He arrives on time at a high-end steakhouse in downtown
Cleveland wearing a Nike sweatsuit, disrupts his meal to mingle and take photos
with fellow patrons, and when asked if he wants to finish off two appetizers,
he gladly offers his guest to eat both.
So what could be so dangerous about Australian Matthew
Dellavedova, who has quickly built a reputation in some NBA circles for being
too aggressive? Delly, a key energy and defensive catalyst for the Cavaliers,
downplays that notion over dinner on Sunday.
"When [the Al Horford incident] first happened, I was
pretty annoyed by people calling me dirty because I think it's a pretty serious
thing to say that about somebody in the sporting world," he tells Bleacher
Report over calamari, crab cakes and his order of the New Zealand lamb rack at
XO Prime Steaks. "Because no one was talking about the [Kyle] Korver loose
ball until the Horford thing happened. That's why I was kind of a bit perplexed
by that, and then I just pretty much turned off my phone and didn't really
watch TV."
Dellavedova's 19-point performance in the Cavaliers'
close-out win in Game 6 in the conference semifinals and his physical hustle
plays against the Bulls and Hawks have made him a cult hero in Cleveland.
But when you dig deeper into his life in Cleveland, you
discover that his competitive nature growing up in country Victoria in
Australia started with simple board games, which ignited an approach to take
calculated steps on the court to win at all costs.
Monopoly. Trouble. Uno. These are the games a young
Dellavedova and his parents, Mark and Leanne, and two little sisters, Yana and
Ingrid, played at home. These days at his downtown Cleveland apartment, he's
into backgammon, Bananagrams and Sequence. He plays them regularly with his girlfriend,
Anna, a former volleyball player he met at Saint Mary's College of California;
his closest friend on the Cavaliers, Joe Harris; and family and friends from
Australia when they visit.
"My mom and dad are very competitive people, whether
it's sport, which they both played, or board games," said Dellavedova,
who's a sixth-generation Italian. "I've just always had that feeling that
I needed to win at everything that I've done. I've managed to try to scale it
back a little bit when it comes to Monopoly and different board games, so it
didn't become a problem. I would get too competitive over things that don't
really matter. It's funny because Anna is competitive like me."
Dellavedova unleashed that competitiveness in multiple
sports: Australian rules football, basketball, field hockey, soccer and tennis.
While he played football at the junior level—his second most serious sport at
the time besides basketball, which he started playing at four years old—he
learned two aggressive techniques that helped him on the court: one, to corral
offensive players to the sideline, keeping them away from the attacking middle
of the field; and two, to create a double action out of a loose ball.
"In Australian football, there's a way you dive on a
ball so you can get it to your teammate as quick as possible," he said.
"We'll use the Korver example. I dove on the ball, and I quickly tried to
grab the ball and then quickly sit up and try to find a teammate. If you just
dive straight for the ball, what are you going to do on your belly with the
ball? It's going to end up either a jump ball, or you burn a timeout."
When Dellavedova arrived at the prestigious Australian
Institute of Sport (AIS) training institution in 2007 in Canberra—where fellow
NBA Aussies Aron Baynes, Andrew Bogut, Dante Exum, Luc Longley and Patty Mills
attended—he was locked in on obtaining that "1 percent edge," his
former AIS coach Paul Goriss said.
That included seeking out Debbie Savage, a former Australian
standout runner who works at AIS teaching the Pose Method of running, which is
a style of falling forward through a gravitational torque while pulling the
support foot rapidly from the ground using the hamstring muscles.
Like Savage, Dellavedova had issues with his feet and shins
from running too heavily. "It always looked like he was running in
mud," Goriss said. About four days per week at AIS before his basketball
practices, he would work with Savage for about 45 minutes on running, moving
laterally and changing directions.
"The technique really did help me become lighter on my
feet and helped me become quicker," he said.
In addition, Dellavedova kept a daily diary at AIS, charting
things like his shots and training sessions. He would mark down what he needed
to improve each day and then his strengths and weaknesses after every practice.
"It was an amazing opportunity to go to AIS," he
said. "It definitely helped me become the player and the person I am
today. ... I'm sure a lot of the Australians in the NBA, Europe and the
Australian league would trace a lot of their success back to the Institute of
Sport because it has just been a great base to learn from."
The 6'4" Dellavedova says he can dunk, but athleticism
has never been his thing. He made his mark in what has become his NBA
specialty: scrappiness.
"He's a street fighter," said 76ers coach Brett
Brown, who previously led the Australian men's national team. "Delly would
make us run out of canisters of ink charting the effort chart we do [for our
players in Philly]. He just epitomizes that Australian spirit. They just fight,
man. They just have an incredible way about them as a people, and he's a hell
of a story."
The first time Dellavedova knew defense had to be his staple
came after Brown picked him for the U19 team in 2009. That summer Australia had
a game against New Zealand, featuring then-28-year-old Kirk Penney, who had a
brief stint in the NBA. And Dellavedova, 10 years younger, was on the bottom of
his team's 12-man roster.
"I ended up guarding Penney off a lot of screens and
getting beaten up," Dellavedova said. "The international game is a
lot more physical, especially the Australia-New Zealand rivalry games. That's
how it started off with the national team in Australia, and then my role kind
of grew from there. Having that defensive presence helped give me time to work
on other parts of my game to eventually take on a bigger role with the national
team."
His knack for defense also convinced him he could play in
the NBA.
"I was playing on the national team, and we had a game
versus France [in 2011], and I got assigned to Tony Parker," he said.
"I just felt like I defended him well, and I was like, I feel like I can
definitely hold my own at that NBA level."
