NBA: First-place Cavaliers dump David Blatt, coach who led them to NBA final last season
As bold moves go, it is among the boldest ever taken by an NBA team — a middle-of-the-season tectonic shift that, regardless of reality, underscores the perception that what LeBron James wants LeBron James gets.
And if there was pressure on the Cleveland Cavaliers a day ago, there is exponentially more now.
The 30-11 Cavaliers, leading the Eastern Conference and favoured to reach the NBA final again, fired coach David Blatt late Friday afternoon, replacing him with Tyronn Lue, a promising young assistant who has never coached a professional game in his life.
It was a stunning move that few saw coming and sights will immediately be set on James, the transcendent Cavaliers star bent on delivering a championship to his home state.
While numerous reports say he wasn’t consulted about the sudden move, whispers have abounded in NBA circles for the last year about James’s relationship with Blatt, who was hired as Cleveland’s coach before James rejoined the team from Miami, and with Lue, Blatt’s chief lieutenant.
“LeBron (James) doesn’t run this organization,” general manager David Griffin said at a news conference. “This narrative that we’re somehow taking direction from him isn’t fair. There’s just a disconnect right now, a lack of spirit and disconnectedness I can’t accept.”
The disconnect included a widely publicized late-game play last spring when James blew off a Blatt play call to use him a decoy before he hit a game winning basket and continued this season when James frequently sought Lue’s counsel during timeouts to discuss strategy.
While James might not have been actively involved in the sudden move — and the use of intermediaries between the front office and its star player would not be out of the question and would provide a level of deniability — many will see his fingerprints at the crime scene.
James will be scrutinized like never before in the second half for a number of reasons: He is so closely linked to Lue, he is on his fourth coach with Cleveland, and his relationship with Blatt was seen as contentious.
For Blatt, the ignominious firing marks a dramatic flaw. One of the most decorated European coaches of all time — he led teams in Russia, Israel, Turkey, Italy and Greece, and won an Olympic medal with Russia — Blatt had an 83-40 record with Cleveland.
The Cavs know they are taking an unprecedented gamble. Only three times in NBA history — the Lakers in 1979-80 and 1981-82 and Miami in 2005-06 — have teams that changed coaches mid-season won a championship. Blatt is the most successful coach ever to be replaced mid-season. His .732 winning percentage is the highest of any coach in any North American pro sport to be fired mid-season.
There was some discussion Friday on whether the Raptors’ Dwane Casey might take over as the East’s head coach at the all-star game, a job that goes to the bench boss of the team leading the conference as of Feb. 1. But Lue will qualify for the post, an NBA source said.