The John Beilein era is over in Cleveland after less than one full season.
Beilein resigned from his position as head coach of the Cavs on Wednesday, citing health reasons as the key component behind his decision.
Former assistant J.B. Bickerstaff will be promoted to head coach. Bickerstaff—a longtime assistant in the league—previously coached the Houston Rockets and Memphis Grizzlies.
Cavaliers forward Kevin Love passed his regards along, saying “I respect the hell” out of Beilein while also iterating the losing has taken a toll on everyone:
Indeed, Love’s initial frustrations were part of what kicked off the internal drama in Cleveland.
Love repeatedly vented his frustration abut his lack of involvement on the offensive end, and he was fined $1,000 after this particular outburst:
That was merely the beginning, however, as Love reportedly lashed out at Cavaliers general manager Koby Altman during a team shootaround in January.
Still, things appeared to cool between Love and the front office. Cleveland elected not to suspend Love, and the former All-Star apologized to his teammates.
But Beilein was already losing his grip on the locker room, especially after calling his players a “bunch of thugs.” At the time, however, Love was one of the players to come to Beilein’s defense:
However, other players in the locker room (understandably) had a hard time letting the comment slide.
Shams Charania, Jason Lloyd and Joe Vardon of The Athletic reported multiple Cavs players played songs with the word “thug” around Beilein. They also reported Beilein–at times–ruled with an iron fist, and he often had a hard time relating to players.
The Beilein experiment was mostly unsuccessful from the very beginning, though Love seems to be chocking it up to the losing.
