Three-Man Weave: Which coach will be on the NBA’s hottest seat in 2015-16?
After winning just one division title in their first 18 years of NBA existence, the Raptors have won back-to-back Atlantic Division crowns under Casey.
The Raps also finished third in the NBA in points scored per possession, landed point guard Kyle Lowry in the starting lineup for the 2015 Eastern Conference All-Star team, and made a second straight playoff appearance for the first time since the 2006-07 and ’07-’08 seasons.
(Masai does love to tinker.) But after taking steps to shore up the leaky defense while still allowing Toronto to build around its All-Star backcourt of Lowry and DeMar DeRozan and crafting a roster capable of keeping that top-flight offense humming with more frequent sojourns into the sort of small-ball with which the Wizards killed the Raps in April, Ujiri’s message to Casey seems clear: if we don’t get better and go farther now, or if we start the season as sluggishly as we finished it, there might not be another vote of confidence coming your way.
He can drape his arm around Blatt in front of national TV cameras and the Cavaliers could settle into their typical East-leading, 60-win havin’ ways, but Blatt will be on the hook until James and company finally take that title.
Notice that I wrote “James and company,” because Blatt will never get the credit should Cleveland win it all, and unless one of his three stars turns in a botched performance for the ages in a losing series (or if one or two stars go down with injury, as happened last season), he’ll always take the blame should his team fall.
He and personnel chief Vlade Divac have already reportedly clashed over what to do with star big man DeMarcus Cousins, and though Karl will do whatever it takes to hang on long enough to break the NBA’s record for all-time coaching wins (he’s 193 wins short of Don Nelson’s mark), it’s hard to get a read on this tempestuous organization.
A coach who took an undermanned squad to within two wins of the franchise’s first NBA title should not necessarily fear for his job, but this offseason’s mass exodus of embattled coaches and Randy Wittmann’s ongoing battle with imminent death syndrome mean that Blatt will receive a great deal of attention as a coach who needs to prove himself to both the public and his organization.
By “organization,” we mostly mean LeBron James, who joined the Cavaliers in July 2014 after Blatt had been hired to guide a problematic young team to a mere playoff berth.
The vast majority of new NBA head coaches do not have the luck of coaching the best player of his generation, two other All-Stars, and a bevy of capable role players.
Unless the team experiences an outright postseason failure, Blatt will be judged on how well he works with LeBron, whether Love looks like more than a superior version of Channing Frye on offense, and the extent to which this loaded roster develops into a destructive force.