Chess Not Checkers?

The John Beilein experiment with the Cleveland Cavaliers' is over, and it didn't last for one entire season. Beilein could only handle being in charge of an NBA team for one half of the season (and I don't think anyone is surprised). The decisions that the Cleveland Cavaliers' have made since LeBron James has left have been head scratchers, and this one was no different.  Out of all of the possible candidates that were available for them to sign as their head coach, they decided to go with a 67 year old life long college coach. Now don't get me wrong, John Beilein's resume as a college coach is not bad at all (coached 4 different teams to the NCAA tournament with 2 championship game appearances) but coaching kids and grown men are totally different. He had a "mishap" earlier in the season when he called his players "thugs" and said he meant to use the word "slugs". Players were complaining about how he dealt with them. He never understood that the kids who he was used to yelling at were grown men with families and egos. Hard to yell at people that make more money than you (if you don't believe me, go to work tomorrow and yell at your boss). The problem is not that they gave Beilein a chance, the problem is that we have seen this story far too many times. Everyone is not going to be able to make the transition as smooth as Billy Donovan did. More likely than not, most people will end up flaming out like John Calipari or Rick Pitinio. But enough about John Beilein, lets focus on the Cavaliers' organizational choices over the past 2 seasons. As times goes on, we see why LeBron chose to leave them again. They seem to always make a difficult situation even worse. Why would you decide to experiment with a team that was mixed with veterans and rookies? Why would you draft another point guard (Darius Garland) after you drafted one the previous year (Colin Sexton)? Most importantly, why would you not choose a younger coach who could grow and learn with this team? Be honest with yourself, no one thought that a 67 year old coach would finish out a 5 year deal. It just seems like Cleveland is playing chess while the rest of the league (minus the Hornets and Suns) are playing checkers.

-CG