Kevin Love quits on his team
doubledragon
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Cleveland Cavaliers player Kevin Love is getting smashed online for quitting on his team last night against the Toronto Raptors. As you can see, the referee tosses the ball to Kevin Love so he can inbound it, and Kevin Love just says, to heck with it all and smacks the ball to a Raptors player who quickly passes it to a teammate who drains a three. Check out the video and the story.
© Provided by Sporting News
Kevin Love called it quits on the Cavs on Monday.
During the Cavaliers’ 112-96 loss to the Raptors on the road, Love — who went to inbound the ball — slapped a pass from an official onto the court, where it became live. Toronto's Stanley Johnson grabbed the gifted turnover and passed the ball to Malachi Flynn, who easily sank an uncontested 3.
The sequence occurred with 29.4 seconds remaining in the third quarter, part of a 7-0 Raptors run that helped them to an 81-70 lead heading into the fourth. Cleveland only trailed 76-70 before Love committed the turnover. He did not play in the fourth quarter and left before the final buzzer sounded, finishing with 11 points and seven rebounds in the loss.
Love's play was the lowlight of a game in which Cleveland, down seven players, dropped to 21-40 on the season and 13th in the Eastern Conference standings. The Cavaliers have lost three straight, six of their last seven and eight of their last 10 and will miss the playoffs for the third year in a row.
Coach J.B. Bickerstaff quickly addressed the sequence in his postgame news conference, saying Love apologized to teammates and that the team would move on.
“You’ll have to ask Kevin,” Bickerstaff said when asked about the play in postgame (via Cleveland.com). “We talked about it. He apologized to his teammates for it and we’ll move on.”
Comments
Oh, I love the part when the Raptors player races up and drains the three.
To heck with it all!
Im a Cavs fan and I’m ready for the KLove era to be over.
Did he get credit for an assist? On the serious side he has had a problem with depression which can be quite debilitating.
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Ralph
That doesn't look very good.
Shame on Cleveland for not releasing him immediately after the game. I hope he does it again, the Cavs management deserve it
Isn't he making like $31 million a year? There's no excuse for that kind of lack of effort.
Almost hard to believe.
If somehow slapping the ball was a mental mistake of some sort, Love can't claim that because once he did it, he made no attempt to guard the opponent who got the ball.
If Love was injured or something, he could have just held the ball or caught it and laid it down out of bounds, or whatever. If it was a hand injury, just don't catch the ball.
If Love felt he wasn't ready to receive the ball from the ref, well then he should have been ready.
At the very least, Love should receive a very heavy fine that will sting him a bit. But he's probably so rich, he won't care much about that either.
what a loser.
literally.
I wouldnt have a player like that on my team. If I was the GM I would have come down to the court from the owners box or wherever he sits and released him on the spot.
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
I was just thinking about something. It is obvious that it is not only us on Sports Talk who are exasperated by this. But the reality is that many incidents like this happen in professional sports today, but most are nowhere near as egregious. And the owners, GMs, etc don't do anything about it. And won't. And there is something about that, which makes me feel a certain way inside, that just doesn't sit right.
The reason is simple. They care more about their investment portfolios, than they do about the game.
Each contract should be on a year to year basis, and except due to injury, if they get cut, no money is owed, IE no guaranteed contracts.
Oh well, ain't never going to happen so we're stuck watching unmotivated, pampered, wealthy professional athletes going thru the motions.
One good aspect about golf, tennis, bowling, etc, is these particular non-team athletes are trying their best each time they are out there. IE: No guaranteed contracts in which for the most part these type of contracts basically guarantees to produce not the best performance.
i'm not going to condemn Love the way most will. yes, what he did was inexcusable and should not be overlooked. yes, he should probably offer up an apology to the organization and perhaps even be fined. but i'm a context kinda guy, thus i looked into what happened before and after to get a better understanding of why this went down.
a minute before this infamous act he got drilled in the back by a Raptor and injured his knee -- he had a big, bloody strawberry on his cap. a foul was called. then the next time down the floor -- the play in question -- he got hit in the back again, but this time a ref -- who was standing a few feet away playing pocket pool -- swallowed his whistle. that's when Love lost his head and gave Toronto a free 3. but the very next time down the court the Cavs turned the ball over and Love sprinted back and tried to make a defensive play. so it appeared to be very temporary.
i don't follow him closely anymore and it would be humanly impossible for me to care less about this Cavs team, but i will assume he's a first-time offender over the duration of his entire career and thus i will personally give him the bare minimum -- a public admonishment.
Trust me, the cavs coaches, front office, and fans are fuming at him. He was whining as usual because he wasn’t getting calls during the game. So because he was angry at the officials, he flipped his team the bird. He is going to face some consequences from the team, believe me. If he didn’t have $60 million in two years left on his contract, he’d be on his way home right now. Frankly, the team is almost better off without him regardless. He is extremely immature and hasn’t shown 1 ounce of leadership since showing up at the team years ago.
