The Blueprint

by Jason Lloyd

  But that wasn’t the end of the concessions. Whereas previously James often guarded an opponent’s best player, that couldn’t continue. Lue was asking James to do so much offensively that he pulled his defensive assignments, and he often left James on weaker players so he could save his energy for the offensive end. All of those factors, along with Lue trying to hold back some of his better schemes for the postseason, caused the Cavs’ defensive game to deteriorate dramatically. They habitually coughed up big leads, fell into bad defensive habits, and often lost focus. They got distracted too easily and couldn’t be bothered to play hard on many nights.

  They ranked ninth in the NBA during the championship season in defensive rating, which standardizes how many points teams allow per hundred possessions. In the 2016–17 season, they tumbled to twenty-first.

  Why was that so important? No team had finished outside the top ten in defensive rating and still won a championship since the 2001 Lakers. Lue was a reserve guard on that team. Like the Cavs, those Lakers were defending a championship and dealt with complacency and some injuries during the season. Lue promised things would improve during the postseason, and for a while he was right.

  The Cavs’ collapse at the end of the regular season, when they lost their last four games, handed the number one seed and home-court advantage in the playoffs to the Celtics. That meant the Cavs would have to open the conference finals on the road, but privately no one in the organization thought the Celtics had a realistic chance of beating the Cavs, so they weren’t overly concerned.

  The Cavs won their first ten playoff games, including sweeps of the first two rounds, just as they did during the championship season. They improved dramatically defensively by following Lue’s intricate blitz schemes, which they rarely showed during the regular season. Lue’s focus was to eliminate an opponent’s best player. They caused fits for the Pacers’ Paul George in the first round and Toronto’s DeMar DeRozan in the conference semifinals by sending two defenders at them and forcing the ball out of their hands.

  The Pacers had a chance to steal the playoff opener at the buzzer when C. J. Miles missed an open jumper, but then the Pacers blew the biggest halftime lead in playoff history when the Cavs rallied from a twenty-five-point deficit to steal Game 3 at Indiana. But each victory in the postseason seemed to strengthen the Cavs. Although they blew Game 3 at home against Boston, spoiling their perfect march through the East, the Cavs had little trouble eliminating the Celtics in five games—just as most everyone in the organization had predicted.

  James surpassed Michael Jordan as the NBA’s all-time postseason scoring leader in that Game 5 victory, turning James’s seventh consecutive trip to the NBA Finals into an homage to Jordan.

  “For my name to come up in the discussion with the greatest basketball player of all time, it’s like, wow,” James said. “I did pretty much everything that M. J. did when I was a kid. I shot fadeaways before I should have. I wore a leg sleeve on my leg and folded it down so you saw the red part. I wore black and red shoes with white socks. I wore short shorts so you could see my undershorts underneath. I didn’t go bald like Mike, but I’m getting there. But other than that, I did everything Mike did. I even wore a wristband on my forearm. I did everything Mike did, man.”

  And now James was chasing that ghost to the Finals again, seeking his fourth championship in an effort to match Jordan’s six rings. But he was going to have to do it against those same mighty Warriors, who stormed through the West playoffs with an average margin of victory of 16.2 points. And now they had Durant. Even losing coach Steve Kerr to health concerns in the first round couldn’t slow them. The Warriors swept through the twelve wins behind acting head coach Mike Brown—the same Brown the Cavs had fired three years earlier. The same Brown whom James credits with teaching him the importance of defense early in his career. And the same Brown to whom owner Dan Gilbert will pay severance checks until 2020.

  But the Warriors were much more than Brown. They were perhaps the most talented team ever assembled and they had been plotting their revenge against these Cavs for the past year. After all of the “Warriors blew a 3–1 lead” jokes; James’s Halloween party shenanigans; and another Cavs victory in this series on Christmas Day, when Irving made yet another shot in the final seconds to give Cleveland another stunning win in basketball’s best rivalry, these Warriors were ready to unleash their anger.

  “If Cleveland comes out of the East, I want to destroy Cleveland,” outspoken Warriors forward Draymond Green told NBA.com in October. “No ifs, ands, and buts about it. But I also know that there’s steps to get to that point. And if and when we get to that point, I want to annihilate them.”

  Green finally got his chance, and the Warriors didn’t disappoint. The Cavs privately hoped the nine-day layoff would disrupt Golden State’s rhythm, but it didn’t. The Warriors outscored the Cavs 33–20 in the third quarter to win the opener 113–91 and extend their postseason record to 13-0. When the Cavs forced twenty turnovers in Game 2, but the Warriors still scored 132 points and won by 19, everyone in the organization knew the Cavs were in trouble. Durant was the reason why.

  “You take one of the best teams that we had ever assembled last year, that we saw in the regular season and in the postseason, and then in the off-season you add a high-powered offensive talent like [Durant] and a great basketball IQ like that, that’s what stands out,” James said. “It’s no if, ands, or buts. It is what it is. We got to figure out how to combat that, which is going to be a tough challenge for us. But that’s what stands out.”

