Would Larry Bird have been successful as the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers?
Would Larry Bird have been successful as the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers?Byron Scott will be on the bench as coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers tonight against the Charlotte Bobcats. But this may not have been the case if owner Dan Gilbert would have gotten his wish, according to ESPN's Marc Stein.
We all know that Michigan State coach Tom Izzo was Gilbert's first choice to replace Mike Brown as coach of the Cavaliers. But as it became clear Izzo would decline the Cavaliers' offer, Gilbert contacted another legend.
Sources close to the situation have confirmed that, before naming Scott as their new coach July 2, Cleveland officials thus contacted [Larry] Bird to see if they could convince the Indiana Pacers' team president to consider returning to coaching.
Bird did take the call, sources said, but quickly informed the Cavs that he had no interest in coaching again. Sources said Bird, 53, let Cleveland know that he wants to continue in his front-office work with the Pacers and that he has all but ruled out coaching again because of health and family reasons.
The Cavaliers were in search of a former player-turned-coach (unlike Brown) who would impress LeBron James, hopefully enough that James would have stayed here. Not only is Bird a Hall of Fame player, but he is also a former coach of the year.It appears, however, that the Cavs' conversations with Bird never got far enough to describe him as a full-fledged candidate to replace Brown. Scott, by contrast, was one of the first candidates Cleveland targeted and interviewed and commanded support within the Cavaliers' organization throughout the search process and the drawn-out pursuit of Izzo.