Looking at TT’s 2016 Finals contributions and how he’s been so unselfish
TT started all seven games in the Finals and averaged a double-double with 10.3 points and 10.1 rebounds per game, per Basketball Reference.
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His biggest game of the 2016 NBA Finals came in Game 6. Everyone loves to talk about LeBron James‘ 41 points, 11 assists (some of which were to J.R. Smith) and eight rebounds, and rightfully so.
However, Thompson was a huge reason why the Cavaliers were able to come out on top that night with the season the line, as Tristan posted a 15-point,16-rebound performance to go along with a team high plus-32 plus-minus, again as shown by Basketball Reference.
Those who started for us in our championship run all deserve to get their number retired.
The ending of the 52-year championship drought in terms of major professional sports and overcoming a 3-1 series deficit against the team who had the best regular season record of all-time in the Golden State Warriors brought so much joy to the city of Cleveland that those who made big contributions to win that championship should be honored indefinitely.
I don’t see Kyrie Irving getting his jersey retired because of the way he reportedly requested a trade in the summer of 2017 of which he was then traded to the Boston Celtics (and he’s now on the Brooklyn Nets via unrestricted free agency last summer, by the way), and the fact that we were so quick to hand his number 2 jersey to Collin Sexton, though.
Neither do I see Smith getting his number retired, because of (and h/t Cavaliers Nation’s Omar Guerrero) when someone asked Smith on his Instagram story, “Swish do u want your Jersey retired by the cavs” and he replied back, “Naw not the way it ended!”
Smith and the Cavs essentially agreed that he was no longer an active member of the team early on last season with J.R. not wanting to be a part of a team moving to a rebuilding focus.
This leaves LeBron James, Kevin Love and Tristan Thompson as the remaining starters from the championship team, all of which will get their numbers 23, 0 and 13 retired, in my opinion (and LeBron might get a whole lot more than that).
Now we’ll get into more on why Thompson’s number 13 should eventually be retired by the Cleveland Cavaliers.