Two things that I think did/didn’t happen in that sequence that led to what we saw: 1) you could tell he was pissed at the ref down in the bottom corner after that Raptors player scored inside but I couldn’t see what was the reason for it. 2) he might have been expecting the Cavs coach to call a timeout there with the way he nonchalantly just taps the ball. If you watch enough games you can see stuff like that all of the time but usually immediately following a coaches TO.
I wouldn’t call that play quitting on his team,he just looked like he was frustrated and his actions led to a meaningless basket.
Quitting on your team is Scottie Pippen taking himself out of a close playoff game against the Knicks all because Phil a Jackson drew up a play where Toni Kukoc took the game winning shot over Pippen.
Eric
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It looks like one play where a dude lost his cool and reacted in a way we consider lazy. If he had exploded on the ref and gotten thrown out, giving up the same 3pts or more (throws+ball), we’d probably applaud his fire (or decry him for being a moron)...but it’s the same dumb thing. Hurting your team because you don’t keep it together.
The Cavs hung on to him for some reason when LeBron left and I don’t know what they’ve done to help him out. He’s not the number 1 on a contending team and wasn’t going to be. Honestly, though, he seems like a good dude, overall, who has needed a better situation for awhile.
Whether or not Love acted in a way as terrible as the video looks, I stand by what I said earlier.
I think it was less that the Cavs hung on to him and more that they probably couldn’t find a taker when you factor in his contract and durability issues in recent years. If they moved him it would either have to be straight up for another albatross type player/contract (see the CP3/Westbrook & Westbrook/John Wall trades in recent years) or it would require the Cavs adding a lightly protected first in a salary dump like Philly did this past offseason with Al Horford going to OKC.
Eric
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All i know is if a customer gave me an order on the phone, and i called a competitor and gave them the order...i would be fired on the spot.
Wouldn't matter if i had a headache, backache, having a bad day, or whatever.
Technically this is what Kevin Love did. Gave a competitor the ball for an easy bucket. Doesn't matter why he did it...he did it.
And he made zero effort to defend after it happened.
I can assure you that is not how the team is viewing it. He has a history of this kind of stuff and for a guy making $30M a year, it just isn't acceptable.
He didnt have an albatross contract when Lebron left. The FO panicked when they lost Lebron and offered him a max contract to stay. Love said he wanted to be the man and kead the team as the #1 but he has done none of that. There is a lot that only those who closely follow the team would know. As i said, i cant wait for him to be gone.
Well then that’s on the Cavs for paying him all of that money and for thinking he could be their #1 guy. Even during his best years when he was averaging 26&12 while playing very close to 80 games a year he was never good enough as the #1 guy to get any of his teams to the playoffs.
On the plus side,you really have just one more season to wait after this one before his 29m salary turns into an asset as an expiring contract.
Eric
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I've been patiently waiting for Prof. Chang to make a Sports Talk appearance via DoubleD. And I have finally been rewarded. 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
@thisistheshow, It was just the right time for it.
Kevin Love, on the inbound.
........
My wife is in her second decade teaching HS Spanish. She never watched this show, but somehow found Prof Chang. And she thinks these scenes are hilarious.
Guys get warnings and punishments all the time in tennis for not trying.
It was > @thisistheshow said:
You know, I actually took a spanish class in high school and had to drop out of it and transfer to another class because I just couldn't figure out how to put sentences together. I could learn certain words , but I couldn't put sentences together. I remember "gato" is the spanish word for cat. I never forgot that.
If you look where the white arrow is, you can actually see Kevin Love after he purposely turned the ball over on the inbound, not much of an effort to play defense.
Never heard of him until now. The last time I watched an NBA game was 10-12 years ago. It was a playoff game. San Antonio against ? I thought the whole game looked like this Kevin Love incident. Pathetic. John Wooden is turning over in his grave.
Ok boomer.
Thanks for the compliment. I take it you've never seen a basketball team play defense............ And....do you like have any like way cool tattoos? Like, maybe like a spider web like on your like elbow or like some like real like bad ass like you know tattoo like you know umm like a skull so like everyone in line at the AM PM like
when you get like your like M&M's and Monster drink like knows you really are like a like TERRIFYING like BAD DUDE? I'm like all thinking you like you like do. Like I'm all want to like umm like know..
Anyone who thinks the NBA doesn't play defense isn’t watching the same game i am. These are the best athletes in the world playing with intensity against ridiculous scorers (the most talented scorers as a whole ever). A team from 1960 would have no chance against a top ten team today. No chance.
Monster Drink, vodka, and listening to voices on T.V. saying "WORLDS BEST ATHLETES...... WORLDS BEST ATHLETES" ad nauseam is a bad mix.
"The mustard is off the hotdog!"......." Put him in the popcorn machine! "......" Four point turnaround! ".......AND........" THE WORLD'S BEST ATHLETES! ".........who coined those phrases? I know. You don't. It's all fun.....but....HYPE! Believe the hype if you want to. I don't care.
