland Cavaliers have remained the topic of discussion for all the wrong reasons.

The team hasn’t clicked on or off the court. They’ve held a share of the league’s worst defense nearly halfway through the season, had an unproductive — and publicly reported — player’s meeting, dealt with porous amounts of friendly fire pettiness, and now, after an embarrassing loss, will be without Kevin Love for up to two months.

If there’s ever been a time for LeBron James to envision fleeing to greener grass, the hellacious month of January 2018 has been it.

Cavaliers fans should be on edge.

Love broke the fifth metacarpal in his left (non-shooting) hand on Tuesday night. He removed himself from the game immediately in the first quarter, received an X-ray, and was transported by car back to Cleveland from Detroit after talking to his teammates at halftime, per ESPN’s Dave McMenamin.

ESPN’s Brian Windhorst reported that Love will miss 6-8 weeks with the injury, meaning he’ll safely return before the playoffs if all goes to plan. But this injury is still extremely ill-timed.

The pressure is ramped higher than ever for non-LeBron James pieces — namely the struggling Isaiah Thomas — to step up quickly. It’s been a messy month in Cleveland, and there’s much to clean up with little time and few resources.

Two games separate the Cavs from third to seventh place in the Eastern Conference, and it’s nearly February. That was a frightening realization before news of Love’s injury, and the idea of losing home-court advantage for the entirety of the playoffs is very real.

Love was averaging 18 points and nine rebounds on 40 percent three-point shooting. They’ll have to replace a lot of his minutes with Channing Frye — who’s been excellent in limited time — but has averaged just 12 minutes per game with a few healthy scratches. He’s also far from the defender Love is. Jae Crowder — who’s struggled — will assume a larger role as well if the Cavs opt to play smaller.

As solid as Frye’s been, he won’t average 18 points per game, and neither will Crowder. James has already been taxed with unimaginable responsibilities on his own.

That means Thomas — who is all of 11 games back from a major hip injury — will need to snap back to Celtics form quickly.

So far, Cleveland is 15.6 points per 100 possessions worse than average with him on the court, as he’s shooting just 39 percent from the field and 27 percent from three. (Last season he shot 46 percent from the field and 38 percent from deep.) It’s been a really slow start from him.

It’s a bit unfair and unrealistic to expect him to return to his All-Star self all of a sudden.

Even before Love’s injury, it was clear Cleveland needed new pieces. Now, they’ll have to be extra aggressive in fear of sliding down in the Eastern Conference’s playoff standings.

Cleveland has been rumored to be eyeing George Hill, we know DeAndre Jordan and Lou Williams are on the market, and Nikola Mirotic was nearly dealt on Tuesday morning. But with all of the team’s salary restrictions, and few assets, a deal is going to be hard to strike up. The Cavs may have to part with their coveted Nets pick to salvage the regular season.

It’s now more difficult than ever to move Tristan Thompson without a real center behind him in the depth chart — and any idea of a Love-centered blockbuster is all but completely off the table.

Still, something has to be done. If their flurry of losses with Love didn’t prove that, the one without him to a Tobias Harris-less, Avery Bradley-less, Boban Marjanovic-less and, most importantly, Blake Griffin-less Pistons team on Tuesday night had to.

Through all the well-warranted panic, it is important to remember that the Cavs still have probably the greatest player of all time in James. He’s weaseled his way out of hiccups and other difficult situations before (see the Cavs’ 2015 Finals competitiveness without Kyrie Irving or Love, his 2006 Finals run, or the 2016, 3-1 comeback.)

This might be LeBron’s most difficult task yet, though.