LeBron James hits career low as Cavaliers lose to Timberwolves

LeBron James, widely regarded as the best player of his generation, logged the worst plus-minus of his 15-year NBA career on Monday (Tuesday AEDT) as the Cleveland Cavaliers suffered a 127-99 rout at the hands of the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Cavaliers (26-14) are now five-and-a-half games behind top seed Boston Celtics (33-10).

In his 1,101st regular season game, James registered a career-low plus/minus of -39 in 27 minutes on the floor. The four-time MVP finished with 10 points (the lowest since 2007), 8 rebounds and 5 assists as the Cavs had no answer to the rising Timberwolves, who improved to 26-16 and consolidated their fourth seed in the West.

"They put a good one on us. We got it to 14 at the end of the first, but we didn't get any closer than that," James said before being informed of his career-low plus/minus stat. "I don't care about no damn plus-minus. I've won a game and had a bad plus-minus before, so what does that matter. I don't give a damn about no damn plus-minus."

LeBron James, Cavaliers blown out by Timberwolves

Playing at home, the Timberwolves came out all guns blazing and claimed a 20-4 lead before holding Cavs to a mediocre 8-for-23 shooting in the first quarter. Cleveland's defensive woes continued as the Timberwolves shot nearly 60 percent from the field in the first half.

Kevin Love had a season-low tally of 3 points and 2 rebounds from just 21 minutes on the floor. After the game, the former Timberwolves star admitted his team checked out of the contest after the first half.

"Tonight, I don't know what tonight was. It was just ugly. We were getting good shots up, I think, all the way around. We got really good shots to start the game. They just didn't fall and that kind of held true throughout the entire game, and it seemed like they hit everything. So it's easy to say it's just one of those nights, but in a lot of cases there's a lot of things that we can do better," Love told reporters, via ESPN.

LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers will continue their five-game road trip with visits to the Toronto Raptors on Thursday and Indiana Pacers on Friday. Following that, they will return home to host the mighty Golden State Warriors on Monday, Jan. 15. Despite their struggles, the Cavs are still odds-on favourites to return to the NBA Finals for a fourth consecutive year.