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Why did Cavaliers fire Tyronn Lue? ‘Disconnect’ between playing youth, veterans

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The Cavaliers decided to fire Tyronn Lue, which according to Chris Mannix, stemmed from a conflict between Lue and the front office about who should be playing right now.

The Cavaliers spent the offseason being pulled in two different directions — and they had the hubris to believe they could pull both off. On the one hand was the desire to develop young stars that would be the next generation and iteration of the Cavaliers. However, Cleveland thought they could keep on winning while doing that, hence giving Kevin Love $120 million and keeping Kyle Korver, J.R. Smith, and others on the roster.

Needless to say, that didn’t work out, the Cavaliers are 0-6. Coach Tyronn Lue became the fall guy for this, he was fired Sunday morning.

The ultimate disagreement was was about playing the youth — Collin Sexton, Cedi Osman and others who have potential but are not going to win a lot right now — vs. more run for the veterans on the roster. Lue, always the players’ coach, leaned veterans. That became the “disconnect” between the two sides according to multiple reports.

“We wanted to overachieve?” Really? “We set our sights so ridiculously high the ghost of Red Auerbach couldn’t have coached this team to success, so we fired the coach” seems more accurate.

The distrust of management in Cleveland — more owner Dan Gilbert than GM Koby Altman, Gilbert never keeps GMs and coaches around long — has led to a strange situation with the interim coach for the team. The Cavaliers want Larry Drew to take it, he has former head coaching experience in Atlanta and Milwaukee (he was the guy pushed out the door so Bucks’ ownership could bring in Jason Kidd).

But Drew is too experienced to just walk into a bad situation — and make no mistake, this is a bad situation — without a lot more money and some job security. And that where things are hung up. Drew says he is not the interim coach, just the voice of the coach for a while, which may be the strangest description ever.

Good times in Cleveland!