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Should Dean Wade be considered for the Cavs’ starting lineup? Wine and Gold Talk podcast

Ethan Sands

What up, Cavs Nation? I’m your host, Ethan Sands, and I’m back with another episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast. I’m joined by your favorite beat reporter, Chris Fidor. It’s Taco Tuesday, Chris. How you feeling?

Chris Fedor (00:22.254)

I’m doing great, man. We actually had Chipotle for dinner earlier tonight on Taco Tuesday. Why not?

Ethan Sands (00:28.12)

Hey man, that is the way to go. I’m actually probably Chipotle’s biggest hater, but I’m gonna let it slide. I’m gonna let it slide for the day.

Chris Fedor (00:35.438)

I know you’ve expressed your displeasure with Chipotle and I can understand there are other people that don’t like it either. Some of the portions can be a little bit iffy. The quality varies, it feels like, from location to location or Monday to Tuesday, Tuesday to Friday, you know what I mean? So there just isn’t that level of consistency and I totally understand it. But it was Taco Tuesday, we didn’t want to cook.

Holly was already out doing some kind of errands. So we decided to go with Chipotle and Elliot loved it. I loved it. Holly loved it. It was great.

Ethan Sands (01:16.344)

So I went the authentic route. I went to Tapatía’s Taqueria for lunch today. Me and my girlfriend went out there. Yeah, had some good authentic food for Mexican food. It was delicious. I was excited to get it. And actually, this gets into the first topic, which is kinda in the funner realm of what we’re talking about today. And it’s Taco Tuesday. So I guess you gotta mention LeBron James who kinda made the…

Chris Fedor (01:23.118)

There you go.

Chris Fedor (01:43.534)

Yeah.

Ethan Sands (01:43.736)

term more famous than it had been before. And there’s two things to talk about with LeBron James. And we’ll start with the more fun side when it comes to that and we’ll get to business a little bit later. So LeBron had an interview or actually was on his own podcast, Mind The Game podcast, talking to JJ Reddick, who was the co -host of that. We’ll get into JJ a little bit later. But LeBron said and was talking about Kyrie Irving being in the finals of

Dallas Mavericks versus the Boston Celtics. We had a whole podcast about Kyrie Irwin and talked about that a lot in the latter half of a podcast recently. And I want to talk about what LeBron said. He called, he said that he had called Kyrie the wizard. He said that he missed playing with Kyrie and that he was upset that he is no longer Kyrie’s running mate. And Chris, I just want to get your sense of what it was like to

and watch those guys together and then also comparing that to watching Luca and Kyrie from afar.

Chris Fedor (02:50.254)

Man, LeBron and Kyrie together, it was magic. It really was. They played so well off of each other, Ethan. It was a really, really good pairing. And you could tell that during the time that they were playing together, especially early on, that they understood how each one was going to make the other one better and how each one could make things easier on the other.

And look, for all of the things that happened toward the end of the relationship between LeBron and Kyrie, and all the things that happened toward the end of Kyrie’s tenure with the Cavs that led to him being traded to Boston, LeBron always spoke extremely highly of Kyrie, even before LeBron came back to Cleveland. Like he was talking about Kyrie at the All -Star game and just how…

enthralled with Kyrie he was and how incredible of a talent Kyrie was and seeing him play at such a young age and do the things that he was able to do and the success that he was able to have individually at such a young age, that always captured LeBron’s attention. And a big reason why LeBron came back in 2014 was because Kyrie was here and because he wanted to play alongside Kyrie and he wanted to mentor Kyrie and he wanted to give, as LeBron liked to say,

He wanted to give Kyrie the blueprint for greatness. The only problem is Kyrie already had a basketball mentor. And it wasn’t LeBron. That wasn’t the guy that Kyrie looked up to. The guy Kyrie looked up to was Kobe. So LeBron was trying to be that to Kyrie and obviously they played together. So LeBron was giving him pointers on the sidelines and during stoppages and all that kind of stuff. But Kyrie looked up to Kobe.

not to LeBron, it was very, very different from that dynamic. But in saying that, they understood how they could make each other better. And LeBron felt like at that stage of his career, he needed a running mate like Kyrie. And I think Kyrie grew to understand that if he was going to become a champion, if he was going to learn some positive championship habits, if he was going to become a winning basketball player, something that he wasn’t.

Chris Fedor (05:08.206)

early on in his time with the Cavs. Now part of that was the Cavs were purposely tanking, but you know, he wasn’t a winner until LeBron came back. And I think Kyrie grew to understand that to become a winning basketball player, he had to learn how to be that. And he did learn how to be that alongside LeBron. So the pairing was, it was great. there, there are a lot of conversations about LeBron and D Wade together, LeBron and AD together.

