CLEVELAND, Ohio — In this episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast, host Ethan Sands, along with beat reporter Chris Fedor and columnist Jimmy Watkins, discuss the Cavs’ hiring of Jawad Williams as part of Kenny Atkinson’s coaching staff.
Takeaways:
Jawad Williams Joins Cavaliers Coaching Staff: The Cleveland Cavaliers have hired Jawad Williams, a Cleveland native and St. Edward High School graduate, as an assistant coach on Kenny Atkinson’s staff. Williams joins the Cavs after serving as an assistant coach and director of player development for the Sacramento Kings. This addition comes after the Cavaliers lost three assistant coaches this offseason: Jordan Ott, Damari Carroll, and Brian Tobaldi, along with Cleveland Charge head coach Chris Darnell.
Williams Brings Valuable Playing Experience: Williams brings 17 years of professional basketball experience to the Cavaliers, including three seasons with the Cleveland Cavaliers where he played alongside LeBron James. His background includes playing at the University of North Carolina (where he won a championship), NBA experience, and international play. This diverse playing career gives Williams credibility with current players and allows him to fill the void left by Damari Carroll as a former player who can communicate with the team in a unique way.
Mike Brown’s Recommendation Was Key: Kenny Atkinson’s decision to hire Williams was heavily influenced by a strong recommendation from Mike Brown, whom Atkinson worked with at Golden State. According to Chris Fedor, Brown gave “the highest glowing recommendation” of Williams based on their time together in Sacramento. Their connection extends further through St. Edward High School, where Brown’s son Elijah played and Williams maintained a close relationship with head coach Eric Flannery, creating a network of trust that ultimately led to Williams joining the Cavaliers.
Williams Expected to Focus on Player Development: Williams is expected to take on significant player development responsibilities, potentially including working with All-NBA forward Evan Mobley. The podcast hosts discussed how Williams’ experience in Sacramento, where center Domantas Sabonis was central to the Kings’ offense, could provide valuable insights for developing Mobley’s offensive game. Williams began his coaching career as a player development specialist in Japan before bringing those skills to the NBA with the Kings, making him well-positioned to fill the player development void left by Jordan Ott’s departure.
Williams Fits the Cavaliers’ Culture: Beyond his basketball credentials, Williams is described as “a really good dude” who “gets along with a lot of different people” by Chris Fedor, who personally knows Williams from their time at St. Edward High School. Williams has been a winner at every level of his career and has shown the ability to accept specific roles for team success. The hosts emphasized that his personality and communication skills make him the “right kind of dude for this organization” as the Cavaliers continue building their team chemistry and culture with championship aspirations.
Listen using the player below:
You can also listen using your preferred podcast app. Subscription information is below.
Subscribe and listen onApple Podcasts or Spotify.
The video version of the podcast is on YouTube as well.
Transcript
NOTE: This transcript was generated by artificial intelligence and could contain misspellings and errors.
Ethan Sands: What up, Cavs nation? I’m your host, Ethan Sands, and I’m back with another episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast. Joining me today, Chris Fedor and Jimmy Watkins, cleveland.com’s finest. And we’re going into some news. In a very quiet off scene season thus far, with the NBA Finals still going on, the Cavs made a move. Instead of departures, they started bringing people on. And today it was Jawad Williams, Cleveland native and someone who went to St. Eds was an AP and Gatorade Player of the Year at St. Eds, and he also was a McDonald’s All American. Not to mention that he did end up having a 17 year professional career. And no, I’m not going to keep hyping up Jawad as much as I want to because we also have a letterman from St. Ed’s on the podcast, Mr. Fedor himself, Mr. 300. We might start calling him Chris. We want to talk about Jawad Williams, but there’s a story that you have known Jawad dating back to 2002. 2000. Give us the lowdown. What’s going on there?
