CLEVELAND: Twenty-nine thoughts for 29 points from Kevin Love in Tuesday’s 103-86 Cavs win over the Memphis Grizzlies…
1. There will be plenty of angry fans in Memphis Wednesday night. A number of them erupted on Twitter (and my timeline) moments after Cavs coach Tyronn Lue announced none of the Big Three are making the trip.
2. Lue’s decision to leave LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love behind in Cleveland will only exacerbate the ongoing debate about the length of the NBA season and the problematic back-to-backs. Lue is playing the long game here and driving a train that isn’t expected to stop until mid-June. He’s within his rights to rest guys as he sees fit, even if it’s disappointing to fans of a Western Conference team who only get one visit from the defending champs. Such is the risk when purchasing tickets to live events.
3. James, for one, isn’t about to apologize for missing Wednesday’s game. This is the second time out of the Cavs' five back-to-backs thus far that LeBron is sitting on the back end of it.
4. “I do whatever my coach asks me to do,” James said. “I’ve been in this league 14 years. I shouldn’t have to explain me sitting out a game or not playing games. I’ve played in every arena, including Seattle that’s no longer here. It’s not like it’s my first year. I’ve got 14 years. I’ve paid my dues and more than a lot of guys in this league. But I’ll ride with my coach.”
5. The curious aspect in all of this is Irving, who complained about tired legs during Saturday’s win against the Hornets and now will rest in consecutive games. On the surface, it’s unusual for a 24-year-old to take a week off in December, just a quarter of the way into the season. But factor in Irving’s major knee injury last season, consecutive Finals runs and his Olympic gold medal prior to this season and it makes more sense.
6. “He wanted to go,” Lue said of Irving. “I just said take another game off. That will give him seven days to work on his game, get his legs back, get his rehab and hopefully he’ll be ready to go come Saturday.”
7. Lue made the decision prior to Tuesday’s game to give all three the night off Wednesday. He chose to play both Love and James at home, rather than split them up and give one the night off while playing the other, to maximize the chance of winning.
8. “You’ve got a home game. With two of the Big Three I know we can win that game,” Lue said. “It’d be hard to go down there and travel and ask one player to try and carry the team, especially the way our offense runs.”
9. The decision to sit all three evoked memories of Spurs coach Gregg Popovich resting Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Danny Green and Manu Ginobili for a nationally televised game at Miami when they were the top teams in the league. It was the final game of a six-game trip, but Pop sent them all home early. Former Commissioner David Stern hit Pop with a staggering $250,000 fine for doing “a disservice to the league and our fans.”
10. It’s unlikely Commissioner Adam Silver would fine Lue for a variety of reasons, starting with the fact this isn’t a national TV game and the Grizzlies aren’t considered one of the top three teams in the West. Beyond that, Silver understands the grind of back-to-backs and is doing his best to eliminate them as quickly as possible. He has already reduced the number most teams have to play and now the league is considering starting the season sooner next year in an effort to abolish them all together. Of course, simply eliminating back-to-backs won’t eliminate teams from resting their stars. But it should prevent situations such as this.
11. It should be noted that the Grizzlies made a similar move Tuesday, resting Marc Gasol for this game even though Gasol is the reiging player of the week in the West and the Grizzlies are already wrecked with injuries. Much like with the Cavs’ situation, Grizzlies coach David Fizdale said the decision to rest Gasol was made before tonight.
12. “This was kind of marked on the calendar for a while,” Fizdale said. “We knew this stretch was coming with this back-to-back and we were going to have to make some decisions. The timing isn’t perfect because he’s playing so well and with him getting player of the week and all, but it is what it is. We’re thinking big picture and making sure he can sustain a full season.”
13. The news of the mass benchings was more exciting than anything that happened on the court. Love played well by scoring 29 points and grabbing 13 rebounds, James made more dazzling passes and J.R. Smith showed signs of pulling out of his shooting funk. Smith began the night 6-of-8 shooting before missing six straight. He recovered in the fourth quarter and ended the night with six 3-pointers.
14. Smith was shooting the ball one-handed prior to the game Tuesday, a trick he has used since childhood when he isn’t shooting well.
