Heat part-owner downplays comment about LeBron trying to get Spo fired

During the radio interview, Katz revealed a bomb of a story-that LeBron James “made it clear” he wanted Erik Spoelstra fired during his tenure with the Miami Heat.

Cleveland fired coach David Blatt on Friday, and the apparent, overwhelming perception outside the Cavs’ organization – stretching from Miami to the Western Conference to Israel – is that it was James who shoved him out.

In the wake of David Blatt’s firing, many have wondered whether LeBron James is a “coach killer”.

One Israeli journalist described sentiments as such: “It’s a little bit joking and a little bit true: These days I can only compare the Israeli hate for LeBron James to the hate for Hamas”. Blatt’s inability to beat the Warriors ultimately appeared to be a big part of the reason he was sacked but even with Love and Irving healthy it will be tough for Cleveland to win an National Basketball Association championship and Lue’s lack of experience could come back to haunt them at some point.

“David Blatt’s main problem was LeBron’s attitude”, Katz said. There was no dialogue between Blatt and LeBron. It would be stupid to blame their loss to the Warriors in last year’s NBA Finals on Blatt when the Cavaliers were without both Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving and while they were beaten up by Golden State in their latest regular season rematch that likely had a lot more to do with the rosters than the coaching.

“Blatt did a great job in Cleveland.

I’ve never, in my time since I picked up a basketball, ever undermined a coach, ever disrespected a coach”, James said Wednesday after shootaround, in preparation for the Cavs’ home game against the Phoenix Suns. One solution that floated around was of team president Pat Riley taking over for Spoelstra as he had done in the 2005-06 season after then coach Stan Van Gundy resigned his position. Riley told James that Spoelstra is his guy, and that firing Spoelstra is out of the question.

Kantz was a shareholder of Israeli basketball team Maccabi Tel Aviv when Blatt coached there years ago, so this could be a case of the owner just sticking up for an old friend in Blatt.