LeBron James

1. LeBron had every right to leave Cleveland and did not "owe" them anything at all.

2. However, LeBron showed no class whatsoever in how he handled this. If you have to break up with your girlfriend, the classy ones do it discretely, not on national TV. Utterly, utterly classless.

If anything, I now actually care a little bit about the NBA - I care enough to root against the Heat to never, ever win an NBA championship. I hope Dan Gilbert is right and they fall on their face. Nothing better than having a villain in your league - and they are it for years to come.

 

Self-imposed exile over.

Apology accepted, Tom. Now let's move on.

It is wrong. The problem is that the Knicks all but said that Lebron was coming. Their fans spent 2 years watching bad teams with the promise that they were clearing the necessary cap space to bring Lebron and at least one other superstar. If I remember right, they had the cap room to bring 2 max superstars. They didn't land anybody but Stoudemire and the fans, who completely bought the bill of goods the Knicks sold them, are mad about it.


I'm not saying the following is true, but somebody who knows things laid out the plan as follows. Lebron, Wade and Bosh all got their contracts lined up to expire in the summer of 2010 so they could all play together. Further, they would all play together for the Knicks, if the Knicks had the cap space. Funny thing happened on the way to Madison Square Garden.

Dwyane Wade got divorced. Getting divorced is bad enough, but this one was particularly bitter. Wade needed the big paycheck and he would never make as much money anywhere else than he would if he stayed in Miami, so he decided to stay. So, instead of all 3 of them going to the Knicks, they all decided South Beach was a fine 2nd option.

This is exactly the problem I have with it as well. He knew before July 1st where he was going. Just tell us then. Why do a Self Absorption Me Me Me Tour unless you're incredibly narcissistic? Oh, wait.

Want to know how to handle contract signings? Take a look at what Kevin Durant did with the Zombie Sonics. Quietly signed a 5 year contract extension. No press conferences. No hour long television "special". No "look at me" time. Nothing like that. Signed the deal, tweeted about it, and probably went right back into the gym to keep working on his game.

That's how you do it. That's the way you keep building your pro basketball career. I became a big fan of Kevin Durant this summer. I was once a fan of Lebron James. No more.

 

Yes, NY has a 12% tax and Miami as 0%.

Do the math ... It's not hard to figure out why Miami won.

LeBron James is a world class jerk who is a good player. But he's not a Magic, a Bird, a Jordan, or a Kobe. My guess is that Miami still doesn't do great.

 

Yeah as you don't call a news conference and have a huge entourage to announce it. That was classless in itself. As usually that is why people dislike self-promotion in this world.