Koby Altman explained why the Cleveland Cavaliers plan on keeping Kevin Love despite the departure of LeBron James.

"The years where you're non-competitive aren't fun," Altman said, in his first public comments since James agree to leave the Cavs and join the Los Angeles Lakers. "And I know that's hard to build a culture that way and we've had a great culture of winning because of LeBron and that infrastructure that he brings right away. And I'd like to capitalize on that.

"You won't be nearly as good if you lose a player of that magnitude," Altman said, speaking of James. "But we can still be competitive, we can be tough, we can be skilled, we can be talented and we can still use that culture that's sort of been embedded these last four years."

The Cavaliers have insisted behind the scenes for weeks that they would not trade Love.

Love is owed about $50 million over the next two seasons, and the last year is a player's option.

Altman said they would "explore opportunities with the roster in general," but "as far as Kevin goes I don't see how you get better doing that."

"Kevin is an All-Star and you don't get better by moving Kevin," Altman said. "Kevin's been incredible for us for four years and he wants to be here, and to me that's a big part for guys that are here and the guys that we're gonna acquire, is that they want to be here and be a part of this new chapter and culture that we're creating."

Altman rejected the possibility of the Cavaliers tanking.

"To go the complete opposite direction, which we've been through, is not fun and it's hard," Altman said. "It's hard to sort of come out of that. And the unknown is really daunting to me.

"I really like what we have now and I don't necessarily want to go backwards."