The Cleveland Cavaliers make the shocking decision to fire head coach David Blatt today, promoting assistant coach Tyronn Lue to take his place, signing him to a multi-year deal. It's clear that Cleveland's front office thought Lue was the better man to lead this team (and some would argue that he already has been - more on that in a second), but that doesn't mean this move wasn't made out of sheer panic and will ultimately hurt the Cavs.
Blatt was just a season and a half into his tenure with the Cavs, and they've been one of the best teams in the league since. On top of making the NBA Finals and winning two games against the Golden State Warriors without stars Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love, they are 64-20 in regular season games since Jan. 15, 2015 - including an Eastern Conference-leading 30-11 this year.
Those stats alone should be more than enough to get any coach a multi-year extension. Instead, Blatt got the axe. Why?
The most obvious answer is the constant power struggle between him and LeBron James and his disconnent with the players. He never commanded the respect of the locker room, and there were numerous reports of players looking to Lue for leadership instead of Blatt. Players even opted to take playcalls from Lue instead of following Blatt's directions.
All that controversy suggested that Blatt would be fired sooner rather than later, and their 132-98 loss to the Warriors on Monday night signaled that the Cavs were way behind were they should be. That gets blamed on coaching, and as a result, Blatt got fired. However, Cleveland's thinking in this regard is completely misguided.
For starters, firing a coach mid-season rarely produces improved results. 40 NBA coaches have been fired mid-season since 2000, and those team's combined winning percentages improved from .386 to just .390. Cleveland is destined to continue to do well because of the sheer talent of their roster, but one alarming stat will now loom over them for the rest of the season - only the 2005-06 Miami Heat, 1981-82 Los Angeles Lakers, and the 1979-80 Lakers have won a title after a midseason coaching change (and Pat Riley was the coach taking over in the two most recent cases).
There's also another factor the Cavs are overlooking - isn't it possible that they just aren't good enough?
Their stats and record are a bit misleading when talking about the NBA's top teams. The Eastern Conference is considerably weaker than the West, and the Cavs have had no trouble dismantling other contenders in the East over the past two years. However, they've struggled considerably against the top teams in the West, going just 10-12 against the Warriors, Spurs, Thunder, Clippers, and Rockets over the last two seasons.
Those five teams are viewed as Cleveland's competition (since the East has no real threat to offer), and the Cavs put the blame on Blatt for failing to produce against those teams. He simply doesn't deserve that.
For starters, the Cavs' "Big 3" of LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love have only played in 52 games together - and Cleveland is 45-7 in those games. Pretty good, right? The Cavaliers have apparently overlooked those injury issues.
They've also overlooked that talent gap that exists between their team and the top teams in the West. Golden State is one of the best teams in NBA history, and San Antonio has kept pace with them every step of the way. Then there's Oklahoma City, who has two of the top five or six players in the league in Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook.
LeBron, Kyrie, and Love are good, but Cleveland's downfall comes in their supporting cast and massive defensive inefficiencies caused because of that. Having all three of those players signed to max contracts - along with Tristan Thompson's $82-million deal - has left them with scraps to spend on role players. That has shown up in a big way against those three teams, and you can't blame Blatt for that.
That falls on the front office for failing to provide the talent.
Firing Blatt is simply a panic move that will have negative effects on Cleveland for the rest of the season. Historically speaking, coaches who take over mid-season have had minimal impact, and the Cavs (probably) don't have the talent to beat the top teams in the West, no matter who's coaching.
The Cavaliers are feeling their championship window closing, and instead of staying course, they panicked because they haven't seen immediate results. That panic cost Blatt his job, but Cleveland still won't win the title this year.
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