Rembrandt? No, LeBron just being LeBron

His was an unremarkable performance for three quarters. For nothing LeBron James had done last night during those 31 minutes he spent on the floor against the Utah Jazz looked like much.

The Cavs, though, didn't need remarkable from LeBron -- not at that point.

But without Shaquille O'Neal (he was sidelined with a bad shoulder, or so the Cavs told the media), all eyes inside The Q focused on King James, because three quarters don't decide a basketball game. And to think the Jazz, a team crippled with injuries, wouldn't make a late run would be to confuse the Jazz with the Knicks and not understand its brilliant mastermind, Jerry Sloan.

Few teams in the NBA are as well coached as Sloan's Jazz. Even without Kyle Korver, Ronnie Price and Deron Williams, perhaps the best point guard in the universe, the Jazz remained a team the Cavs would have to reckon with. The reckoning began with 1:56 left on Carlos Boozer's two free throws.

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Cavs look like a team that's 'clicking'

The Cavaliers return Saturday night to The Q. They're returning to town to face the Utah Jazz with a cockiness and the tough guy's swagger that seemed to be missing in the first five or six games of their season.

Winning has a way of putting the strut back into pro athlete's step, and to perform in victory the way the LeBron James, Shaquille O'Neal, Mo Williams and the rest of their gang have done lately is reason enough to predict their early-season troubles were behind them.

In a display that looked like midseason form, they showed offensive versatility during their two-game road trip.

Coach Mike Brown figured out how to use Shaq, and Brown's decision to start J.J. Hickson over Anderson Varejao was coaching brilliance. It was risky business to bring Varejao off the bench as a sixth man, but Hickson's athleticism complemented Shaq's powerful inside game better than Varejao's does.

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West silences Cavs' concerns ... for now

We waited Saturday night for Delonte West after the Cavaliers had beaten the Bobcats, 90-79, at The Q. The game was West's first of the season, and his thoughts on his performance were of interest to anybody who follows the Cavs -- fans and writers.

For more than a month, no player in Wine and Gold has been as intriguing to both of these parties as West. On a team with LeBron James and Shaquille O'Neal, it's not a situation West, a talented but emotionally-fragile guard, and the other Cavaliers will find themselves in too often.

But West was of interest because he had been absent with personal problems. His mental instability worried people. Nobody knew what to make of his circumstances -- whether to be critical of this gifted athlete or sympathetic of him.

What everybody did know, however, was that the Cavaliers did miss him.

As much as LeBron and Shaq matter -- and they matter most -- West might be the most important complement to this team's two megastars. He's the team's best shooting guard and its most dependable backup point guard. West is also its best defender not named LeBron James.

West can score, and he has the kind of boundless energy not found in most NBA players.

Yet, in some people's minds, he's a lit powder keg, which was the reason his return to the Cavs lineup drew so much attention. The team hadn't functioned well in West's absence.

"Missing piece," point guard Mo Williams said of West. "It felt good to have the whole team back."

LeBron and Shaq echoed those sentiments. They offered only compliments for their returning teammate, and their kind words were deserved. For the first time this season, the Cavs looked like a team with championship intentions.

Now, they were only playing the Bobcats, a sorry lot of an NBA team. Still, an elite team like the Cavs has to beat the bad teams, too. A win is a win, no matter the opponent.

Having West a part of this win was significant, and knowing he might be back for the long haul was even more important to the Cavaliers. They will need him -- back physically as well as emotionally.

For they won't always be playing a team like Charlotte. They have tougher teams ahead, starting Tuesday night when the Cavs play the Wizard.

It might be then when West's presence will be most needed. It might be then when we can hear what he has to say about being back in uniform and playing the sport that has made him rich.

We want to hear from West himself that's he all right.

Cavs coach welcomes all-purpose West back

Coach Mike Brown still had to wonder how his Cavs might look when all the pieces were in place. Brown, as with almost everybody else, knew he had been blessed with a good collection of splendid talent, but how to blend that talent had been his struggle.

It didn't help Brown, a defense-minded coach, that he was forced to play without Delonte West, his hustling, all-purpose guard who had to sit out the first three games of the season with psychological problems.

His mind right now, West returned to a standing ovation Saturday night, no small matter to Brown. He was as pleased to have West in the lineup as the fans were, because West can open Brown's offense in ways not possible without him.

No other Cavaliers player, including LeBron James, is as versatile as West.

"Delonte can play," Brown said. "He really affects the game in a lot of different ways. He's a guy who can score but also run the team and distribute the ball at the right time."

Doubt his words if you'd like. Surely, Brown wouldn't be the first coach to inflate the contribution of a player. In this case, he was speaking the unvarnished truth.

The evidence was in West's performance, and in the comparison to how the Cavs played in their first three games as opposed how they played in their last game, West proved the difference in this 90-79 dismantling of the Bobcats. He played a bigger part in the win than any of the 20-562 fans in The Q could have expected.

"It wasn't a surprise," LeBron said.

West scored 13 points and handed out a couple of assists, statistical totals that didn't match the nightly outputs of Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade or Brandon Roy. Brown doesn't need those kinds of statistics from West, not when he can count on LeBron for them.

What Brown does need from West is what he got: a productive performance from the floor, strong defense and selfless play. His first game back wasn't markedly different from games he had in the past. If West had any first-game-back rust, he didn't show it. He looked good.

So did the Cavaliers.

"Missing piece," Mo Williams said of West. "It felt good to have the whole team back."

Williams called West's performance "terrific," perhaps an overstatement. Such hyperbole isn't uncommon when one teammate talks about another teammate. In this case, Williams meant it, because West's return gave him someone to share the point guard's.

Brown counted on that, too. He was, however, more circumspect in his analysis of West's return. He didn't necessarily expect West to be in midseason form. What player is four games into the season?

The fact that West is back will allow Brown to reconfigure his substitution patterns and build an offense and a defense that are cohesive. Compared to the first two games of the season, he did a better job of rotating players in and out in the victory Friday night in Minneapolis, and his rotation had few exposed seams against the Bobcats, no NBA powerhouse.

West was the glue that Brown's Cavs had been missing. With him back, they should get better and better the more they work together.

"I think we're taking steps in the right direction," Brown said. "We still have a long way to go. I think guys understand that, and in time, we will be a very good basketball team. We're pretty good right now, but we have the chance to be great."

(Photo of Cavs coach MIke Brown from NBA.com)