Life Lessons From Dirk and Lebron

[puca]

I'm opposite. I was pulling for the Heat to win this series.

Obviously I'm not a fan of LeBron and the dog and pony show that went on with the "decision", but my dislike was more with Dan Gilbert.

As bad as Miami is without the Big Three, LeBron had garbage surrounding him in Cleveland. You can use the Jordan excuses, but the MJ led teams had some pretty good players playing for them, namely Scottie Pippen. Even when D-Wade won his first title he had Shaquille O'Neal in probably his last great season.

LeBron lobbied for Gilbert to get Amare Stoudemire, he got Antawn Jamison.

When LeBron became a free agent, Gilbert tried to use the hometown card to resign him. One of the bits I remember reading involved a PowerPoint presentation using Family Guy to appeal to LeBron's lighter side.

So when the decision happened, I felt bad for the Cavs fans. This is a city that has had their heart ripped out a lot. With the Indians losing in the WS to the Marlins, the Browns leaving for Baltimore, and now the native son "taking his talents to Souf Beach".

Of course, then the letter by Gilbert following the announcement, assuring the Cavs fans that they wouldn't turn their back on the fans (despite already selling season tickets before LeBron left to watch the crap that would take place following) and that the Cavs would win a championship before the "self proclaimed King" won one.

Dan Gilbert is a businessman, pure and simple. He didn't surround LeBron with the talent necessary to win in the postseason and expected him to put a horrendous team on his back and carry them. When LeBron upped and left, he issued a childish letter to the Cleveland papers despite fleecing his own fan base before that.

Of course, Cleveland has some consolation in that they hold the first and fourth overall picks in the draft in a couple of weeks. The downside is that this is the weakest NBA draft in some time. If they are still down next year (assuming there isn't a lockout), they could be in a prime position to draft another native Ohioan in Jared Sullinger, who I think would be more loyal to the Buckeye State. Add Sullinger to a likely draft of Kyrie Irving and Enes Kanter and the Cavs could be back in contention shortly.

Regarding LeBron, with his comments the other day following the Heat loss, if I was a player rep I would be chewing him out in the media. The NBA is likely headed toward a lockout and the comments are similar to those made by Adrian Peterson comparing the NFL to modern day slavery. You need the players to avoid making stupid comments that are going to alienate the fans, and this doesn't help.

And yet Cleveland had the best record in the NBA in both 2009 and 2010 despite surrounding LeBron 'with garbage'.

I'm not a Cleveland fan. I'm not an NBA fan. Heck I'm not really even a basketball fan anymore - I have gravitated towards sports where scoring is an actual accomplishment.

I defend LeBron's right to leave Cleveland for Miami, regardless of his reasons. What I can't defend is the way he did it. He strung the Cleveland franchise along - handcuffing them until he announced his decision. And then putting a spotlight on 'the decision' was absolute classless. The live TV coverage of the Cleveland fans having the rug pulled out from under them was truly sad. Did he not understand that would happen? Did he not care?

When LeBron realizes the entire world does not revolve around him he might be able to start rebuilding his legacy.

[TeamSelig]

omg... this whole Lebron is the devil stuff is so annoying. He moved to a better place to live to play with his friends. Miami > Cleveland in all facets of life. Plus, Cleveland failed get him any good players to play with.

[Edskin]

omg... this whole Lebron is the devil stuff is so annoying. He moved to a better place to live to play with his friends. Miami > Cleveland in all facets of life. Plus, Cleveland failed get him any good players to play with.

Then why even have teams in cities like Cleveland, Detroit, Cincy, OKC, etc? Most places in the US are not as fun or exciting as NYC or South Beach.

Let's also not forget that this was almost undoubtedly in place while he still played for Cleveland.

Indianapolis is not as cool of a city as Miami-- so why didn't Peyton force the issue towards the Dolphins?

The "he wanted to live in south Beach and play with his buddies" stuff is just lame. Defeats the competitive nature that drives sports. It would have really sucked had Larry Bird decided he could win more title as a Laker alongside Magic than doing it with the Celtics.

