Friday, August 20, 2010

I'm Taking My Talents To This Blog


In the last post regarding my beloved Nets I did not address the Lebron fiasco. This idiot deserves a rant reserved just for him. Let me start by saying that I can’t fault Bron Bron for not wanting to come to the Nets. A superstar player, even a self proclaimed “king” would not enjoy playing in Newark for two seasons before going to Brooklyn. Fine, I understand that and I don’t hold anything against him. With that being said, I was hopeful that the new billionaire owner and good friend/partial Nets owner, Jay-Z, might persuade Lebron to come play here. Well, as we all know James “took his talents to South Beach,” (or as Josh pointed out, to Miami, not actually South Beach). It would have been comical to hear what he would say if he had chosen to come to NJ, “I am taking my talents to Manasquan.” I digress, there is some Lebron bashing that has to be attended to.

To be a self proclaimed anything is never good. To be the self proclaimed “king” is quite the title, and also totally unwarranted in Lebron’s case. Last time I checked he has never won a ring, and looked completely lost during critical games of last years conference finals. A true “king” would have led his team to victory and let nothing hold him back, (see Kobe Bryant or MJ). A “king” should be the undisputed team leader who has the “killer instinct,” (see Kobe Bryant or MJ). In the pivotal game six against the Celtics, Lebron went 8 for 21 and resorted to “chucking” three pointers from about 15 feet behind the three point line. He was in panic mode, tell me, when have you seen MJ or Kobe in panic mode? The answer is never. Nobody will be MJ and the closest we have seen is Kobe Bryant, these men are basketball “kings.” Proven winners of multiple championships, who have taken over the game when needed and done whatever it takes to win. I would have argued that Lebron is still young and will have many more opportunities to lead the Cavs to a championship, however that will not be the case. The “king” has abandoned his court.

As the name states, it is free agency, and players are free to sign wherever they would like. Lebron is no exception, however he chose the “ready made” option, it’s the perfect turnkey operation, and is viewed as a “cop out.” The pieces are in place for him to win, all they needed was for Lebron to sign on the dotted line and climb aboard. I can’t blame the guy for wanting to win, but I can blame him for not having the fortitude and gumption for wanting to build his own winning team. He should have wanted to be THE man and have a team built around him. It is very “un-kinglike” to agree to play the second fiddle to Dwayne Wade and have Bosh taking some of the spotlight as well.

Some people argue Lebron is taking a pay cut to play in Miami. If his new mega contract is taking a pay cut, sign me up. Let’s not forget he will be making an insane amount of money from endorsements in Miami, a little bit more of a hotspot than Cleveland. In all good conscience I can’t use the term pay cut when referring to any professional athlete, it’s just tasteless.

Lebron has a management team compiled of guys his own age, who are basically “hangers on” from high school. They are a bunch of “yes men” who would never dare to disagree with their very famous and very rich boss. This might be the reason he handled this entire process so poorly. As everyone knows, every action has a reaction. Lebron’s actions resulted in Cavs owner, Dan Gilbert, writing a seething letter ripping his former star player.

I can completely understand where he is coming from, imagine your franchise player who basically quit on your team in the conference finals, and decides not to return your calls or texts. He is not communicating with anyone from the organization and keeping you in the dark. This culminates with him having a one hour dog and pony show where he announces he is leaving your team. You do receive a call though, five minutes before the “The Decision” aired on ESPN, Lebron had one of his friends call Cavs management to alert them he was going to Miami. This seems par for the course, abandons his team and then doesn’t have the balls to call and tell them he is leaving, a king? more like a jester.

Can we really be shocked that Dan Gilbert would write this kind of letter after his star player basically gives the Cavs and the people of Cleveland the middle finger on national TV? This could have been avoided if Lebron had done one of two things (or both); not done the insane and horribly produced “Decision” show on ESPN, and/or kept in contact with the Cavs and informed Dan Gilbert on where he planning on going. I guarantee that if he had taken these steps Gilbert would have never written that letter. The people in Cleveland would still have been crushed, but there would not have been such a public backlash.

By deciding to “take his talents to South Beach,” Lebron’s legacy will be tainted. He is now hated in his home state. Many people believe, (myself included), that he cannot and didn’t want to try to win, being the number one player on a team. He is still a great player, but is now seen on Scottie Pippen’s level , rather than Jordan, (let’s not forget that Scottie has six more rings than Lebron). It is still a compliment to be compared to Scottie, but we have to acknowledge that Lebron as a player and as a brand has been taken down a notch.

I want nothing but failure for the Heat. I’m sure within a week of the start of the season Pat Riley will be the coach and Erik Spoelstra is demoted to bellboy. In a perfect world the Heat will not win the championship and hopefully there will be a clashing of ego’s creating a huge mess. In a perfect world the Nets would have gotten the first pick in the draft, and in a perfect world I wouldn’t have taken Grady Sizemore two years in a row in fantasy baseball. Well, it’s not a perfect world and the Nets still signed Travis Outlaw to a $35 million contract.

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