At Saint Mary's for four years, he blossomed beyond defense,
becoming the school's all-time leader in career points. In coach Randy
Bennett's system, Dellavedova mastered the middle pick-and-roll and developed a
unique floater game, both with lob passes and finishes in the paint. However,
entering the 2013 draft, his former coaches say there were questions about the
confidence, consistency and range with his shot—now positives playing more off
the ball alongside LeBron James and Kyrie Irving.
But at the time, those factors led to him going undrafted
and starting the process of scrapping from the bottom again—first in the 2013
Vegas Summer League with the Cavaliers. Then it was later during the season in
practices, going up against Irving, who was born in Melbourne.
"When he first came, it was almost a fistfight every
day in practice, every single day," Irving said after a pre-Finals
practice in Cleveland. "It wasn't that he was trying to be dirty or
intentional or anything like that. It's just the way he is. It's just his
nature. It's that Australian blood that he has in him that's running deep, and
it's just deep-rooted.
"They just are nonstop. They're going to keep coming at
you and whatever they have they're going to throw at you. So I just truly
appreciate having a competitor like that. I love him."
Dellavedova added, "It would get very physical at times
because I was trying to defend him as well as I could, and we both just wanted
to win the drill. He's a really tough cover. It does make it a little bit
easier to try to guard other people in games."
In the Eastern Conference Finals, Dellavedova's 3.97 average
foot distance from his defender was the best mark for a non-center with a
minimum of 50 shots defended, according to Pro Basketball Talk's Kurt Helin and
NBASavant.com. And his defensive rating went from 103.9 in the regular season
to 95.0 in the playoffs, according to NBA.com. Taking a page from his
Australian rules football days, he typically sticks to his man full court and
constantly shows his hands—unless an opponent drives, and then he'll guard them
with his chest so he can avoid a foul.
"He's a guy that's possession by possession,"
Goriss said. "Whatever he has to do in that possession, he will. To me,
that's not dirty; that's just a competitor."
Dellavedova's liking for close-up contact has led to a total
of seven stitches on his forehead over the years and getting cut a few times
underneath his chin, resulting in a few more stitches.
"That's why I have a beard, because it's a bit of
protection," he said, smiling.
Before the Hawks series, Cavaliers Player Development Coach
Mike Gerrity uploaded plays of Dellavedova's specific opponents onto his iPad.
Delly said that helped a lot, as he noticed that point guard Jeff Teague liked
to reject a lot of screens and drive the other way.
"I thought I did a pretty good job of not letting him
do that and try to make sure he was always using the screen," Dellavedova
said. "That's something that you pick up on the tape."
NBA scouts have noticed.
"He plays every minute like it's his last," a
Western Conference scout said. "He's gritty and rugged, and he's very
intelligent. I really think he has more of a psychological effect for the Cavs
more than anything right now. He's gone from a guy that probably shouldn't have
been on the floor early in the season to one of their key players. There's
nothing exceptional about his game, but he plays with high energy and makes
open shots. That's what most coaches want from their role players."
An East scout added, "I think of that old saying 'true
grit' regarding Dellavedova. He's been a bit of a lightning rod for
controversy, but, hey, John Stockton wasn't known as being the nicest guy on
the court either. ... Delly fights over the top of screens, sticks his nose in
and gets rebounds and 50/50 balls—winning plays."
So what's the game plan against Curry and Co.?
"Obviously he's the big key for Golden State,"
said Dellavedova, who has film to watch of the current MVP, as well as Leandro
Barbosa, Shaun Livingston and Klay Thompson, "so we have to try to limit
his shot attempts and his touches because he creates so much offense through
shooting, passing and penetration. He's going to hit tough shots on people, but
as long as you can get a contest, that's all you can do. Another big thing with
Curry and Thompson is limiting their threes off offensive rebounds."
It hasn't hit Dellavedova yet that he's in the
Finals—"It just feels like another series against another good team,"
he said—but he'll soon feel the buzz from his family, flying in from Australia,
and local friends who will be in attendance. Saint Mary's is only 20 miles from
the Oracle Arena.
"He's been great for us, and I know he's happy to be
back here, too, playing college ball here," James told reporters on
Wednesday. "I love Delly, what he brings to our team—just toughness and
grit, determination. He just tries to beat all the odds."
In Australia, the excitement for the Finals is just getting
started.
At the popular Kickz101 sneaker store in Melbourne, the
hottest NBA jersey off of the rack is Stephen Curry's. James' and Irving's are
also hot sellers. One jersey that owner Matt Hammond wishes he had to sell was
Dellavedova's, but some local fans have asked for custom orders.
"There's a lot of hype down here for the NBA at the
moment, especially after [Dellavedova's] Game 6 against the Bulls, and now
meeting Bogut in the Finals," said Hammond, who will be airing the games
at the store. "There's only a few people here who believe the bulls--t
that Delly plays dirty, but they're just Bulls, Hawks and Warriors fans."
This past season, a record eight Australians played in the
NBA, with six this postseason. And this is the first time that Australians will
face off against each other in the Finals, according to the NBA. In fact, Bogut
and Dellavedova have attracted two of the country's largest channels, seven and
nine, as well as Fox Sports Australia, to cover the Finals in the states.
Back in Cleveland, how big has Dellavedova gotten lately? On
Monday night, maybe as many as 1,000 people came out to Summit Mall in suburban
Akron to meet him.
While he won't be taking over for James in his own hometown,
Dellavedova does share a similar do-it-all mentality, which could be the
biggest X-factor for the Cavaliers in the Finals, starting Thursday night.
"Delly's the kind of guy that you can throw in any
situation," said Cavaliers coach David Blatt, who started working with
Dellavedova last summer in Vegas. "He's one of those kids that if his
parents were to throw him into the water before he knew how to swim, he'd be
doing the backstroke, the breaststroke and the crawl before any of us even
figured out he was in there. So whatever we need him to do, he'll be ready to
do."
