LeBron’s moment of truth awaits

[ATENEARS]

LeBron’s moment of truth awaits

By Adrian Wojnarowski, Yahoo! Sports

 

CLEVELAND – This isn’t important enough to LeBron James. That’s the uncompromising, unconquerable truth. Everything has come too easy to him, and he still doesn’t believe that winning championships takes a consuming, obsessive desire that borders on the maniacal. He is chasing high school and college kids on recruiting trips for his fledgling marketing company, medicating his insecurities with unending and unfolding free-agent dramas.

 

James is chasing Warren Buffett and Jay-Z the way he should be chasing Russell and Jordan and Bryant. He wants CEOs to bow before him, engage him as though he is a contemporary on the frontlines of industry. Only, the truth of the matter is, he’s a singular talent who’s going to watch his playoff failures start to chip away at the thing that seems to matter most to him: his marketability and magnetism.

 

Most of all, James is forever selling something of himself – an ideal, an image, a possibility. Something nebulous, something promised. He’s chasing a global platform, the bright, blinking billion-dollar fortune, and he’s largely gotten the natural order of things backward.

 

Stop strutting, stop preening, stop stomping away as an ungracious winner, a sore loser, and win something, LeBron.

 

Win something now.

 

No more excuses. Not now, not after this biblical bottoming out that pushes the Cleveland Cavaliers to the brink of an unthinkable collapse. And yet, after Tuesday’s ferocious failure of his professional career, the encompassing embarrassment of a 120-88 Game 5 loss to the Boston Celtics, James dismissed his unthinkably poor performance with this colossal cop-out: “I spoil a lot of people with my play. When you have three bad games in seven years, it’s easy to point them out.”

 

Who is he to be indignant after he gave a playoff game away? What’s he ever won to be so smug to the masses? That’s what drives the Celtics crazy about James. Eventually, he will understand his greatness isn’t measured on the hit-and-runs through NBA cities across a long season. It’s measured now, in the teeth of the battle, when a tiny guard, Rajon Rondo(notes), has stolen his stage and nearly a series.

 

Somewhere, the whispers of the game’s greatest talents became a murmur louder and louder: James still doesn’t understand part of the price of greatness is inviting the burden on yourself and sparing those around you. He missed 11 of 14 shots. James didn’t score a basket until the third quarter. He was terrible, just terrible, and yet James couldn’t bring himself to say the worst home playoff loss in franchise history began and ended with him.

 

For all of James’ unselfishness on the floor, he can still be so selfish off it. They could’ve lined up the greatest players in the game’s history Tuesday night in the primes of their championship lives, and there isn’t one of them who would’ve deflected and deferred like the self-proclaimed King James. They would’ve been livid and they would’ve put it on themselves. Magic Johnson and Larry Bird. Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant(notes). Tim Duncan(notes) and, yes, Shaquille O’Neal(notes).

 

They had titles, and they would’ve mutilated themselves for public consumption. James is too cool, too stubborn and maybe too self-unaware. This is on me, they would’ve told you, and, I’ll get us out of this. They would’ve made sure teammates and opponents, fans and enemies understood. They would’ve made sure the whole world understood: This isn’t how an MVP plays in the playoffs. This isn’t how he lets a legacy linger in limbo. What you heard out of James was self-righteous: “I put a lot of pressure on myself to go out and be great and the best player on the court. When I don’t, I feel bad for myself.”

 

This wasn’t the night to feel bad for himself. There’s been enough pity for him in this series. As much as anything these past two years, the Cavaliers have taken on James’ persona: Entitled, arrogant and expectant that the sheer divine right of his greatness will win them a ring. Only, the Celtics are proud, old champions arisen out of the rubble and on the brink of closing out the Cavaliers on Thursday night at the Boston Garden. No one saw this coming on Tuesday night, the surgical removal of the Cavaliers’ hearts surrounded with a stunned silence that devolved into the debris of boos.

 

James lorded over one of the most agonizing, humiliating losses a championship contender ever endured. So much comes with this collapse, bookended with decades of a city’s championship sports futility set against the free agency for the son it spawned in neighboring Akron.

 

This collapse will cost people jobs. This will change the course of the franchise. Where’s James going? And as job security goes, the CEO of British Petroleum has more going for him than Mike Brown right now. Forty feet away Tuesday night, Kentucky’s John Calipari was sitting under the basket with Leon Rose, the agent Cal shares with his buddy, LeBron.

