Posted on 05/15/2010 1:24:31 PM PDT by BenLurkin
As sure as you can’t get youth back, you also can’t get loyalty back.
LeBron James can, and will, do whatever he pleases over the next couple months in deciding his future. There are no wrong choices when you’re being courted with multimillion-dollar contracts and fawning fans and various levels of power and control.
Everyone is going to offer something. The promise of a championship. A supporting cast. Perhaps LeBron’s choice in coach, general manager, free-agent signings and draft picks. If LeBron’s cadre of advisors can dream it up, they’ll ask for it.
It’s only in Cleveland, though, that the ultimate intangible remains. This is home. This is northeast Ohio. This is unfinished business, unfulfilled promise. This is where all the sporting pain and disappointment that LeBron grew up with exists – no championships in any sport since 1964. None.
”I understand the burden of the Cleveland sports fan,” he said.
Since he developed into a high school star in Akron, LeBron spoke of pleasing his people, putting his hometown on the map. Even as a 16-year-old he reveled in national media coming to his town. After the Cavs drafted him, he spoke endlessly about delivering that long-sought championship parade. He said it would be a celebration like no other. He isn’t wrong about that.
So now, with the times getting tough, with other cities batting their eyes, he’s just going to walk away?
This decision will say a lot about James. And if he’s off to Chicago or New York it will disappoint many who have known him the longest, in a way that goes beyond the selfishness of fandom.
If he walks, he walks on what a lot of people believe he is about – substance behind all that on-court sizzle.
There’s no reason to go.
(Excerpt) Read more at sports.yahoo.com ...
This is illustrated by Lebron famously wearing a Yankees cap to an Indians game, after sucking all kinds of special favors from the Indians' management. Questioned about it, he said "I'm here representing the Yankees."
Lebron is a goner, outa here, and most of us realize it is already a done deal.
We’ll take James in Dallas!!!
I think he made that abundantly clear when he tore off his Cavs jersey mere seconds after leaving the court.
The most selfish overrated player in African Volleyball. Choked when it counted the most.
Pray for America
But the Heat did have a great coach who knew how to build a TEAM and players who knew how to work together and win. Mike Brown does not seem to have a clue as to how to motivate his players to do anything more than stand around and watch LeBron do it all for them.
The coach and other players all get paid yet they let LeBron do all the work. If you’ve ever watched them you’ll see it. Other teams’ players move around trying to get into position to get a good shot at the basket. The Cavs stand around a watch LeBron. They stand still waiting for him to make the basket. They give him very little help at all.
It was a little better this year because they had Shak, who at least knows how to play, even though his old body doesn’t work as well as it used to. And Jamison who they got this year from another team also knows how to play without standing around watching LeBron James. It’s pathetic.
LeBron comes to the stadium two to three hours early to practice every game. Very few of his teammates ever join him and even then it’s very rare when it happens. He has done everything within the power of one human being to win games. Yet he has to take the blame for the owner who doesn’t care, the teammates who are no help and a coach who can’t figure out what to do about it all.
If LeBron had Pat Riley and Dwayne Wade with him, he’d probably have a championship ring now.
He plays thugball for a living. What substance do they think is there?!
This is like asking Secretariat not to poop in his stall.
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