Hey, Ringo. Why do you think NBA players today are "the most talented scorers as a whole ever?" Why do you think NBA players today are the "best athletes in the world?" Why? Anybody can say anything. Just because the voices on T.V. say so doesn't make it so. Explain.
To jump in on this a little bit...the rules are different today than in the past and definitely favor the offense. Today’s athletes have better training and nutrition than any other time in our history and are training and specializing earlier than ever before (they’ve been decrying the absence of the 4sport letterman for 20yrs).
I’ve got unrelated theories about how gene pools can only get diluted on the whole, but that’s probably for a different forum.the point is that the dudes out there today are tremendous athletes who’ve been able to put more time/money/effort/science into their craft than anyone who came before them. The fact that they aren’t out there hand checking and body slamming anymore is due to rules changes. There’s no place for a Kermit Washington in today’s game (unfortunately?).today’s guys are mostly spoiled, I don’t deny that one bit, but they’re quitting on an inbounds play in a meaningless (to their season) game. Not doing crack between playoff games.
Comparing eras is tough business.
And just who is drinking Monster, vodka and listening to voices?
This much is indisputable. Performance in every sport is significantly better today than it was 60 years ago.
Let’s look at just one metric, shooting. At the end of Larry Bird’s career he was widely considered the greatest shooter ever. His three point shooting percentage was .376. Today, there are 95 players shooting a better percentage than Larry bird. Just take his best year ever in his prime at .427. There are currently 13 players above his high watermark. Shooters today are far superior to what they were even 30 years ago. I’m sure somebody will do cry the mid range jumper. But it’s not there today shooters can’t make those or aren’t better than shooters for mid range 30 to 60 years ago. It’s that they don’t take them because the metrics tell them a wide-open three is a better shot because its worth 50% more. Anyone watching today’s players shooting mid range jumpers nose that they are extremely good from there as well.
And don’t even get me started on the 6’10” wing players who can put the ball on the floor and shoot the three. There are 6 to 10 players today that would absolutely destroy the 1962 NBA.
@ringer Are you seriously using Larry Bird in your example comparing today's shooters to shooters of previous eras to prove that today's shooters are better?
There are many more accurate shooters than there were years ago. Before the three point shot teams tried to get the ball as close to the goal as possible. If a player was shooting from what is three point range today but was only getting credit for two he would find himself on the bench.
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Ralph
Players like Bird did not even really practice the three, and most of his practice came later in his playing life. In fact, they barely took three pointers. Bird could accurately shoot from any spot on the floor, from any angle. I am not going to argue that all shooters from other era are better than now. But he is not the one to use in comparison. Many , myself included, consider him the greatest shooter ever.
Love had his issues here in Minnesota. He put up great numbers, but when he wasn't offered a contract he liked, he apparently wanted out.
He is not fondly remembered here.
Hard to blame him from wanting out of here though, worst sports franchise in the history of sports.
Here’s Kevin Love’s own words about that play taken from an article on USA Today:
“The intent there wasn’t malicious," Love told USA TODAY Sports on Tuesday. "It wasn’t against the team."
With 33 seconds left in the third quarter, Raptors guard Malachi Flynn drove past Love for a layup just before Raptors forward Freddie Gillipsie shoved Love from behind. After stopping his momentum at the stanchion, Love glared at official Courtney Kirkland. Earlier in the game, Love had also been shoved from behind without any call. So when official Brandon Schwab gave Love the ball for the inbounds pass, he swatted at the ball instead of passing it to Cavs guard Darius Garland. The ball incidentally went in-bounds, resulting in Raptors forward Stanley Johnson picking up the loose ball and finding Flynn for the open 3-pointer.
"Not to say too much that could get me fined, but it was the officiating," Love said. "When I snagged that ball, I didn’t realize it wasn’t even inbounds. I was a little thrown off. I was going to go grab it and throw back into passing the ball to DG and move on. I get the optics. That’s something I have to take on the chin and understand that was a very bad look."
So after sitting the entire fourth quarter, Love said he apologized to the team in the locker room where teammates, coaches and front office staff were present. Love said "they all understand it was a quick moment," and the Cavaliers are not expected to discipline him. He added that he and Cleveland coach J.B. Bickerstaff "have a great relationship." But after an unnamed teammate showed Love video of the incident, he became more aware of the potential big-picture ramifications.
"It’s something that you handle internally," Love said. "Over the course of the season, these types of things happen. Now in the world that we live in, that becomes a viral video or a meme. Everybody starts to talk about it. But with the relationship I have with my teammates, coaches and front office, everybody will take these 24-48 hours and then move on."
Eric
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Which is exactly why are used him in the example. Whether he practiced the three-pointer or not is irrelevant. There are at least a dozen shooters today that are more accurate than he is. It doesn’t mean they were better players, just better shooters. I mean, are you actually saying bird is a better shooter than Stephen Curry?
...............
I think there was a mistake in the article. I fixed it @doubledragon