 

James invites these storylines into the gymnasium, this drama, and leaves everyone else to live with the consequences. Owner Dan Gilbert has fostered a culture of permissiveness with James that hasn’t served him or the franchise.

 

 

The Cavs live in fear of him, his moods, his whims, and it’s the reason no one ever tells him the truth: Hey ’Bron, you looked childish for refusing to shake the Orlando Magic’s hands last season. You sounded small grumbling about criticism for your wildly up-and-down play in this series. James walked out of the Q on Tuesday night and there’s no guarantee he’ll ever return as a Cavalier here.

 

Yet make no mistake: James has enough around him. This team isn’t perfect, isn’t assured of beating the Los Angeles Lakers, but it has no business losing in the conference semifinals – never mind failing to even compete. And, yes, as much as ever, this is on James.

 

He invited all this drama about walking out on his hometown team this summer, and now free agency hung over the Q like an anvil. Here’s a city that’s waited 46 years for a championship, a town that reacts viciously to the sheer suggestion that James could leave for New York this summer. These fans have been much better to James than he’s been to them. It hasn’t been the media that’s built his role in the summer of 2010 to a crescendo, but James himself. He constantly manipulated it with suggestions and hints and wink-winks to New York.

 

James proclaimed July 1, 2010, as the biggest day in the history of basketball, ramping up suspense of his ultimate decision: Do I stay or do I go? What it has done is throw more palpable pressure in the air, more desperation, and it’s come back to haunt him now.

 

James says the Cavaliers know all about what it takes, but he knows about winning in the regular season. This is a different time, a different game. Three bad games in seven years? He’s kidding himself. Now, he has a championship cast around him. Now, he’ll be judged. No one gives a damn what he did in the regular season.

 

Perhaps sooner than later, he’s going to get his coach fired for losing this series. Or the next to Orlando. He’s mocked Brown for acting too angry with the Game 2 thrashing, but the coach understood what James refused to acknowledge until Tuesday night: The Cavs have been wildly inconsistent in these playoffs and they’re nowhere near playing championship ball.

 

Across the regular season, James can play hard, let his talent take over and embark on all the side gigs that gobble his time.

 

This isn’t a part-time thing. Winning everything takes a single-minded, obsessive devotion. Michael Jordan had it. Kobe Bryant does, too. They didn’t want to win championships, they had to win them. They needed them for validation and identity and, later, they became moguls. LeBron James is running around recruiting college kids to his marketing company. He picks up the phone, tells them, “This is the King,” and makes his pitch to be represented in his stable. Think Kobe would ever bother with this? Or Michael? Not a chance when they were on the climb, not when they still had a fist free of rings.

 

LeBron James is on the clock now, and Game 6 in Boston could be for his legacy in Cleveland. He has been prancing around the edges for too long now, angling for a transcendent existence he believed his brand could bring him. Only, it’s all a mirage. It’s all vapor until he does the heavy lifting that comes now, that comes in the shadows of Magic and Larry, Michael and Kobe. This isn’t about selling an image to Madison Avenue, about pushing product through all those dazzling plays across the winter months. This is an MVP’s time, his calling, and there was LeBron James standing in the middle of the Cavaliers’ locker room at 11:25 p.m., staring in a long mirror, fixing his shirt before the long walk down the corridor to the interview room.

 

James stood there for five seconds and 10 and maybe now 20, just staring into the mirror, just taking a long, long look at himself. For the first time in his career, the first time when it’s all truly on him, maybe the sport stood and stared with him. All hell breaking loose, all on the line now. Forget everything in his life, all the make-believe nonsense, Game 6 and maybe Game 7 will promise to serve as the most honest hours of his basketball life.

[ballpeen]

Good read.

 

 

 

There is a difference between wanting to win and working to win.

 

 

[LeBrent]

I wish I would've seen some fire from him last night. He pushed it aside like it was just another loss.

 

It would be unfair to blame it all on him before it's over though. He got us this far. This series isn't over yet.

 

Come on LeBron. Remember how upset you apparently were when you lost last year? Remember how your one mission in life is to bring Cleveland a championship. Remember how MVP's don't matter but titles do. Is that all just talk?

 

He played scared last night. He looked like he was scared to put the team on his shoulders and fail.

