The general consensus around the NBA is that the Cleveland Cavaliers are tanking this season to try and get the opportunity to select Duke phenom Zion Williamson with the No. 1 overall pick of the draft this June.
Don’t tell that to Kevin Love, though.
The Cavaliers big man rejects the idea that his team is tanking, saying that Cleveland is trying to win:
“No. I was looking at Phoenix. Champ (James Jones, Phoenix’s interim GM) was telling me the same thing, ‘You’ll feel it when you’re out there. We’re trying to win. We’re just too young to figure it out,'” said Love in reference to tanking, according to Jason Lloyd of The Athletic. “So long as I’m out there, I just can’t go there in my mind. It goes back to the circle when I was young. I never want to wish away my time in the NBA because I know like anything in life, it’s fast fleeting.”
To be perfectly honest, Love’s point is pretty irrelevant.
Players never tank. It’s front offices that do, and it seems blatantly obvious that the Cavs are trying to do their best to earn as high of a draft pick as possible.
To be fair, the Cavaliers did not go into the 2018-19 campaign with that intention, as evidenced by the fact that they signed Love to a four-year contract extension.
However, after it became apparent that Cleveland wasn’t going anywhere, it’s clear that the franchise’s direction shifted.
The Cavs currently own a record of 16-48.
