{"id":10427,"date":"2016-01-25T09:00:54","date_gmt":"2016-01-25T17:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/cavs-regroup-after-stunning-coaching-change\/"},"modified":"2016-01-25T09:00:54","modified_gmt":"2016-01-25T17:00:54","slug":"cavs-regroup-after-stunning-coaching-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/sports\/cavs-regroup-after-stunning-coaching-change\/","title":{"rendered":"Cavs regroup after stunning coaching change"},"content":{"rendered":"

INDEPENDENCE, Ohio \u2014<\/strong> Both knees wrapped in ice, LeBron James walked in a circle, waiting for his turn to speak with a larger-than-usual media contingent.<\/p>\n

First, though, it was new coach Tyronn Lue\u2019s turn to address the shocking developments of the past 24 hours in Cleveland.<\/p>\n

Halfway through a championship-or-bust season, the Cavaliers are picking up the pieces.<\/p>\n

One day after coach David Blatt was fired despite taking the Cavs to the NBA Finals last season and guiding them into first place in the Eastern Conference, James said he was surprised by the bold move but supported general manager David Griffin\u2019s rationale behind it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just a team that we\u2019re a bit fragile at times,\u201d James said following Saturday\u2019s shootaround, \u201cand we\u2019re still learning each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Cavs needed a shake-up and one was provided by Griffin, who sensed the talented team was not as connected as it needed to be in order to win a championship in Cleveland, the title James covets most.<\/p>\n

James was told of Blatt\u2019s firing during a meeting Friday with Griffin and his teammates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just as surprised and caught off guard like everybody,\u201d James said. \u201cIt\u2019s unfortunate what happened yesterday, and as a team we just have to focus on what\u2019s now, what\u2019s now in front of us with the coach that we have now and we\u2019ve got to continue to get better. He (Griffin) was right on everything that he said. Obviously, he sees it from the outside and the inside looking in. He\u2019s around us every day and he felt like as good as we can be we weren\u2019t reaching the potential to this point.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe made the change that he felt was appropriate for this team and like it or love it or hate it or whatever, we\u2019ve got to respect it. … He felt like it was best for the team. There\u2019s no sugarcoating what he said.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lue will make his debut Saturday night against the Chicago Bulls, who will challenge the Cavs for their Eastern Conference crown.<\/p>\n

Blatt\u2019s top assistant the past two seasons, Lue said he won\u2019t try to do things differently than his boss. He will, however, attempt \u201cto do some things better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lue said Cleveland\u2019s 34-point loss to the Golden State Warriors this week shook the Cavs, breaking off a huge chunk of the team\u2019s confidence. His challenge is getting James and the others to believe in one another, play together and win.<\/p>\n

A point guard for 11 seasons in the NBA, Lue named Doc Rivers, Phil Jackson and Jerry West as his biggest influences. Before the team\u2019s light practice, Lue, who worked on Rivers\u2019 staff in Boston and with the Los Angeles Clippers, said he talked to the Cavs about what he wants to accomplish the rest of this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just talked about playing the game the right way, having more spacing, playing with more pace,\u201d he said. \u201cI talked to the guys about just being able to focus on the moment and the process. Just by us having a coaching change doesn\u2019t mean we\u2019re going to be better. We got to change. So, you can bring Phil Jackson in or whoever you want to bring in, but if we don\u2019t change as players and as a staff and as a unit, we\u2019re not going to be any good.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t about the coaching change. It was about us changing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lue has known James since the forward was 17 and the two have a solid relationship. Lue, though, promised to treat him like any other player.<\/p>\n

\u201cI talked to \u2018Bron,\u201d Lue said. \u201cI told him: \u2018I got to hold you accountable. It starts with you first. And if I can hold you accountable in front of the team and doing the right things, then everybody else has got to fall in line, fall in place.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Griffin\u2019s decision to change coaches led to speculation that James was behind the move. There\u2019s no denying the four-time MVP has major influence within Cleveland\u2019s organization, but Griffin was adamant that James was not consulted before the decision was made.<\/p>\n

James knows there is a perception that Blatt would still be Cleveland\u2019s coach if the 31-year-old didn\u2019t want him fired.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve stopped that a long time ago in my career, worrying about what other people think about me or what I influence or what I don\u2019t,\u201d he said. \u201cBut the only thing I can worry about is how I continue to get these guys prepared and get them playing better basketball, because obviously we know we can be much better and I know we can be much better.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

INDEPENDENCE, Ohio \u2014 Both knees wrapped in ice, LeBron James walked in a circle, waiting for his turn to speak with a larger-than-usual media contingent. First, though, it was new coach Tyronn Lue\u2019s turn to address the shocking developments of the past 24 hours in Cleveland. Halfway through a championship-or-bust season, the Cavaliers are picking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-10427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10427\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10427"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=10427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}