CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Tyronn Lue was indeed on the plane Sunday when the Cavaliers left for Orlando, as were the players and coaches in the locker room Saturday.

The Cavs are not firing Lue, a team official confirmed to cleveland.com, despite the tailspin and deluge of blowout losses to apparently superior opponents. And no one was traded yet.

Team officials said Lue was safe two weeks ago after the Cavs gave up a franchise-record 148 points to Oklahoma City. He remains safe after the Cavs' 120-88 loss to Houston Saturday.

ESPN first reported Lue's job status was (still) safe Saturday.

Lue is owed $21 million over the next three seasons. He is also the only coach to win a championship in franchise history and is a player-friendly coach with LeBron James' backing.

But Lue has taken his share of criticism, inside and outside the organization, for sticking with certain players and lineups.

"We're not playing good ball," James said. "The lineups we have on the floor at times are not meshing together, not playing well together. That's just the reality of it."

Since Christmas, James is averaging 22.6 points and shooting 49 percent from the field (21 percent from 3-point range). He was averaging 28 points and shooting 57 percent from the field (41 percent from 3-point range, both career highs) before that.

Virtually no one is playing well with Isaiah Thomas.

Thomas, who missed the first 36 games with hip injuries and has struggled (as have the Cavs) since he came back, has a minus-14.9 rating (average net scoring per 100 possessions when he's on the court) with James. That's in a span of 13 games, covering 286 minutes.

According to a league source, Thomas was shooting 9-of-33 on passes from James heading into the Houston game and 7-of-26 from 3-point range.

Thomas' net rating with Jae Crowder is minus-25.8. Thomas is averaging 15.8 points, but shooting a career-worst .364.

On Saturday, Lue opened the second quarter with Thomas, Dwyane Wade, and Derrick Rose on the court together -- all point guards. Thomas and Rose have a minus-37.4 rating (in two games), while Rose and Wade have a minus-17.1 rating in 10 games.

The Cavs' deficit grew from 12 to 23 points in less than five minutes Saturday with the three of them on the court.

"We went small, tried to play a little faster. It didn't work," Lue said.

It's not a fair comparison, due to things like strength of schedule, but Thomas, Rose, and Tristan Thompson were not part of the rotation (because of injury) while the Cavs won 18 of 19 games in November and December.

Asked if he could go back to those old rotations (for instance, Jose Calderon was the starting point guard, and Iman Shumpert started some games before he was hurt), Lue said: "I mean if we did that, guys wouldn't play. You can't do that. Guys are back, guys who coming into the season we knew were going to play. So we're struggling right now but we can't go backwards right now, no."