The balls bounced the right way Tuesday night and the Cleveland Cavaliers gained the No. 1 overall pick in June’s NBA Draft for the second time in three years.
Now it is up to general manager Chris Grant to not screw this up. And if his caller ID shows “Mike Lombardi” he should probably not pick up. Don’t want to get any crazy ideas about trading away draft picks for down the road.
While there is no one “correct” way to build a championship-caliber team in the NBA, there is one element that all title-winning teams have in common: the element of luck.
If Portland had drafted Michael Jordan instead of Sam Bowie, the Chicago Bulls would not have won six titles. If Jordan hadn’t been suspended (oops, “decided to play baseball”), Houston would not have two championship banners hanging in their arena. If David Robinson doesn’t miss all but six games in the 1996-97 season, the San Antonio Spurs are probably not in a position to draft Tim Duncan in the 1997 NBA Draft.
Well, you get the point. And that brings us to the Cleveland Cavaliers and tonight’s NBA Draft lottery.
Welcome back,
To that same old place that you laughed about.
Well the names have all changed since you hung around,
But those dreams have remained and they’re turned around.
Who’d have thought they’d lead ya (Who’d have thought they’d lead ya)
Here where we need ya (Here where we need ya) …
The Cleveland Cavaliers are reportedly planning to re-hire Mike Brown as coach, three years after they fired him.
Brown and the Cavs have reached a “handshake agreement” according to The Beacon Journal and the hiring could become official as early as Wednesday.
We certainly didn’t see that one coming.
The Cleveland Cavaliers made the speculation that has surrounded the team for the past few weeks reality on Thursday, firing head coach Byron Scott.
Scott was “released” from his duties in Cleveland (the team’s word) after compiling a record of 64-166 and successfully guiding the team into the NBA lottery for three consecutive years.
In other words, Scott did what he was ostensibly hired to do.
Just since September, every pro team in town has fired its manager or head coach, leaving current Tribe manager Terry Francona, who was managing his 14th game with the Tribe on Thursday night, as the most-tenured manager or coach of Cleveland’s three sports team.
Whatever. We’re too tired and we just want to get off the coaching carousel for a while.
For the full story, head over to The Cleveland Fan.
(Photo by The Plain Dealer)
This week will bring an end to the 2012-13 NBA season for the Cleveland Cavaliers and, for the third consecutive season, the Cavs will be sitting at home when the playoffs begin.
Much has been made over the past few weeks about the future of Cavs coach Byron Scott, who carries a record of 64-164 as he closes out his third year as coach, making him the longest-tenured coach of a Cleveland sports team. It’s not so much the losing – after all, the Cavs have openly been in rebuilding mode almost from the day Scott took the job – but the historic nature of the losing.
From blowing 20-plus point leads numerous times – including Tuesday night’s in Indiana, when the Cavs became just the second team in the shot-clock era to lose a game that they led by more than 20 points with less than nine minutes to play – to an ongoing lack of attention to defense, many are wondering if Scott will be back for a fourth season when the Cavs return this fall.
All the talk about Scott’s coaching future made us start to wonder just where Scott ranks among Cavs coaches throughout the years. We started following sports in the mid-1970s, so we’ve actually seen every head coach that’s ever led the Cavs onto the hardwood.
The Cavs have had 12 full-time coaches since entering the NBA in the fall of 1970 (we’re not counting interims, so sorry Don Delaney, Keith Smart, Brendan Malone, among others. And really sorry, Chuck Daly). While Scott is not the best coach the Cavs have ever employed, he’s certainly not the worst.
To find out just where Scott ranks, head over to The Cleveland Fan.
There are a lot of things that are out of the control of a head coach, which is a lesson that Cleveland Cavaliers coach Byron Scott knows all to well.
Even taking that into consideration, we can’t help but still feel we need to ask an important question:
Is Scott the right man for the job?
While it is probably too much to think the Cavs can win without their top players, does it really have to be as bad as it has been at times? It not so much that the Cavs are losing – after all, the team is still being rebuilt and is not a finished product – it’s the way the team is losing that has us worried.
We take a look at the gory details over at The Cleveland Fan.
(Photo by The Associated Press)
The Cleveland Cavaliers announced on Monday that point guard Kyrie Irving will be shut down for three to four weeks with an AC sprain in his shoulder.
Are there any Cavs fans who are surprised?
In the short run, the Cavs plans for Irving should be pretty easy – with only five weeks left in the season, they should shut him down for the rest of the year. With the Cavs looking to maximize their draft position rather than battling for a playoff spot, there is little reason to bring Irving back this season just so he can play for a week.
It’s easy enough to make plans for the next few weeks; it is the long-run plan that may be a bit trickier.
We look for answers at The Cleveland Fan.
(Photo by The Associated Press)
With visions of Horseshoe Casino chips dancing in his head, Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert will reportedly ask the NBA to bring the All-Star Game to Cleveland in a couple of years.
According to a report in The Beacon Journal, Gilbert will submit a proposal to have the game at Quicken Loans Arena in either 2016 or 2017.
Adam Silver, the NBA’s deputy commissioner, was in town recently looking to see if Cleveland would be a realistic host and he gave Gilbert the thumb’s up to submit a bid.
“The league is very receptive and open to it,” Gilbert told the paper. “As soon as this (weekend) is over, we’ll start talking more seriously about it. The city would be unreal. It would be a great weekend.”
Especially for the bottom line of the casino, no doubt, which would be filled with plenty of high rollers from out of town. And if those out-of-towners don’t get to see anything else about Cleveland in the middle of winter? Well, that’s the way it goes.
It’s nice that the Cleveland Cavaliers have four players taking part in this weekend’s All-Star Game festivities, but there is a small part of us that wishes it wasn’t so.
Because right now what Kyrie Irving, Tristan Thompson, Dion Waiters and Tyler Zeller probably need, more than anything, is time away from the game to rest up. Especially Irving, who played 27 minutes in Friday’s Rising Stars Challenge, will take part in tonight’s 3-point contest and represent the Cavs in the actual All-Star Game on Sunday.
“They’ll probably have him do a bunch of stuff,” Cavs coach Byron Scott told The Plain Dealer earlier in the week. “So I’m a little concerned coming back he’ll be more tired. But that’s something we’ll deal with Monday when he comes back.”
We’re with you coach.
To find out why, head over to The Cleveland Fan.
(Photo by The Associated Press)