I don’t know, man. Like, at the time that Kyrie and LeBron were together, I think there is a strong argument that that is the best running mate that LeBron had. And it’s because D -Wade was toward, like, the end of his career. He was just past his prime when LeBron latched on to him. Obviously, he was established as a champion. He was established as a Hall of Famer. But Kyrie, Prime Kyrie…

at the apex of his talents basically alongside LeBron. Like that was as good of a duo as you’re going to find in the NBA. And now you’re seeing Kyrie make that kind of connection with Luca. And if those two guys stay together, there’s no reason to think that Dallas isn’t going to be in a similar position to this one competing for championships. Obviously nothing is guaranteed in the NBA and things happen.

But if those two guys stay together, there are plenty of reasons to believe that this isn’t just a one -off thing for Dallas here.

Ethan Sands (06:47.352)

Yeah, Chris, and I think you made a really good point and something that Kyrie has actually touched on recently about how much of a mentor Kobe was for him at a young age. We’ve talked about him challenging him one on one and Kobe saying that he’s going to put $50 ‚000 to any charity if he were to win that game. Don’t know if that game ever happened. But I mean, that just knowing that that was him.

after his rookie of the year campaign and knowing that he was willing to put himself out there against one of the all -time greats in Kobe Bryant. And Kyrie talked about it recently, talking about how much he misses Kobe every day, how much like the mentorship that he misses as well and how he carries that every day and every play and things like that. And I mean, you also think about how he’s instilled that mentorship in the players around him. Like,

The Mavericks are a young group. They have Derek Lively, you think about. You think about Luke Adonchis, one of the up and coming running stars, and how much he needs mentorship because he’s never been to the NBA finals. But you also gotta realize how much Kyrie had to grow to get to this point. And some people say that he needed that tenure with LeBron James to do that, and some people say he needed that tenure in Brooklyn.

to deal with that because you got to see him go through adversity. He lost his grandfather. He lost Kobe Bryant in that stint. And you got to see him have to reevaluate who he was as a person. And I wrote about that for cleveland .com today and talked about how much the Cavs fandom should want to cheer on or root for Kyrie Irving because of what he’s gone through as a player and also what he meant to the city of Cleveland. And he’s not done nothing but show love.

to Cleveland since he’s left. So I think the next po – well, later on, later on.

Chris Fedor (08:41.102)

Well, well. Not initially. Initially on his way out.

Ethan Sands (08:50.488)

Yeah, yeah, definitely later on. Later on. And more recently, obviously. There you go.

Chris Fedor (08:53.134)

Yeah. Yeah. Recently is what you’re going for. Cause initially there was bad blood and he said, you know, Boston was a real sports town, unlike Cleveland. So yeah, there, there were some things that, that he said that obviously he regrets to this point, but you’re right. Recently he has talked about, growing up as a kid, like as a member of the Cavs, some of the great times that he had as a member of the Cavs.

A lot of the things that he learned as a member of the Cavs and thinking back fondly on those years with the Cavs. Those are reformative years for Kyrie, not just Kyrie the basketball player, but Kyrie the person as well.

Ethan Sands (09:35.096)

Yeah, and I mean, that’s really where my article went today was more the human aspect of it rather than the person. But the human aspect of it is you, because he wanted to get and went and got the attention and the counseling that he needed, you now continue to get to see one of the best ball handlers and one of the best finishers in the game. But the next part of that goes back to LeBron James, who the Cavs know and love very well. And he has a podcast.

Chris Fedor (09:50.734)

Mm.

Ethan Sands (10:05.048)

with JJ Reddick, who we alluded to earlier on in the podcast. And try saying that three times fast. JJ is apparently, reports are saying that JJ Reddick is now the front runner for the head coaching job with the Lakers, which one goes into the coaching search for the Cavs. I know we had never talked about JJ really being a true option for the Cavs, but it was up in the air.

But now knowing that he is the front runner for the Lakers job, you never know what could have gone on behind the scenes. But it’s very ironic that he’s got a podcast with LeBron James and how that dynamic could pan out. What do you think about that whole thing?