[WMR]

I wonder how many years it will take Cavs fans to get over being spurned by LeBron... probably not until their next major championship (i.e. never).

Who was the best player(s) Larry Bird played with on the Celtics? Where do those players rank all-time? What about Magic in LA?
Who was the best player(s) LeBron James played with on the Cavs?
Yeaaa... I'm guessing if Larry or Magic had to play with a 70s/80s equivalent team to those squads LeBron absolutely CARRIED they would have gotten the hell out of Boston/LA too.

Then again, maybe they would have stuck it out like "good soldiers" and never won a damn thing like LeBron apparently should have done.


But oh wait, he left in a way that made our feelings go ouchy, nevermind that it raised millions of dollars for charity.

[Roy Tucker]

omg... this whole Lebron is the devil stuff is so annoying. He moved to a better place to live to play with his friends. Miami > Cleveland in all facets of life. Plus, Cleveland failed get him any good players to play with.

Yabbut, perception is reality in this case. Right or wrong doesn't matter. Outside of Miami, I think Lebron's fans are few and far between any more.

When he was with Cleveland, he was a well-liked player. And from a PR stadnpoint, he getting to where he could rival Michael Jordan in marketing punch. And that is some very serious bucks.

And it was "The Decision" that turned the worm. If he would have just had a run-of-the-mill press conference and gone to Miami, Cleveland fans would still hate him but at least the rest of the country wouldn't. But I think he got very bad advice from his handlers and agents. Now his name is mud and the general sporting populace thinks he is a ****** bag and now a choke artist.

And I'd think his endorsements are way down. And a bad PR rap like this is going to be long and hard to repair. He really screwed the pooch.

[Edskin]

WMR--- the charity thing is possibly the weakest of all defenses for The Decision. They tried to make it sound like that absurd event was the only way they could raise that money. There are about a million other ways they could have done that minus the narcissism and humiliation for his former fans. It was also funny that a group of boys at the home were outside playing and were hurriedly shooed away once the limos and ESPN crews arrived

In Cleveland Lebron won an MVP, had the best record in the league twice,made the ECF once and the NBA Finals.

The only thing left to accomplish was a ring. So every year he falls short of that it will be viewed as failure.... Especially considering through his own words he set the bar at seven titles.

I guess the bottom line is that I find Lebron to be 100% disingenuous and a soft competitor. I believe his actions and decisions have cast his lot and he can never really overcome them at this point. As Roy said, he screwed the pooch royally.

[jojo]

WMR--- the charity thing is possibly the weakest of all defenses for The Decision. They tried to make it sound like that absurd event was the only way they could raise that money. There are about a million other ways they could have done that minus the narcissism and humiliation for his former fans. It was also funny that a group of boys at the home were outside playing and were hurriedly shooed away once the limos and ESPN crews arrived

In Cleveland Lebron won an MVP, had the best record in the league twice,made the ECF once and the NBA Finals.

The only thing left to accomplish was a ring. So every year he falls short of that it will be viewed as failure.... Especially considering through his own words he set the bar at seven titles.

I guess the bottom line is that I find Lebron to be 100% disingenuous and a soft competitor. I believe his actions and decisions have cast his lot and he can never really overcome them at this point. As Roy said, he screwed the pooch royally.

But as a Cav he was a warrior poet?

[IslandRed]

Yabbut, perception is reality in this case. Right or wrong doesn't matter. Outside of Miami, I think Lebron's fans are few and far between any more.

When he was with Cleveland, he was a well-liked player. And from a PR stadnpoint, he getting to where he could rival Michael Jordan in marketing punch. And that is some very serious bucks.

And it was "The Decision" that turned the worm. If he would have just had a run-of-the-mill press conference and gone to Miami, Cleveland fans would still hate him but at least the rest of the country wouldn't. But I think he got very bad advice from his handlers and agents. Now his name is mud and the general sporting populace thinks he is a ****** bag and now a choke artist.

