Eastern Notes: LeBron, Brand, George

Despite the Cavs‘ early struggles LeBron James insists that he isn’t losing patience, and while he doesn’t like losing, he is happy with the effort the team is giving, something Cleveland fans took as signaling this was a rebuilding year for the Cavs, Chris Haynes of The Northeast Ohio Media Group writes. James acknowledged that in a way, the franchise was rebuilding, notes Haynes.

“We put a lot of pieces together that weren’t here last year,” James said. “I don’t want to say rebuilding. I think when people think of rebuilding, they think of starting from the ground up. We are a team that wasn’t together last year so [we] have the same struggles as the 76ers or teams like the Miami Heat right now. And us, we have some of the same qualities as far as putting new guys together. Obviously the talent is a little bit different on every team, but coming together and going through a new system [is the same]. We have a new coach, we have a new staff, and we have new players.”

Here’s more from the east:

• Though he’s only made two appearances thus far for Atlanta this season, Elton Brand is happy that he chose to re-sign with the Hawks this past summer, Chris Vivlamore of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution writes. “It’s kind of what I expected coming here,” Brand said. “I look at the teams that I could have been with. Some are doing well. Dallas said ‘What do you want to do? Do you want to come back?’ Some other teams I could have played a lot of minutes with are doing really bad. So, would I want to be there? I believe in our talent, what we have and I’m glad I’m here.”
• Paul George still believes that he can recover from the broken leg he suffered while playing for Team USA this summer in time to return to the Pacers by April, Michael Marot of The Associated Press writes. “It’s a goal, for sure, to have an opportunity to play this year,” George said. “We have a good team and one of my goals is to come back and try and help this team out any way I can.”
• But Indiana’s head coach Frank Vogel continued to preach caution regarding his star, Marot adds. “It’s up to the doctors to see where he’s at,” Vogel said. “He [George] really hasn’t done much activity other than walking around and shooting around. It’s still very unlikely he’ll play this season.”