Chris Fedor: Yeah, I mean, we were only a couple years apart at St. Ed’s. I graduated in 02. He’s a little bit older than me, but we had a class together. And then there was also another moment where we were playing pickup basketball in the basketball gym afterward. And if anybody has ever been to St. Ed’s Gym, you know, it’s not the greatest gym in the world. And at the very back of it there’s is a stage because it doubles as like an auditorium. It doubles as a place where a lot of plays are taking place. So we were playing pickup basketball after school one day, and I kind of knew a lot of the basketball players. Some of them were my camp counselors when I was growing up. Other ones were in my gym class. Other ones, you know, oversaw my inner bureaus when I was playing those as well. So I, I, I had a familiarity with, you know, a number of the basketball players for St. Ed’s and every now and then after school I would just play pickup and I would just shoot around or whatever. So one time I was playing pickup in the gym and Jawad was way too good. He was way too good for his age. So look at me then look at Jawad Williams, who ended up going to North Carolina, who ended up playing in the NBA, who ended up playing professionally overseas. So we’re playing pickup and I go to take a shot and he swatted my stuff all the way onto the, like, he didn’t take it easy on me at all. He swatted this basketball on this jump shot all the way onto the stage, like the opposite end of the floor. And then I just kind of like walked away with my head down and said, all right, it was nice playing with you guys, but you’re way out of my league. And there’s a reason why I’m not playing basketball at St. Ed’s and I’m on the bowling team instead. We’re.
Ethan Sands: Well, just for reference, for people that don’t understand, Jawad Williams is 6 foot 9, around 220 pounds, and Chris Feor on a good day is around 5 10, 5 11. Very big difference here. All right, now let’s get into the basketball talk and why this matters for the Cleveland Cavaliers, bringing him on as part of Kenny Atkinson’s staff. Obviously, we know the Cavs lost Jordanott, they lost demari Carroll, and they’ve lost Brian Tobaldi. Three assistant coaches on Kenny Atkinson’s staff, along with Chris Darnell from the Cleveland Charge, the former head coach, two opposing teams and the ncaa. When we talk about Brian Spalding. And so they’re bringing in Jawad Williams from Sacramento, ironically enough, that’s exactly where Kris Darnell went. So, Jimmy, when you think about this guy who is getting his, not necessarily his feet wet, but is just a few years into his coaching career after the Sacramento Kings and also having experience overseas as a coach, what do you think this means for the Cavs and how he’s going to impact player development? Because that’s been his specialty since he got into the coaching fray.
Jimmy Watkins: I just think with a guy like Jawad’s background that gives you so much currency with players when you can speak from experience. And I mean, what he’s teaching me, his career is a player development career. That’s the story of his career. I mean, he’s scrapped and clawed for every minute he got at every level of basketball once he left unc. Obviously he scrapped and clawed for every minute of basketball that he played as a pro. And I just think that with, with that experience comes a ton of respect from current players who understand what it takes to get to that point and all the work that went into it. It obviously gives him a modicum of presence with them. I mean, it’s not, it’s not the same thing as having like a multi year, decades long veteran in Damari Carroll. And obviously like everyone who works in basketball has a relationship with the game as a player to a certain extent. Right. It’s not a language, but it’s a. It’s just an understanding. I think it’s a. A different tongue of the same language that former pro players will speak, that they. They understand each other a little bit better. Obviously, you know, Kenny’s still making the plan, and Jawad’s going to execute it to a certain extent, but it matters. Kenny clearly believes this because he had demari Carroll on staff and he’s. He’s following that plan. Again, it matters to have former players on your staff and with a player development position, a guy who made his career on player development.
Chris Fedor: It fits. We talk so much about fit when it’s players, but. But the coach has to be the right fit, too. And just a little bit of background. You know, Kenny Atkinson, obviously, when he lost Jordan Odd and he lost Amari Carroll, and there was some concern or some belief that there was a chance that Johnny Bryant could go to New York. That has quelled since. But as that was all happening, Kenny was making calls and he was doing his due diligence, and he was trying to figure out, okay, who would be a good fit in this organization, who could be an assistant from outside this organization that. That we can bring here that would allow me to. To put my trust in him that could connect with players. And one of the people that Kenny trusts most is Mike Brown. Mike Brown and Kenny worked together in Golden State, obviously, and Mike Brown, I’m told, gave the highest glowing recommendation of Jawad Williams. Now, Mike obviously was in Sacramento at