For the first time since he was the Cleveland Cavaliers head coach, John Lucas will be facing his former team from the opposite bench. Lucas, now an assistant coach with the Los Angeles Clippers, has decided to open his mouth in honor of the reunion.

For the first time, Lucas is claiming that in the 2002-2003 season, the Cavs main goal was to tank the season in order to draft high school standout LeBron James and sell the team. Did they tank that year? Honestly, they were bad anyway, so it’s really hard to tell. Is it possible? More or less, because they knew the Ohio star was entering the NBA draft and was a sure shot number one pick.

In case you forgot, the Cavs tied the Nuggets for worst record in the NBA that season with a 17-65 record. Now, they weren’t even guaranteed the first overall pick despite having the worst record because of the lottery system.

You know what, sounds like someone’s a little bitter. Lucas was fired midway through that season, a season in which they dumped many of their players. He doesn’t necessarily blame the team for doing all of this though, because the Cavs were repeatedly one of the worst in the league, but Lucas feels he really had no chance to succeed. Not only that, but he says he was ordered to play his young players.

Gordon Gund – yes, as in Gund Arena (now Quicken Loans Arena) – was the principal owner at the time and of course he disputes these claims. He states that the lottery is put in place to prevent a situation like this, but I’m sure he remembered the Spurs/Tim Duncan draft. Tanking can work.

That season, the team traded Andre Miller to the Clips for Darius Miles (who was washed up by then) and Harold Jamison (who was waived). They also traded leading scorer Lamond Murray (remember him?) for Yogi Stewart (yeah..). Finally, they traded G’s boy Wesley Person for the 49^th pick in the draft.

Gund says those trades had to happen. They wanted to keep Andre Miller but he made too much money. He says Lamond Murray was not a key player, which is not true – he was that team. And Wesley Person was washed up, which he kind of was.

Either way, Lucas was fired and now he is exercising those demons that were around when he left. Did the Cavs lose on purpose? You can’t rule that out, but I would hope that wasn’t the case. You know what though, the players can win games no matter what the roster is. I mean even the Nets have 3 wins this year….. But what I’m saying is the players attitudes and intensity is what will determine if a team is good or bad.

What is your opinion on the matter?

Do you think the Cavs tanked? Do you think they were wrong if they did? Do you feel teams are willing to do this?

-Shooter