15. “Felt great. Finally hit some shots,” Smith said. “Felt like I was getting back to my old self a little bit.”
16. In an alternate universe, David Fizdale could’ve been the coach of the Cavs. After Byron Scott was fired, former general manager Chris Grant and owner Dan Gilbert quickly locked in on Mike Brown as their top choice to replace him. But they had competition. Their old friend Danny Ferry needed a coach in Atlanta and Brown was also drawing interest in other circles. Had Brown chosen not to return to Cleveland, Fizdale was next on the list for a variety of reasons.
17. Fizdale remains close to both Brown and Grant from their time together at the University of San Diego. Fizdale is also close with LeBron from their time together in Miami, and given the stage the Cavs were in at the time, plucking a coach James deeply admires and respects made sense because they were trying to win him back.
18. Fizdale told me Tuesday that after the Heat won their second championship, James and Dwyane Wade cornered him and told him it was time for him to go become a head coach. Fizdale told them he was committed to Miami as long as they were, because opportunities like that to coach a talented group like that don’t come around very often.
19. Fizdale likely would’ve left for Cleveland and his good friend Grant, but as it turned out, he kept his word. He didn’t leave Miami until James left, ultimately disbanding the Heatles. Now as a rookie coach, he has the Grizzlies in the thick of playoff contention in the West despite a roster decimated with injuries.
20. Fizdale and James watched film together constantly in Miami and Fizdale openly conceded James may have taught the coach more than the other way around. Their relationship deepened during their years together.
21. “From the first day I got to Miami he was someone I related to right off the bat,” James said. “He helped me throughout that first year. Getting through that first year, as difficult as it was both on and off the floor, we watched film every day. He helped me reinforce my game. He’s someone I could go to every single day. Spo had to deal with so much as far as our team, getting us ready every day, preparing us, communicating to the guys. There was so much on Spo’s plate that sometimes an assistant or another player, you can give them some of your time as well. Fiz was that every single day. I was so excited when I heard the news he was getting the Memphis job. He was a perfect fit for any team that had an opening this summer. Memphis got them a good one.”
22. Fizdale is also close to Lue and Cavs assistant Larry Drew from their time together in Atlanta. When he was learning how to rein in his emotions as a coach on the sideline earlier this season, Fizdale looked to Lue as an example.
23. “You can just see it. Nothing shakes him,” Fizdale said. “He really stays in the moment as well as any coach in the league. Coming into this year, I watched myself on the sidelines a few times in those early games and I was really disappointed in myself because I was too fired up and too wound up on every single thing that happened. So I went back and actually watched a little sideline film of him and Jason Kidd – two guys that I look to mirror. And both of those guys are as poised as you get when it comes to things happening on the court and then they really understand how to stay in the moment and then move on to the next play.”
24. It’s worth remembering: Lue hasn’t even been doing this for a full year yet. He’s still about 20 games shy of a complete first season in the NBA – although a championship run tends to speed up the learning curve for any head coach.
25. One more funny James-Fizdale nugget. Fizdale doesn’t think LeBron can ever be a head coach in the NBA because of the crimes he’d commit.
26. “He would kill somebody,” Fizdale said. “He wants perfection. I could see him actually owning his own team and doing something like that, but I think he would end up killing a player at some point (as a coach) because they wouldn’t live up to the expectations that he would set forth. But just as a mentor or a guy that is just going to groom players, I don’t know if you’ll ever find anyone better than he and D-Wade and Chris Bosh and those guys I was with down there. They were incredible leaders and basketball geniuses. So I was very lucky to be a part of that.”
27. For the record, James agrees with Fizdale. “He’s a little right,” James said after smacking his lips and flashing a wry smile. “You’ve got to be very patient as a coach. I don’t think I have that much patience. Not that much.”
28. Since none of the Cavs’ Big Three are making the trip to Memphis, neither am I. I’ll be watching it from the couch so I can attend my kids’ Christmas program Thursday morning. So no Final Thoughts after what should be an interesting game Wednesday.
29. DeAndre Liggins, Iman Shumpert and James Jones will be starting alongside J.R. Smith and Tristan Thompson at Memphis. We’ll gather back after the Lakers game on Saturday. Talk to you then.