the time that. That Jawad was brought on that staff as a player development and an assistant coach. But the relationship between Mike Brown and Jawad Williams goes even a little bit deeper than that because Mike Brown’s son is Elijah Brown. Mike Brown’s son, Elijah Brown, played at Saint Ed’s. Jawad Williams at times came back to Saint Ed’s because he still has a very, very close relationship with head coach Eric Flannery at St. Ed’s who helped Jawad win a state championship when he was there, who coached Jawad while he was there at St. Ed’s Eric Flannery and Mike Brown have a close relationship. They always have, and they still do because Coach Flan coached Elijah Brown and Mike Brown went to St. Ed’s games, and he was around the St. Ed’s program when his son was playing at St. Ed’s. So this does kind of tie back to St. Ed’s through Eric Flannery, with Mike Brown, with Elijah Brown, and because Kenny Atkinson has the relationship with Mike Brown and he believes in the things that Mike tells him and he trusts him implicitly. When Mike Brown is going to go to bat for a guy like Jawad, Kenny’s going to listen and Kenny’s going to say, hey, that makes sense for me to bring him to our place on our staff. Especially because, you know, Mike Brown is no longer the head coach in Sacramento. It’s a different coach in Sacramento who wants to build his own staff, who has his own relationships, who probably didn’t have the same need for Jawad in Sacramento as the Cavs do for Jawad here in Cleveland. And I do think Jimmy brings up a good point about demari Carroll, because, you know, one of the things that we’ve talked about on this podcast is what are the Cavs going to be missing with Jordan Ott departing and Demar Carroll departing? And we said Damari was the one who had the player background. Damari was the one who could speak to players like a former player. And there’s just a different way that he was able to communicate with these guys because he had that particular background. Jawad played with LeBron. That means something. Jawad played for the Cavs. That means something. Jawad played in the NBA. That means something. Jawad also played overseas. That means something. So when you’re looking to fill a void that was left behind, Jawad steps into that former player realm where now all of a sudden, when Kenny wants some kind of input from a guy on his staff and he’s looking for a former player input, that’s going to come from Jawad. So that’s something that he certainly brings to the table. And then on top of that, everybody knows Jordan Ott was huge when it came to player development. And it wasn’t just here in Cleveland. It’s going to Brookly, Los Angeles. That’s what he’s become known for. He’s really innovative, he’s really smart, he has modern philosophies. But player development is where Jordan Ott separated himself. It it’s something specifically that the Phoenix Suns pointed out in their press release when they hired Jordan and the work that he did with Evan Mobley. You can’t overlook that. Evan Mobley became a first time All Star. He became a second team all NBA player. So when you’re looking to replace somebody who is well respected as a player development guy, you’ve got to find somebody that can step in and fill that void. And that’s Jawad Williams. That’s how he got his start as a coach. He started in Japan as a player development guy. Then he came to the NBA as a player development guy, and he’s going to be a player development slash assistant for the Cavs, and he’s going to take on a lot of the responsibilities that Jordan Ott had. And I would not be surprised if Jawad becomes the person that oversees the development of Evan Mobley.
Ethan Sands: That’s interesting, because when I was thinking about the comparisons between Jawad and the coaching staff that had already departed from the Cleveland Cavaliers, I was thinking of the Damari Carroll role and his player development and also his journey from UNC to NBA overseas, all of these different things, and having the connection as someone who has been dealt with as a fringe player. Obviously, as I mentioned, he played three years with the Cleveland Cavaliers. The most games that Jawad Williams ever played in the NBA was 54 in a season. But when we talked about Demari Carroll and his role and his stature as a player development coach, as someone that was able to talk with these players to a different level, it felt like that was more of a role that was going to be taken over by Jawad Williams. Helping out guys like Craig Porter Jr. Jaylon Tyson, people that have the physical abilities but might not have the opportunities to be successful and continuing to breathe life into those players. Do you think that’s also accurate or you’re more so of the mindset that Evan Mobley is going to be the guy that he’s going to work with? And is there any type of relationship that they would already have that you might know of? Because for me, Kenny Atkinson is the guy who I would think would take a little bit of a heavier hand with Evan Mobley, even though he’s more of a point guard guy?
Jimmy Watkins: Sure.
Ethan Sands: Johnny Bryant handles Donovan. Omar Cook handles Darius Garland. What are your thoughts on that and how Jawad Williams responsibilities could be divvied up, or do you think he’s going to be focused on Evan Mobley?
