Cleveland Cavaliers Must Step Up to Keep All-Star Kyrie Irving

Swish. Swish. Swish. One after another the basketballs went through the hoop, often hitting nothing but net, once they left the hand of Kyrie Irving. His 23 treys from 30 shots edged Spurs forward/center Matt Bonner by three, and the Cavaliers point guard won the three-point contest at NBA All-Star Weekend in Houston on Saturday.

Last season Irving was the NBA Rookie of the Year, and now he adds this award to his trophy case. Word of warning, Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert: you might need to sell one or more of Rock Gaming’s casinos to keep this guy from taking his talents elsewhere, as another Cleveland-area superstar infamously chose to do.

What this means is that Gilbert must invest in quality players to provide support for Irving to build a playoff contender. As it is stands, the Cavs are at the bottom of the Central Division, 21 games below .500 with no signs of improvement on the horizon. They’re bad at home and worse on the road; 11 games away from the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Other than Irving there’s Dion Waiters, who is better than Daniel Gibson as a shooting guard, but that’s not saying much; Brazilian center Anderson Varejao, who is filled with potential but hasn’t been able to stay healthy; Canadian forward-center Tristan Thompson, who has been improving steadily since the loss of Varejao created a starting spot for him and — apart from Irving, is about the only other bright spot in the lineup; and Tyler Zeller, who has trouble with layups.

With Irving and Thompson, there is the promise of something good with the Cavaliers. It’s not quite the championship contender Gilbert boldly predicted when LeBron James left to join the Miami Heat, but you need to start somewhere. You also need to take it from that start and add more elements to it to build a contender, and that is where Gilbert and general manager Chris Grant and the rest of the Cavs’ brain trust find themselves now.

Despite the animosity which followed “The Decision,” LBJ has not ruled out a possible return to the team where he spent the first seven years of his career. Gilbert did, though, and apparently is willing to stick to his own decision on the matter — at least for now. But Gilbert is a business owner, and all business owners should want to do what they can to increase the value of their assets. Gilbert’s company owns Quicken Loans Arena, and the Cavaliers are the major sports tenant. If the team stays a pretender instead of becoming a contender, the value of both drops.

At some point, the Cavs will need to do what they can to keep Irving happy, and almost nothing makes a player happy than to be with a winning team. LeBron left because he couldn’t see the level of desire in Cleveland’s ownership that would work towards a championship. They must take concrete, confident steps towards building that kind of atmosphere, because they can’t risk losing another superstar. Anyone can see that — even from outside of the arc.