  Cleveland returned home down 0-2 in the series, which forced Lue to make some changes. He was frustrated with the lack of focus he was seeing defensively. Guys were turning their heads and getting beaten on backdoor cuts. The defense would stay locked in for twenty seconds, then break down at the end of shot clocks. Lue had been hesitant to use some of the blitz schemes that were so effective against East teams because of how powerful the Warriors were. They simply deployed too much shooting, and double-teaming guys was viewed as too risky, particularly against the starters. But nothing else was working and Lue was running out of options.

  As we walked toward the Cavs locker room prior to Game 3, Lue told me he was going to run two defenders at Steph Curry and Durant and force the ball out of their hands.

  “We’ve got to try something,” Lue said. “We aren’t just going to roll over and die.”

  The Cavs played one of their finest games of the season in Game 3. James scored thirty-nine points and Irving scored thirty-eight. A three-pointer from Smith, who struggled badly in the first two games, extended Cleveland’s lead to 113–107 with 3:09 left. But it was the last basket of the night for the Cavs. Kerr, who returned for Game 2, kept reassuring his players that James and Irving were eventually going to wear down. James played forty-six minutes and Irving forty-four. Eventually, Kerr was right. James and Irving appeared exhausted by the end of the game. James’s last field goal came with 6:55 left, Irving’s with 5:29 to play. The Cavs missed their last seven shots and the Warriors escaped with a 118–113 victory. James and the Cavs threw their best punch and it still wasn’t enough.

  “Before the series even started we knew what we was dealing with. I said it after we won the Eastern Conference finals that we’re getting ready for a juggernaut. It’s probably the most firepower I’ve played in my career. I played against some great teams, but I don’t think no team has had this type of firepower,” James said after the Game 3 loss. “So even when you’re playing well, you’ve got to play like A-plus-plus. We made enough plays tonight to still win the ball game, but they made a couple more.”

  The Warriors were one victory away from becoming the first team in history to go 16-0 in the postseason. They were also one win away from dousing the visiting locker room at Quicken Loans Arena again in champagne, the site of their first championship celebration in 2015. James spoke on the day before Game 4 like a man resigne
d to his fate, like a man who knew he was outmatched. When asked about whether what the Warriors did was fair by adding a superstar like Durant to an already established juggernaut, James never hesitated.

  “Is it fair? I don’t care. I mean, I think it’s great. It’s great for our league,” he said. “Look at our TV ratings, look at the money our league is pouring in. I mean, guys are loving the game, our fans love the game. Who am I to say if it’s fair or not? No matter who I’m going against, if I’m going against four Hall of Famers, like I said before the series started with Draymond, Klay, Steph, and KD, or if I’m going against two or whatever the case may be, I’m always excited to play the game. And I’m not one to judge and say if it’s fair or not if guys are adding players to their team. Is it fair that the New York Yankees in the ’90s was adding piece after piece after piece after piece? Is it fair that the Cowboys added Deion Sanders? I mean, listen. It happens. It’s sports. You have an opportunity to sign one of the best players, and you can do it, go ahead and do it. Why not? If I become an owner, I’m going to try to sign everybody.”

  The Cavs avoided the sweep with a magnificent performance in Game 4. Forty-eight hours after that crushing Game 3 loss that left the locker room devastated, the Cavs found the strength to rally behind James’s triple-double (thirty-one points, ten rebounds, eleven assists) and Irving’s forty points. The Cavs smashed the Warriors 137–116, setting up another round of half-hearted “Warriors blew a 3–1 lead” jokes. Only these weren’t the same Warriors. Not with Durant.

  He scored thirty-nine points in Game 5, and the Warriors extracted their revenge with a 129–120 victory and their second championship in three seasons. Durant was named NBA Finals MVP and James went home a loser, despite becoming the first player in history to average a triple-double in the Finals. When the Cavs lost to the Warriors in 2015, James sat at his locker for nearly an hour wrapped in a towel with his face hidden in a second towel. This time, however, he was showered, dressed, and at the podium before the Warriors had all of the champagne bottles uncorked. Although he denied it on the podium following the Game 5 loss, it seemed throughout the series that James knew he didn’t have enough to topple these revamped Warriors.

  “I left everything on the floor every game, all five games. So for me personally, I have no reason to put my head down,” James said. “I have no reason to look back at what I could have done or what I shouldn’t have done or what I could have done better for the team. I left everything I had out on the floor every single game for five games in this Finals, and you come up short . . . it’s just not my time.”

  The Finals loss thrust Griffin into the spotlight one more time. While Lue signed a rich five-year, $35 million contract after the season that made him one of the game’s highest-paid coaches, and guys like J. R. Smith, Tristan Thompson, Kevin Love, and Iman Shumpert all got contract extensions, Griffin never got his rich extension. That he was working on the final year of his deal was one of the quiet mysteries of the season.

  When Masai Ujiri had two years left on his contract in Toronto and the Warriors’ Bob Myers had two years left on his deal, owners tore up their old deals and offered the executives new extensions to keep them in place. But that didn’t happen here. And while Griffin and Gilbert chatted during the season, Gilbert never expressed a desire to bring Griffin back.

