The All-Star break certainly came at a bad time for the Cleveland Cavaliers as it disrupted their momentum after making a good start with their new acquisitions.

After securing trades for Jordan Clarkson, Larry Nance Jr., Rodney Hood and George Hill, the Cavs won two straight games on the road against the Boston Celtics and Oklahoma City Thunder before the break.

Since the return they have gone 1-2, losing at home to both the Washington Wizards and San Antonio Spurs.

In the 110-94 defeat to the Spurs on Sunday, the Cavs struggled offensively in the second half as the visitors ramped it up defensively, holding the Cavaliers to just 41.8 percent shooting overall.

LeBron James led them in scoring as usual with 33 points and tried to will his team to a victory but didn't get enough help from his teammates, particularly the starters who shot the ball terribly.

Head coach Tyronn Lue is still looking for ways to integrate the new players into his system and believes their over-reliance on James is making it easier for opponents to defend them.

According to ESPN's Dave McMenamin, he used Monday's practice session to design new offensive schemes to keep opposing defences guessing and to avoid being "predictable".

"I thought today was a good day, a good teaching day," Lue said, per ESPN. "I was able to add some more stuff offensively because right now with only two or three practices, we're predictable offensively and teams are kind of sitting on that and taking advantage of that."

This session was just the fourth with the quartet of new players and there was inevitably going to be ups and downs as they adjust to the team and pick things up on the fly.

The biggest message Lue wanted to get across to his new additions was to be aggressive and not look to defer to LeBron so much.

The King's 33 points against the Spurs came on 25 shots; the four newcomers combined had 29 points on 28 shots.

"It just became a little bit stagnant," Hood said. "We got to be aggressive. Especially not depending on LeBron to do a lot. We got to be aggressive, especially in transition.

"We got to be able to make plays. We can, but we just got to be confident to make plays while he's on the court, and I think that's the biggest thing that [Lue] stressed to us today."

Cleveland returns to action on Tuesday night when they welcome the Brooklyn Nets to Quicken Loans Arena, which is the first of four consecutive home games.