Yes, the countdown has begun. Two years left on the contract. Watching the Celtics raise their championship banner and get bedecked in jewels, LeBron James is ready to bolt. That’s the belief on the national level.
With James, the Cavaliers are running out of time. It’s two seasons and counting until he can become a free agent. To listen to Cleveland owner Dan Gilbert dismiss the possibility of James leaving in the summer of 2010 for a bigger market as a product of “bored sportswriters” is beyond laughable. These aren’t bored sportswriters, but a restless superstar and a stable of handlers seemingly sold on his exit.
Get used to it Cavs fans because whenever James arrives in a town for the first time over the course of the next couple of seasons. That will be one of the first questions asked of him. Given that in an interview with ESPN a couple of seasons back, he said that he wanted to be a sports ambassador to the world along the lines of Muhammad Ali, then it’s a possibilty he bolts. The only tact that Cavs fans can take is hoping that Danny Ferry and Dan Gilbert do enough to keep him here.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
George, why even continue to print this material. It isn’t even a story. And to continually make it one is ridiculous. It may be a story in a year or so but it isn’t now. If Lebron has proven anything it is that he is unpredictable so nobody really knows for sure what will happen.
Dave, I agree. So let me say this: it wasn’t my decision and leave it at that.
As for what I think, he’s going to leave if he wants. The way I look at it is that it’s incumbent on the Cavs to make him believe he can win here. In my estimation, this is a lot of a bunch of national and NYC writers counting chickens before they hatch – more like before they’re even created.
george – i see your point, but i think the cavs have already done about as much as they possibly can to show that the organization is dedicated to being first class and to winning. they were in the finals 2 years ago, were arguably the second-best team last year and are even better this year. they are one of the clear favorites to win it all this year. the team will most likely be even better in a few months once Wally and/or Snow’s contract gets traded.
its counterintuitive to compare the cavs to the jordan bulls or old-time lakers since the nba is a different league now with different salary structures, like alot of people like to do. its apples and oranges. the show-time lakers would never have been able to keep kareem, magic, worthy, etc. together for all those years in today’s game. i doubt the bulls would have been able to keep jordan and pippen together under today’s cap rules since pippen would have been a max contract player.
Gilbert has more than proven a willingness to spend money. unfortunately, teams arent lining up to hand over high level and cheap talent to help the cavs win. i dont think the cavs have to make him believe he can win here – they have already done that. they just have to keep doing it (which they clearly are). the national writers continually say that without LBJ, the cavs are essentially chop liver. i guess thats true, but give me another “championship caliber” team that is still championship caliber without its top player. you can’t because they dont exist. a championship caliber team is just that because of its #1 championship caliber player. at this point, if he leaves it is not because of anything the cavs did or didnt do. it would just be because he has it set in his head that he has to play in NY in order to fulfill his destiny/goals. i personally disagree that he HAS to be in NYC for that, but if that is in his mind there is nothing anyone can do to change it.
What’s the source of the quote? I hit the “national” link and nothing came up.
Some interesting conjecture that has come up in New York recently is that Ratner is already looking to sell the Nets, and that the arena in Brooklyn will probably not be built.
Adrian Wojnarowski on Yahoo.com.
Forgot to post the link.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-lebron102908&prov=yhoo&type=lgns
this guy adrian w. writes a “lbj is leaving cleveland” article about once every 2-3 weeks. its about all he can figure out to write about.