David Blatt Fired by First-Place Cleveland Cavaliers in Shock
LeBron James’s Eastern Conference-leading Cleveland Cavaliers have fired head coach David Blatt four days after suffering their worst loss of the NBA season, according to multiple reports on Friday.
The surprise decision to fire the second-year coach, who led Cleveland to the NBA Finals last year, comes as the Cavaliers have a 3-1/2 game lead in the Eastern Conference.
Cavaliers associate head coach Tyronn Lue has agreed to a multi-year deal to be the team’s head coach, ESPN and Yahoo Sports reported.
In his first NBA coaching job, Blatt compiled an 83-40 record with the Cavaliers, who lost last year’s best-of-seven NBA Finals to the Golden State Warriors in six games.
The Cavaliers are heavy favorites to represent the Eastern Conference again in this year’s NBA Finals but there has been growing criticism over their performance against the top teams in the Western Conference.
Cleveland have lost only two of their last 11 games but one was to the San Antonio Spurs and the other was a crushing 132-98 loss at the hands of the defending champion Warriors.
Prior to joining the Cavaliers, Blatt had no NBA experience but was a well-respected and accomplished international coach.
Blatt led the Russian national team to the 2007 Eurobasket championship, 2011 Eurobasket bronze medal and 2012 London Olympics bronze medal.
He also led Israeli club Maccabi Tel-Aviv to six Israeli Cup championships and five Israeli League championships.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