And I'd think his endorsements are way down. And a bad PR rap like this is going to be long and hard to repair. He really screwed the pooch.

Agree. In that respect, James reminds me of Alex Rodriguez -- a player who wants to be liked, who does not relish being a villain in the slightest, yet sometimes just doesn't understand he's shooting himself in the foot until it's too late.

[puca]

It is not what he did but how he did it.

Whether or not it was his intention the result was that he spurned the fans of Cleveland in the most public way possible, a group of fans that had (over)worshiped him for 8 years. I know some of those fans, and the sadest part is that they were resigned to the fact that LeBron was going to leave UNTIL he announced that his "decision" would be a prime-time event. No way, they reasoned, that he would do that to his fans.

It's one thing for your wife to tell you she wants a divorce, it is quite another for her to throw a party, pick up a microphone and tell you in front of all your friends and family.

[CTA513]

He gave the Cavs 7 seasons and as a free agent decided that leaving the Cavs and teaming up with Wade and Bosh gave him a better chance to win a championship.
Hate him all you want for that but how many good teams would let a player like James get away?

[mlh1981]

I'm a Cavs fan, and while I'm pretty pissed about the whole decision and what not, I'm trying to move on. They have 2 out of the top 5 picks. I'm excited about that.

Seriously, enough is enough. While I was happy the Mavs won, I felt like rushing the streets and acting all excited was a bit unnecessary. I'll save that for when one of my teams actually wins something. I don't want to live through the accomplishments of another sports franchise that's not my own(though, very happy for Dirk).

[TeamSelig]

Then why even have teams in cities like Cleveland, Detroit, Cincy, OKC, etc? Most places in the US are not as fun or exciting as NYC or South Beach.

Let's also not forget that this was almost undoubtedly in place while he still played for Cleveland.

Indianapolis is not as cool of a city as Miami-- so why didn't Peyton force the issue towards the Dolphins?

The "he wanted to live in south Beach and play with his buddies" stuff is just lame. Defeats the competitive nature that drives sports. It would have really sucked had Larry Bird decided he could win more title as a Laker alongside Magic than doing it with the Celtics.

I'm just sayin... how can you blame a guy for wanting to get out of Cleveland? As for their records, most teams are gonna win a lot of games with Lebron on their roster. Miami has had some bad chemistry (bad coaching IMO) otherwise I think they would be nearly unstoppable.

Magic Johnson forced other teams to not draft him... and went to a stacked Lakers team.. but no one ever brings that up. Kobe did the same thing. For some reason, it is a HUGE deal that Lebron wanted to play with Bosh/Wade. Personally, I don't think it's that serious or that big of a deal. Why is it an issue that Lebron won't be as recognized as MJ now that he has two amazing teammates? Idk... I just think most of this is just ESPN wanting good writing material and sports fans hanging on to weird circumstances that consider a player good, great, or GOAT.

There is a good chance that Lebron never would have won a championship in Cleveland due to the Mo Williams' and an old Antawn Jamison. What about Carmelo or any other big name players that have forced trades on their team? It's the same thing as what Lebron did.

[Revering4Blue]

Magic Johnson forced other teams to not draft him... and went to a stacked Lakers team.. but no one ever brings that up.

That's because it's not true.

Magic went 1st overall to the Lakers, who had obtained the pick in a 1977 deal with the Jazz. Granted, if the Jazz had retained the Pick, Magic may well have objected to playing in Utah.

As for Kobe, IMHO, his refusal to even work out for lottery teams in 1996, including contending teams (Pacers) who had traded up that year has forever soiled Kobe in my eyes. And that was before the *alleged* Colorado incident and throwing Shaq under the bus had occurred.

[QUOTEAgree. In that respect, James reminds me of Alex Rodriguez -- a player who wants to be liked, who does not relish being a villain in the slightest, yet sometimes just doesn't understand he's shooting himself in the foot until it's too late.][/QUOTE]

Spot-on.

[TeamSelig]

Magic said he wouldn't play for any other team but LA. He was going to stay in college or something to that effect.