  Gilbert went through a bit of an ownership shakeup following a dispute with his partners, Jeff Cohen and Nate Forbes. They had been friends since college, but Cohen and Gilbert had a falling out over a business deal outside of the Cavs. After he was such an important piece of reuniting James with Cleveland, Forbes also pulled back in his involvement with the team.

  Griffin, meanwhile, had his own list of demands that included a significant raise and more power within the organization. He privately said on more than one occasion that he’d only come back if certain demands were met. The Cavs’ season ended on Monday, June 12. Griffin and Gilbert met to discuss an extension on Friday, four days later. Gilbert was surprised by some of Griffin’s requests. So surprised, in fact, that he canceled a second meeting set for Sunday. Griffin continued to work in the GM role, which meant working the phones for trades to upgrade the roster.

  On Monday, Gilbert called Griffin down to the Q to meet again. On the one-year anniversary of the Cavs’ championship parade, when more than one million people flooded into downtown Cleveland, Griffin drove to the arena expecting a contract extension. Instead, Gilbert told him they were done. He was essentially fired with eleven days left on his contract. Trent Redden, the Cavs’ number two man in the front office, went with him.

  Redden’s contract also expired at the end of the year. He should’ve been next in line. When Danny Ferry walked off the job in 2010, Chris Grant was promoted. When Grant was fired, Griffin was promoted. Redden spent eleven years in various roles with the Cavs after he was hired straight out of college by Grant to be an intern. But he was a bit of a prodigy. The Cavs were so impressed with his work that they sent him out to scout games, which is unheard of for an intern. He worked his way up to assistant GM, but at thirty-three, he was out, too. No one really knows what Redden did to get removed, other than the fact that he never really fostered much of a relationship with Gilbert.

  Griffin’s removal began a 2017 summer of upheaval. Irving went to Cavs ownership in early July and requested a trade. He can’t become a free agent until 2019, but he has grown tired of living in LeBron’s shadow. He wants the opportunity to guide his own franchise and enjoy the power that comes with it. Nothing lasts forever, particularly in the NBA. Grant, Griffin, and Irving all played various roles in guiding Cleveland to a championship. By the start of the 2017–18 season, all of them were gone.

  Irving was traded to the Boston Celtics, while Koby Altman was promoted from third chair to GM, replacing Griffin. Now the focus will turn back to James—joined for the 2017–2018 season by his friend Dwyane Wade—because the lens is never far from him anyway. James accomplished his goal of bringing a championship back to Cleveland. Now he can be a free agent again in the summer of 2018. Somewhere out there, another franchise is assembling another blueprint. . . .

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book never would have been possible if LeBron James didn’t return to Cleveland and bring the city a championship. Thanks first to him for being the most accessible superstar of this generation. Before and after games, in private moments in locker rooms and hallways across the country, LeBron always has time for those of us who travel everywhere the Cavs go. For that I am grateful.

  Special thanks to Chris Grant for pulling back the curtain during his time as Cavs general manager and revealing enough of the breadcrumbs to lead me down this trail. To past and present team officials Danny Ferry, David Griffin, Trent Redden, Koby Altman, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, and Brock Aller. Coaches Tyronn Lue, David Blatt, Mike Brown, and Byron Scott. Cavs media relations officials Tad Carper, B. J. Evans, Jeff Schaefer, Sarah Jamieson, Cherome Owens, and Alyssa Dombrowski.

  To past and present players Kevin Love, Kyrie Irving, Richard Jefferson, Channing Frye, Matthew Dellavedova, J. R. Smith, Iman Shumpert, Anderson Varejao, Tristan Thompson, Tyler Zeller, Brendan Haywood, and Dion Waiters.

  Thanks to my agent, Bridget Matzie, for bringing this project to me. I knew this book existed in my head, but Bridget brought it to life. Thanks to my Penguin Random House editor Jill Schwartzman and her staff for tolerating me when I went off the grid for stretches during the season and for poring over every syllable of this manuscript.

  Thank you to fellow beat writers Joe Vardon, Dave McMenamin, and Joe Gabriele. Every night is a Saturday night with you. And to past and present colleagues Mary Schmitt-Boyer, Bob Finnan, Chris Haynes, Brian Windhorst, Rachel Nichols, and Lee Jenkins for providing a lifetime of laughs and memories. To Bruce Hooley for making me a better reporter.

  To my children, Alex, AJ, and Ava, I’m so sorry I’m not home more. This job takes me
to all corners of this earth and I miss you so much when I’m gone. One day I hope you’ll forgive me for missing so many birthdays. To my wife, Alessia, thank you for wearing so many hats in my absence. I love you all.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  © David Richard

  Jason Lloyd is a lifelong resident of Northeast Ohio. He has covered the World Series, the NCAA Tournament, the BCS National Championship Game, and the NBA Finals, and he has won several state and national awards for his work covering the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Cleveland Cavaliers. He has also worked for ESPN.com, Lindy’s Sports, Cleveland Magazine, and CBSSports.com. He and his wife, Alessia, live in Avon Lake, Ohio, with their three children.

  www.Twitter.com/JasonLloydABJ

  www.Instagram.com/jasonlloydabj

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