LeBron James reportedly begged the Cavaliers not to trade Kyrie Irving! His reaction after the deal was revealed: he was angry and devastated for ten minutes.

On August 28th Beijing time, Tyronn Lue disclosed in his newest podcast LeBron James’s response to Irving’s trade to the Celtics. The star was upset and collapsed emotionally for ten minutes. Prior to the deal, he and coach Lue had begged the Cavaliers not to trade Irving.

Host Sharp asked Tyronn Lue, “At that time, was there any way to keep Irving and LeBron together, or had Irving already made up his mind to leave?”

“Well, he had already made his decision. But it’s like another Kobe and Shaq story. I definitely didn’t want that to happen, right? I was desperately pleading with Altman, and LeBron said he was pleading too. ‘Hey, don’t trade him. He still has a year left on his contract. Don’t trade him.’ LeBron was signing jerseys for his foundation at the time. Then I sat down beside him. We were just sitting there when suddenly a call came through saying Irving had just been traded to the Celtics. LeBron put down his pen, leaned back in his chair for about ten minutes, saying nothing, just very angry. He was devastated. When I saw that moment, I thought things might have gone differently, you know, changes were bound to happen, and indeed they did.”

Irving was traded by the Cavaliers on August 31, 2017. Less than a year later, LeBron chose to leave Cleveland and signed with the Lakers. Tyronn Lue believes that if Irving had stayed, LeBron would have stayed as well. Had Durant not joined the Warriors, he thinks the LeBron-Irving duo could have brought the Cavaliers two or three championships, but that scenario never came to pass.

“I can’t imagine things turning out that way,” Tyronn Lue said, “especially like Kobe and Shaq, who were together every day in the locker room because they had many great players around them. There were many good supporting characters like Fox, Robert Horry, Brian Shaw, who were experienced enough to understand the stakes. They wouldn’t let things get to that point. So that was tough.”

“I think Irving’s biggest issue is that he’s a competitor, a killer, so he wants to prove himself, just like Kobe did to Shaq, since Kobe was a mentor to Irving. Irving wanted to show he could win without LeBron. To take the next step, he had to do that. So having his own team and doing it that way was his goal and what he wanted to do. So I don’t think he harbored any ill will toward LeBron. It was just something he wanted to accomplish in his career.”