During his brief tenure with the Cleveland Cavaliers earlier this season, things were a bit off with former All-Star point guard Isaiah Thomas fitting in with the team both on and off the court that only made the situation that much difficult.
According to Alex Wong of The Score, one of these telling signs that things weren’t exactly acquiescing for Thomas in his new surroundings was less than enthusiastic approach to creating special handshakes with his teammates.
When the Cavaliers arrived in Toronto for an early-January matchup, they were starting the process of integrating Isaiah Thomas, who’d missed the first 36 games of the season with a hip injury, into the lineup. At practice the day before, Love was excited about the possibility of coming up with a personalized handshake with Thomas, who was less enthusiastic about the endeavor.
“That’s not what I do,” Thomas said. “I just score the basketball.” He was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers a month later.
Although it may be as simple as a handshake, it does show that his personality wasn’t necessarily going to mess with the Cavaliers and the environment that they had developed. This made for some tense moments during his tenure after he was cleared to return to the court in January as he struggled to fit into the playing style that the team had established.
It had eventually become evident that the Cavaliers were best suited to move on from Thomas as it wasn’t working out on both sides as it contributed to the team’s struggles on the court. This had reached a point where it was clear that the pairing was not going to pan out in the manner of helping work toward being in the picture working toward competing for an NBA title.
If anything, it’s just another anecdote that shows that Thomas didn’t fit into what the Cavaliers had hoped would have been the missing piece to helping push them over the hump in the playoffs.
