I believe a rule has been violated here...
FIFY
Posted on 06/14/2011 5:19:47 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
I was a freshman in college and a group of us were having some off-topic conversation at the end of an American studies class on science fiction as cultural history (which, I know, I know, sounds like an eminently useless American studies class, but which was nevertheless fascinating and awesome), and the subject of Anna Kournikova came up. I think we were talking about athletes as celebrities. In any event, my 18-year-old self pffft-ed at the mention of her name and said something like “yeah, she sucks!” This was me, I guess, expressing my distaste at style overtaking substance; her picture seemed to be everywhere that fall, and she had just done some music video, despite the fact that she hadn’t accomplished anything of note on the court. At which point the professor stopped me and said, “She sucks?” with an arched eyebrow. He was a serious fellow and all of us desperately wanted his approval, so I sort of gulped and said “Well, I mean she’s ranked 50th or something.” He paused a second and replied, “In the world.”
Which brings me to LeBron James. I was in the wood-paneled locker room of my buddy’s fancy New York gym when “The Decision” originally aired. It was up on every screen in the room. And when it became clear that the 59 minutes of fluff were out of the way and that LeBron would soon announce the eponymous, every dude in the room sort of stopped what they were doing and watched. When King James said he was taking his talents to South Beach, the universal reaction of the locker room — young and old, black and white — was a groan of derision. Sure, a lot of them probably wanted him for the Knicks, but the fact was that we were witnessing a man who had booked a bloc of prime-time television for the sole purpose of breaking the hearts of an entire city — Cleveland. And even in the minutes that followed, the chatter in that locker room prefigured what would become all the major story lines of the season to come: that LeBron was a coward, and wanted to hide behind Bosh and Wade; that the Heat were now the evilest of evil empires, the team to root against; that if they failed to win a championship it would make LeBron the lynchpin in one of the most spectacular chokes of all time.
And so it was! Look, I’m a Yankee fan, and in the interest of penance I root for as many underdogs as I can find. Like everybody else in the country, I was pulling for the Mavs, and like everybody else I am taking pleasure in LeBron’s ego writing checks his body can’t cash.* But surely calling James “nothing but a loser”, as Esquire’s Scott Raab did today, is taking it a bit too far (the piece contains the phrase “the Whore of Akron’s flaccid legacy”. . . .) The fact is that James is the child of a teenage mom and an absentee, ex-con dad who is now a millionaire many times over, and one of the five or ten best ever to play the game. He is also, quite scarily, still in his prime. He’s yet to prove he can carry a team, and he’s got a world-historic PR problem, but he’s not, in any way, shape, or form, a loser. He’s not even Anna Kournikova.
*Most tellingly, the Heat were outscored in the series while LeBron was on the floor, and outscored the Mavs while he was on the bench.
Although reaching No. 8 in the world in 2000, she never won a WTA Title in singles. Kournikova's forte has been doubles, where she has at times been the World No. 1 player. With Martina Hingis as her partner, she won Grand Slam titles in Australia in 1999 and 2002.
;-)
His attitude and his actions make him a loser.
One thing that struck me after the series was how often Lebron said “myself”. He must have said it 25 times in interviews. Compare that with how often the Mavs players said “we”.
I for one found it quite refreshing to see a bunch of no-names win a Championship by playing as a TEAM. Sure, Nowitski had a decent percentage of the points in the series, but every other starter contributed in huge ways, as did the bench.
The TEAM beat the EGOS.....
Congrats to the Mavs, for the Championship, and for the Honorable way you played... :)
“Which brings me to LeBron James”
Imagine you at 18, being given millions of dollars. Then imagine every microphone available being stuck in your fact every day. Imagine the high of that...Now, imagine that same 18 year old at age 26, same lifestyle, more money, more microphones and TV...pretty heady stuff I’d say. Easy to become arrogant if you never had to work for a living.
I'll give him a few days.
“Paging Mr Pippen... Scottie Pippen where are you?”
You don’t need to know anything about Basketball or LeBron... Just look into his eyes in ANY game in the 4th quarter and you’d have seen someone lost with NO clue...
Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy...
Before he got the millions of dollars, James was driving around in a customized Hummer with leather seats embroidered with “King James”.
He’s a talented jerk.
I’m sure he’ll get some titles, but he deserves to be brought down a few pegs.
Great point, seeing as how the oh-so-pale Dirk Nowitzski is receiving the heaps of praise LBJ was expecting to get only a week ago, when the Heat was up 2-1 after beating Dallas in game 3. It's probably already been put out there.
He’s a rich loser.
It was the classic good against bad and the good guys won.
Pray for America
No, he’s a loser...
Why should you never ask Lebron James for change for a dollar?
Because he can only give three quarters.
Hey, me too!
I believe a rule has been violated here...
FIFY
LeBron needs to a grow a mustache.
Yeah, well when you have an hour long TV special about how great and wonderful you are then you abandon your home state team and don’t deliver a championship to your new team, you’ve made yourself a loser.
This guy must be gay.
The same could be said for Jason Kidd. Now after toiling in the NBA for an entire career he gets his ring and stories will be written lauding him for his journey to basketball maturity.
Anybody want to be that these stories will eventually be written about LeBron James in 5 to 10 years when he is a “role player” for a real TEAM?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.