 

We can win this series if he plays with some heart. The team follows his lead. If he attacks, they attack. If he plays scared, they all play scared. Quit acting like this doesn't mean anything.

 

Right now they're all doubting you. No one's going to give you a trophy.

 

Prove them wrong.

 

 

 

 

[LeBrent]

Here is Terry Pluto's letter to LeBron

 

LeBron James, it's time to show Celtics what you're made of: Terry Pluto column

By Terry Pluto, The Plain Dealer

May 12, 2010, 12:47PM

 

Joshua Gunter, The Plain DealerLeBron James watches from the bench Tuesday night during the Cavs' Game 5 blowout loss to Boston.

Dear LeBron:

You have never approached a playoff series like this.

 

Never have you been so passive on the court, so emotionally distant when you talked about all these embarrassing losses to the Boston Celtics.

 

You are the NBA's Most Valuable Player. You are the greatest player in the 40-year history of the Cavaliers, a true hometown hero.

 

But you have been playing in these Eastern Conference Semifinals as if your mind is elsewhere.

 

How can you take only two shots and not score a single point in the first quarter of the biggest game of the season? How can you be so passive?

 

How can you allow your team to lose 120-88 on your home court as you did to Boston in Tuesday's Game 5? Certainly, you couldn't win it yourself. But early in the game, you seemed resigned to the worst, taking only 14 shots and being outplayed and outhustled by Paul Pierce.

 

In the Cavs' three losses, you have attempted only 18, 15 and 14 shots.

 

Where is the LeBron James who went down firing in the Eastern Conference Finals last season, averaging 38 points in this six games against Orlando?

 

Or the LeBron James who fired up 20-25-23-24 shots in the last four games of the 2008 series against the Celtics. Or the LeBron James who scored 45 in that Game 7 loss in Boston?

 

Or how about the LeBron James who had a miserable ordeal in the four-game sweep by San Antonio in 2007, but still put up 16-21-23-30 shots? In 2006 when the Cavs were eliminated 79-61 in a Game 7 at Detroit, you were 11-of-24 from the field for 27 points.

 

LeBron, you have always gone out with fire in your eyes, your finger on the trigger. You have been willing to take the criticism, even when you know that the Cavs had not supplied you with much support.

 

This is the most talent that you've had in your seven years with the Cavs. But so far, this is the worst series that you and your team have ever played in the postseason. The three losses have been by a total of 60 points, including being outscored by 50 points in the last two home games!

 

After Game 5, you strangely said: "I spoil a lot of people with my play. When you have a bad game here or there, you've had three bad games in a seven-year career, then it's easy to point that out. So you got to be better."

 

LeBron, it's not just about a "bad game" or three. It's not about people picking on you, or not appreciating what you've done for the franchise. Most fans are still putting the primary blame on coach Mike Brown and the other players for the Cavs being down 3-2 in this best-of-seven series.

 

The "I spoil a lot of people with my play," sounds as if you're feeling sorry for yourself. It's time to realize that more is expected of you because so much more has been given to you -- be it in terms of pure physical blessings, or an owner willing to try and outspend the government to stimulate a championship in Cleveland.

 

Study the tapes of the last four games of the Boston series. Imagine you are watching Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan or any other franchise player wearing your No. 23. What would you say about their approach to those games?

 

In Game 3 at Boston, who put up 10 shots in the first quarter? Granted, you were sizzling, your jumper was falling, and 21 points went up next to your name in the first quarter. But your team followed your lead, and that energy became a 124-95 victory in Boston.

 

But in the other three games, it was as if were distracted. It seems your joy is gone, your passion for winning has wavered.

 

Maybe your elbow does hurt because of the bone bruise, but you were leaning on it as you spoke to the media after Game 5. And you don't seem to have much restriction in terms of range of motion.

 

Listen to what you said about Paul Pierce (21 points, 11 rebounds, 7 assists, 9-of-21 shooting): "Paul came out aggressive. He did a good job of just trying to attack and just trying to get a good feeling for the game. He didn't shoot the ball particularly well from the field, but he was aggressive, he was able to get 11 rebounds."

 

You can do the same Thursday in Boston. And you have enough talent to bring your team back from this abyss, winning the final two games of this series.

 

But you have to lead. You have to "work to be the best player on the court every night," as you promised at your MVP ceremony.

 

You say you are "a no-excuse" guy, and now is your time to show it.