LeBron James and the Cavs couldn’t right the ship in Tuesday’s loss to the Phoenix Suns. At one moment during the game, James, who was making his return from injury, actually shoved head coach David Blatt. LeBron of course, was trying to save his coach from getting a technical foul. Seems more and more likely each game, however, that David Blatt won’t be this team’s long term head coach.
James explained the shove of Blatt to Dave McMenamin of ESPN:
James and Blatt assured media the push looked worse than it really was. Both player and coach said James was simply saving Blatt from being called for a technical foul.
“I got called for an offensive foul, and they said I hooked one of the Morris twins on a post-up when he grabbed me,” James said after the game. “It was a referee that was away from the play [who called it]. I was talking to Eric Lewis, one of the other refs, and Coach Blatt was getting a little fired up about it, too, and he was on his way to a technical. So I just got him up out of the way before he got a T. So, just protecting my coach.”
Blatt echoed James’ explanation.
“He was trying to keep me from getting a technical foul,” Blatt said.
When a reporter suggested that usually it’s the coach holding the player back from being whistled for a tech and not the other way around, Blatt retorted: “He wasn’t arguing with the official; I was.”
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Watch entire sequence below:
[Oakleyandallen, Ben Golliver]