Chris Fedor: I think it depends on who else they hire throughout the course of this offseason and if there are other people that they bring from outside this organization to fill out this coaching staff. You know, I think roles are fluid. I think roles are not predetermined necessarily, but you’re trying to match, like a skill set. You’re trying to match a demeanor, you’re trying to match a communication style and stuff like that. And as you said, Ethan, Omar Cook is going to keep developing Darius Garland because Omar Cook is one of the best point guards, true point guards that came out of the state of New York from the prep level. And he was one of the best pure point guards that European basketball has ever seen. The work that he has done with Darius, it shows. They’ve worked on the mental side of the game. They’ve worked on breaking down, picking rolls and stuff like that. And I think the Cavs want Omar to continue in that particular role. Johnny Bryant’s going to continue to work with, with Donovan Mitchell. So like, part of it is there are already relationships built in that are going to continue that the Cavs want to continue. And Kenny’s not going to oversee the development of any single player. He has too much on his plate. Like, yeah, he’s going to be a part of it. He’s going to get on the court, he’s going to contest shots, he’s going to simulate pick and rolls, he’s going to go through workouts with these guys, but he’s going to delegate. He’s going to delegate to his assistants because being the head coach of a team with championship aspirations, that is a big, big job. And Kenny is no longer in a situation where he’s only a player development guy or he’s an assistant coach and he can take on that role, that responsibility. So one of the things that he talked about even when he took this job was I’ve got to delegate, I’ve got to trust my assistance. And he did that throughout the course of his first year in Cleveland. And I can’t see him changing that. I don’t think he wants to change that. I don’t think he wants to go back to what he was in Brooklyn when he was a little bit too hands on, when he let a lot of stuff kind of like slip through the cracks because he was too focused in one area. So I don’t think there’s a situation here where, you know, all of a sudden Jordan Ott leaves and Kenny’s like, I’m taking over the Evan Motley development. I think it’s going to be one of these coaches and I think it could be Jawad there. To my knowledge, there is not a, a built in relationship or a pre existing relationship between Jawad Williams and Evan Mobley, but he played forward like he’s a big man developer. So if you like the, the fact that Omar Cook and Darius Garland can speak the same language because they played the same position, and Johnny Bryant and Donovan Mitchell speak the same language because of all of the, the things that they’ve done throughout the course of, of their time together. You know, Jawad Williams and Evan Mobley could theoretically speak the same language. There are other guys on this staff that, that have player development in their background too. Mike Garrity is a possibility to pick up that Evan Mobley thing. They’ve got the USC connection, I guess. Mike Garrity’s been here for a while. He was the player development coach when Darius came into the NBA. And, you know, he had a big hand in Darius’s early days and Colin Sexton’s early days. So I wouldn’t rule him out in this equation either. But somebody’s going to have to take over the responsibility of overseeing Evan’s development. And, you know, from everything that I’ve been told, a big reason why they hired Jawad is, is what he did behind the scenes and in Sacramento with a couple of their individual players. And there’s no reason to think that that couldn’t theoretically translate to Cleveland.
Jimmy Watkins: What we’re trying to turn Evan Mobley into here and the environment that Jawad’s coming from. The Sacramento Kings, they were one of very few teams in the NBA that use their center to initiate so many different. Like Damonis Sabonis is his usage numbers. It’s tricky with some of these guys because, you know, usage is usage rates, this very specific stat. But like Samanus Stubonis, he is the son around which all of the pieces of the Sacramento Kings offense were involved. The amount of. I mean, like, you don’t get credit for the dribble handoff stuff that he does, or Monis Simonis brings the ball up a ton in Sacramento. And whether you are. Whether Jawad Williams worked with Damonas every day or not, just being in that ecosystem, you catch on to what you’re doing, to what that team is doing. And you can take some of the concepts that the Kings have used with Sabonis and apply those to Evan Mobley. It’s not an apples to apples comparison, but you try stuff with Evan Mobley again, they did it last year, but it’s an ongoing process of put more on his plate, see what he can do. And from that perspective, I think it makes a lot of sense given where Jawad is, is coming from and where Evan Mobley is in his career for the that to be a match.
Ethan Sands: I think those are all good points. And I wasn’t ruling out Jawad from being an Evan Mobley coach or player development extraordinaire, but I just think his journey is a little bit different than Evan Mobley’s. And sometimes that counts for something, to.
Jimmy Watkins: Chris’s point, like being able to drop LeBron’s name that carries so much weight. It just does. Even, you know, even if it’s the way you saw LeBron work after a practice or something. Like, how many legendary work ethic stories do we have for all these legends? You know what I mean? Like, there’s so much cachet. What I was saying earlier, it’s like, it’s not this. Maybe they don’t speak the exact same language, but it’s the same dialect. They’ve been in the same circles. Jawad Williams was not himself the player that Evan Mobley aspires to be, but he knows what it looks like up close every day.