Chris Fedor (10:53.39)

Well, so from the very beginning of the Cavs coaching search, I mentioned without actually saying the person, because I didn’t think that it was necessary to say the person. I mentioned that there was at least one candidate that if he had his choice, he was going to pick the Lakers over the Cavs. And it was JJ. JJ would not theoretically turn down an opportunity to coach the Los Angeles Lakers.

that historic franchise with LeBron James for an opportunity to coach the Cavs. It just wasn’t going to happen. So I always felt like he wasn’t as realistic of a target for the Cavs as some of these other guys. But there’s a layer to this, Ethan, that affects the Cavs here. If you think back to the last couple of coaching searches that the Cavs have had, they went with David Blatt instead of Ty Lue. But…

They opened up the checkbook to make sure that Ty Lue was going to be on the staff of David Blatt as basically the lead assistant coach. He wasn’t paid like a head coach, but he was paid handsomely to be an assistant coach. And then after that, the Cavs went with John P. Line. That was a disaster. We don’t have to rehash that. But the runner up in that search was J .B. Biggerstaff.

And the Cavs made sure that they brought JB on that staff so it could be a reliable, stable NBA lifer to kind of help John B -line learn how to deal with day -to -day stuff in the NBA, to be his right -hand man, to teach him certain things that he didn’t know that he couldn’t have known because he wasn’t in the NBA. He didn’t have that experience. So.

I was getting the impression as this coaching search for the Cavs was going on and on and on that some of these guys that they are interviewing Ethan, like, yes, it’s for the head coaching job, but in the back of the mind of Kobe Altman and general manager Mike Ganzee and owner Dan Gilbert and the other decision makers within the organization in the back of their mind was this idea of, okay,

Chris Fedor (13:10.894)

If we get whoever it is as head coach, whoever it is we like the most as head coach, let’s keep whatever guy in mind to be the lead assistant. The Lakers, it seems like they’re doing the same thing. And I think part of the reason why they had such an extensive search is because they understand that if they’re going to go the route of JJ Reddick, he’s never been a coach at any level before.

He’s a first time coach in the NBA in Los Angeles. Just add that pressure and that expectation onto it on a team that is going to have championship aspirations because of LeBron James and Anthony Davis together. And because of a title window that is not closed completely, but that window is starting to close more and more and more each year. So you got to capitalize on the last couple of years of LeBron in the NBA.

So because like that seems to be the direction that they’re going, you know, the Lakers are going to try and find an experienced, smart, respected lead assistant coach for JJ. And there is conversation around the league that if JJ does indeed get this Lakers job, like it appears he’s going to, that he’s going to try and take James Borrego with him or one of those other guys that

the Lakers have interviewed during this process. And that could affect the Cavs. And it’s not to say that, you know, if you’re James Borrego and you have an opportunity to be the head coach of the Cavs, if that’s the direction that Cleveland ultimately goes, you’re not gonna turn that down to be an assistant to JJ. But, you know, if James Borrego isn’t the direction that the Cavs go, then he has the choice of, do I be?

Do I become the lead assistant for JJ Reddick in Los Angeles? Or do I become the lead assistant potentially for whoever it is in Cleveland? Or do I go back to New Orleans or whatever the case may be? And the same thing goes with some of these other candidates that the Cavs are looking at. So I do think that there is some level of interest when it comes to the Cavs coaching search.

Chris Fedor (15:32.814)

in what the Lakers ultimately end up doing. Because I do think that the Cavs have it in their mind to open up the checkbook once again to bring in a highly paid assistant coach, whoever it is that finishes runner up in this coaching search. But that guy, you know, if the Lakers opening is there, the assistant to JJ is there, then it becomes a more complicated discussion.

Ethan Sands (16:00.888)

And speaking of the Cavs coaching search, there was another person named assistant coach that got the Cavs got permission to interview today. That was the Denver Nuggets assistant, David Adelman as one of the next names. And he is someone who stepped in for Chris Finch during the playoffs when Chris Finch went down with an injury of his own. And it was just showing that, I mean, you have to step up into a brand new role.

randomly, basically tossed into the fire. And it’s like trial by fire is really sometimes the only way to learn, especially in a playoff scenario. It’s sometimes the best way that people can learn on the fly. And like you’re saying, they’re for the players and the coaches that could be going different places, but especially for this coaching search, you think about having.

somebody by your side that’s gone through the mud, gone through the fire, gone through those things. And you think about Chris Quinn and you think about other guys who have sat on the sidelines for championship runs and how those guys could impact guys like JJ Reddick who haven’t gotten the opportunity to coach at any level. Or you think about how the Cavs could double up on one of these coaches and have them still be in an assistant role, be like, hey, we’re gonna throw you a couple extra dollars because if he can’t get the job done, you up next. So.

Chris Fedor (17:03.406)

Mm -hmm.

Ethan Sands (17:25.016)

It’s really the thought process of one, that head coaching job for this next decision is big, one, for Kobe Altman, we’ve talked about that, added in abundance, two, it’s also big for whoever is in the assistant role, depending on what the Cavs end up doing, because you never know how quickly you might have to jump into that role. But, it’s…

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