A deeply emotional, successful season has Cavs coach Tyronn Lue aiming to improve
INDEPENDENCE, Ohio – Once he finished hopping exuberantly onto the court and escaped a too-tight headlock from Dahntay Jones, Cleveland Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue decided to sneak away from the celebration. The cameras flocked to LeBron James, who had fallen to his knees to cry tears of joy for making good – under the most unlikely of circumstances – on the championship promise he had made to Northeast Ohio. Lue was several feet away, on the bench, face buried in a wine-colored towel as he wept uncontrollably.
“It kind of all hit me at once,” Lue told The Vertical recently from his office at Cleveland Clinic Courts. “I kind of blacked out for a second. I had that moment to myself, where I didn’t see anything else or notice anything else. My cousin and my brother said, ‘We’ve never seen you cry before.’ I can’t believe I cried, either.”
Lue’s rare and raw emotional outburst was the result of the Cavaliers’ shocking comeback from a 3-1 series deficit to defeat the 73-win Golden State Warriors; the joy of rewarding the Cavaliers’ front office for the “ballsy move” of hiring an inexperienced head coach in January to lead a championship contender; the satisfaction of ending a city’s 52-year championship drought; and also, more personally, the sadness that his mother, Kim, and grandmother, Olivia George, were in their respective homes in Houston and Mexico, Mo., battling cancer instead of being with him at Oracle Arena.
Lue never shared with his players his mother’s second bout with breast cancer or his grandmother’s fight with lung cancer and never allowed their struggles with chemotherapy throughout the year affect how he went about his job. Kim Lue had been too weak to travel during the playoffs, recovering from a double mastectomy and reconstruction, but she joined her son on his parade float in Cleveland.
“To hear the crowd chanting, ‘Ty Lue! Ty Lue!’ she started crying. That was an emotional thing. It was a great feeling. She was proud of me,” Lue said of his mother. “She’s a minister, so she told me, ‘I told you things would work out.’ She’s just is a very positive person. I guess you have to be, if you have to go through two breast cancers and you have to have chemo twice.”
Lue shares his mother’s positive attitude, a trait that was needed to help the Cavaliers overcome the distractions and dissension that couldn’t be washed over simply by winning early last season. Cavaliers general manager David Griffin made the controversial decision to dismiss David Blatt – despite the team having the best record in the Eastern Conference – and entrusted Lue to help a James-led, star-studded team reach its potential.
Initially apprehensive, Lue said he called Jerry West and Doc Rivers and both encouraged him to take the job, reminding him of the unique opportunity – especially for an African-American – to start his career with a team that was so close to winning. On the flip side, there was also pressure for Lue to produce a title before he had established an identity or habits as a head coach.
“With Coach Blatt being No. 1 in the East, doing a phenomenal job, you didn’t see it coming. But I’ve always worked toward being a head coach, so I was prepared,” Lue told The Vertical. “I really don’t ever equate it to pressure, but I guess it is some pressure. Pressure to me is growing up, trying to find where your next meal is going to come from, growing up in the projects, or growing up in a place where there is a bunch of poverty, or gangs. That’s more pressure to me. This is just basketball.”
The Cavaliers were ready to show their commitment to Lue by immediately giving him a contract extension, but he declined to sign any deal until July, when the championship provided the leverage to sign a more lucrative five-year deal worth $35 million. “I wasn’t really betting on myself,” Lue told The Vertical. “I wasn’t going to substitute my happiness for a job, just to be paid. It was about making sure this was the right thing for me. As far as an extension, I didn’t think it looked good. You fire a coach, hire a coach the same day, and it’s an extension on the table. I didn’t want to do that. And especially to be respectful to Coach Blatt, who I had a good relationship with and who I like a lot. That’s the reason I didn’t.”
Having won two championships as a player with the Los Angeles Lakers from 2000-01, Lue entered the job with some credibility among his players. But Lue earned their respect by holding all of them accountable – including James – and giving them defined roles and responsibilities to ensure they were fully engaged. He saved his greatest motivational tactic for the Finals, borrowing a trick from Rivers by taking money from his players after Game 5 in Oakland and hiding it, with the promise that it would be returned should they come back and win.
“Everything I do, coaching-wise, is Doc Rivers-driven. He meant a lot to me. He did a lot for me,” Lue told The Vertical. “He told me when I cried, he cried. Brian Shaw cried. A lot of guys that I’m around and I look up to … they said they cried because they were so happy for me. … I saw Coach Pop [Gregg Popovich] in Vegas with Team USA, he said, ‘I’ve been there. Everything is over. You’ve won it. You can exhale now. And it’s a sigh of relief.’ ”
The Cavaliers will receive their championship rings on Oct. 25 and plan to visit to the White House before the team faces Washington about two weeks later. Lue made it imperative that the Cavaliers were the final NBA champion to visit while President Barack Obama was still in office. “To meet the first black president means a lot. I’m thankful we’re going to be able to do that,” said Lue, who met Obama as an assistant with Boston and received a congratulatory phone call from him last summer.
After a recent practice, Lue walked into his office and paused for a moment to stare at a huge framed photograph of him speaking to fans during the championship rally. Cavaliers staffers were able to sneak in and hang the picture while Lue was on the practice court, much to his surprise. As he stood in amazement, Lue reflected on the day when he only began to understand how much a title meant for a long-suffering community. During the offseason, Lue was offered regular reminders as he spent time in Los Angeles and Las Vegas and could barely go anywhere without someone approaching, teary-eyed, to share the impact of the win.
“I didn’t know so many people were from Cleveland,” Lue told The Vertical with a laugh. “People come up to you like, ‘Thank you.’ I guess they couldn’t claim it until we won.”
Needing just 62 regular season and playoff games to join Rivers, Popovich, Erik Spoelstra, Rick Carlisle and Steve Kerr as the only active coaches with championships on their résumés, Lue has experienced a rapid and unparalleled ride to the top. But Lue isn’t under any delusion that he has already arrived. As he prepared for his first training camp as a head coach, Lue spent time studying schemes from San Antonio, Portland, the Los Angeles Clippers, Boston and Dallas, trying to devise sets that would work for his players as they prepare to defend the title.
“I wouldn’t say it motivates me, but there is always room to grow, there’s always room to get better,” Lue told The Vertical. “I know I inherited a great team, but I’m not going to have a great team my whole career, so I’ve got to continue to look for ways to get better.”
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