Chris Fedor: The other thing is, Trevor Hendry is. Is another coach on this staff, and he’s probably going to move up in terms of responsibilities, but his guy’s Jarrett. And if Jarrett comes back, the relationship that Trevor has already established with Jarrett, I would think that the Cavs want to continue those kinds of things if they like the work that Trevor has done with Jarrett. And I see no reason why they wouldn’t like the work that. That Trevor has done with Jarrett. So at some point you have all these coaches that are already kind of assigned different guys, and you’re looking for who it’s going to be. I guess it could be Nate Ranking. I guess it could be, like I said, Mike Garrity, But Jawad was brought here for player development purposes. A big reason why Jawad was brought here was for player development purposes. So give him the responsibility and see what happens.
Ethan Sands: Again, I wasn’t saying it wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t saying it was a bad idea. I was just telling you guys what I had sent out to our subtexters in thought immediately when the announcement came out about replacing the role of Damari Carroll as the bridge between player and coach and that responsibility. And that doesn’t necessarily mean that he couldn’t be also taking on the player development role as the coach with Evan Mobley or whoever else it may be. Also, just for some context, as we mentioned Japan and his career and all these things, I wanted to get a little bit more specific. On June 1, 2022, Jawad Williams announced his retirement from professional basketball when he was in Japan. And then in July 2022, he joined a Japanese B league team as an assistant coach and director of player development in his first stint as a coach with any team, obviously. Then on September 9, 2024, Williams was hired as an assistant coach and director of player development for the Sacramento Kings. And then he joined Kenny Atkinson’s staff for the Cleveland Cavaliers. So again, When I was referencing the fact that he is somewhat new to this. It’s been three years in the coaching sphere, but again, as we mentioned, he had a 17 year professional playing career on top of playing since however old he was growing up and going to say dance and then going to unc. So his resume speaks for itself. And I think it’s great that Jawad is getting not only to come home, but also the opportunity to be on a bigger stage. Obviously, Sacramento isn’t the biggest and the best team in the Western Conference right now. They’re trying to figure some things out. Now you get to come and be on a stage with a 64 win team, the former number one team in the Eastern Conference. You’re on a bigger stage, you have better players, you have better organizationally ran things that we can talk about. And I just think it’s important for Jawad to take this opportunity and run with it and be able to showcase exactly what Kenny Atkinson and Mike Brown spoke about and believed in is that he has what it takes to coach at this level, to coach with this team and be able to make an impact, a lasting impact. And Chris, since you know Jawad on a personal level, would you mind to just give a description of him? Not as a coach, not as a.
Chris Fedor: Player, just the person, really good dude, I mean, gets along with a lot of different people. That’s something that you can look at, you know, going back to St. Ed’s going back to North Carolina. He was part of that championship team for North Carolina and he was willing to accept a specific kind of role. So he’s been a winner basically every stop of of his basketball career, whether it was overseas, college, high school and like that kind of guy. He’s the right kind of dude for this organization. You talk about chemistry when you talk about the culture that they’re trying to build, when you’re talking about communicating with young players and old players, doesn’t matter what kind of background they have. Just, just a really good dude and very, very personable. And I think he’s going to be a good asset to, to this coaching staff for sure.
Ethan Sands: With all that being said, that’ll wrap up today’s episode of the Wine and Gold Talk podcast. But remember to become a cast insider and interact with Chris, me and Jimmy by subscribing to subtext so you can have your voice heard. This is where you can have daily conversations with me, Chris and Jimmy. This is where you can get daily texts, whether it be insight, whether it be daily reactions and analysis based on trades going on around the NBA and all these things directly to your phone. But you can only get that if you sign up for a 14 day free trial. Or visit cleveland.comcavs and click on the blue bar at the top of the page. If you don’t like it, that’s fine. All you have to do is text the word stop. It’s easy, but we can tell you that the people who sign up stick around because this is the best way to get insider coverage on the Cavs from me, Chris and Jimmy. This isn’t just our podcast, it’s your podcast. And the only way to have your voice heard is through some text. Y’ all be safe.
Chris Fedor: We out.
Note: Artificial intelligence was used to help generate this story from the Cleveland Wine and Gold Talk Podcast by cleveland.com. Visitors to cleveland.com have asked for more text stories based on website podcast discussions.