Looks Like NO Ring for LeBron

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No ring for lebron this year. Dallas was impressive in game 6.

 

I couldn't be happier with the result

 

Yes - the Big O averaged a triple double on the season - he didn't get one in every single game. No one has ever had a triple double every game of a season. In fact, no one has even had a double double every game of the season, but there are tons of guys that have averaged double doubles over the course of the season. (In fact, Tim Duncan has averaged a double-double for his career - points and rebounds.)

Looking back, I think the decisive game was the Game 2. If the Heat don't blow that 15 point lead with 5 minutes to play, they go up 3-0, and then it's series over. Granted, there were a lot of close games in the series (four of the 6 games were decided by 3 points or less), so you can really say that ANY of those four could have gone the other way, but I think Game 2 was really the pivotal game.

Stat I heard on SportsCenter that puts a lot into perspective - points in the 4th quarter. Dirk - 62 - so a shade over 10 per game. LeBron - 18 - just 3.

EDIT: Actually, about the best thing you can say about LeBron, is that Game 6 was one of his better performances of the series. He was 9-15 from the floor, 21 points. For the series though, his ppg were 9 points below his average for the rest of the season. In case you're wondering - yes, that's the highest dropoff in finals history.

 

What I heard was Dirk - 62, Wade and James - 62. Basically Dirk = Lebron + Wade. I find it funny after they making fun of dirk being sick. A-holes.....

 

Well, considering he has probably around 16 months until he has to play basketball again, he has time for both.

I don't know what the ceiling is for Rose. If he gets better, then the Bulls will improve. I don't think they have to tweak much on the current roster. Most of that supporting cast is solid. I'm equally unsure on NY. That's a case where the supporting cast is VERY suspect. They don't need CP3 to compete, but they need more than what they currently have. I think every year Boston doesn't win is a year further away their guys are from their prime. With the exception of Rondo, no one on that team is getting better. The best you can expect from Boston is that their guys stay the same. Unfortunately, Garnett, Pierce, and Allen are all at the points in their career that their skills are going to start to deteriorate.

That could well be true. If LeBron had 18, then that would mean 44 for Wade - that seem reasonable.

EDIT: Changed title of topic!

 

Rose is super fast, but he isn't that tall. As soon as he slows down a little, his game will drop. He doesn't have the magic shooting touch. He is a good shooter, but not a great shooter. It's his ability to create in the lane that make him awesome. Reminds me of Iverson when he was young. Which makes me think the Bulls won't be great unitl they acquire another good scorer or several scoring options. Kinda like the Bulls of old with MJ.

 

The mayor of Dallas announced that today is "LeBron James Day". All city employees get to leave work 12 minutes early!

Here's what I don't get. Why is there so much vitriol regarding LeBron James. I get that the Decision was a terrible idea. I get that the victory celebration before the team had even played a game was immensely egotistical. But why is everyone so upset. I wasn't rooting against LeBron as much as I was rooting FOR Dirk and the Mavs. It seems for most people, the opposite was true. I mean, unless you're from Cleveland and a Cavs fan - in which case I totally get it - why the hatred?

 

I think it was Bill Simmons who said in one of his podcasts (and I paraphrase). It is like playing playground basketball and the two best players decide to be a team and then just proceed to beat the crap out of everybody. The code of the playground is the best players match up against each other, they should never be on the same team. In essence this is what James did. The alpha dogs of the past (Jordan, Iverson, Bird, Magic, etc.) would have never done this as they wanted to go up against their rivals as opposed to joining them. It will probably forever taint James's legacy.

 

You see though, I don't buy that - with the exception of Iverson - who never won a title by the way - all of those other guys didn't have just good players with them, they had great players on thier teams. What do Pippen, McHale, and Worthy have in common? In addition to being the second best player on their team for much of their careers, they are all in the HoF.

 

You I think you are missing the point Aldeth. Those guys didn't leave their teams to join with other stars. The other stars grew with them. The Lakers already had Kareem and Wilkes, but not Worthy or Scott. Bird's supporting Cast were good because of him. None were great themselves. I wonder if a Kevin McHale, Larry Parish or James Worthy are Hall worthy if Bird is never a Celtic or Magic/Kareem weren't Lakers? Who knows....

 

McHale would have because he was one of the best low post scorers in history.

To build on what Blade said those teams were created by management making trades and the draft. Free agency didn't quite exist the way it does now. Lebron, Wade, and Bosh created this Miami team on their own.

 

I swear that McHale had the longest arms of anyone in the history of the game.... talk about a knuckle-dragger. I always thought his arms look a bit too long for his body, even with him being 6'11 or so.

 

and

But I don't have a problem with that. Like I said in the beginning, while I thought that televising the decision was a terrible idea, I didn't have a problem with LeBron deciding to go to Miami in the first place. It was a smart move if he wanted to win a title.

People seem to forget that LeBron stayed in Cleveland for EIGHT YEARS. It's not like he put his obligatory four years in, qualified for free agency, and jetted to the place of his choice. He signed an extention, and tried to win with the team that drafted him. If a finger needs to be wagged, it's at Cleveland ownership for having Mo Williams as the second best player on the Cavs for LeBron's tenure. If the team won't give you help, you need to go where there are already other quality players.

And there are current teams where the situation is similar. Look at Boston's Big three. Garnett was acquired by a trade, but it was a very lopsided one. I had to look it up, but Garnett was traded for Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Sebastian Telfair, Gerald Green, and Theo Ratliff. Talk about trading a dollar for 5 nickles. And the only reason that the Timberwolves traded him was because if they didn't he was leaving. Ray Allen was also acquired in a lopsided deal. Allen and Glen Davis for Delonte West, Wally Szczerbiak, and the fifth pick in the draft that year, who turned out to be Jeff Green. So the Boston Big 3 came together because of smart trades and good fortune. But just because it's orchestrated by management and not the players doesn't make it intrinsically better.

My larger point is that there is a formula for winning championships that you rarely see an exception to. History shows that there's two ways to do it:

1.) You have an alpha dog like Jordan or Bird, and an excellent second banana and/or third banana who is Hall of Fame worthy, like Pippen and Horace Grant or McHale and ROBERT Parish (I don't know who Larry Parish is).

2.) You have an alpha dog, and 3 or 4 above average players (not Hall worthy, but All-Star worthy), and a very deep bench - like the Spurs.

The only instance I can remember in the 30 or so years that I've followed basketball where one of these two situations didn't happen was when Detroit won a title 6-7 years ago. The three best players on that team were Sheed, Ben Wallace and Chauncy Billups. So they had the 3-4 All-Stars, and a deep bench, but no clear alpha dog. That also was a pretty down year in the NBA - probably the weakest year in recent history apart from the Kinicks making it to the Finals in the 90s in the strike-shortened season. (But that gave us the "Ewing Theory" so it wasn't a complete loss.)

So if the Cavs weren't going to trade LeBron, and they weren't going to give him help, there wasn't a hell of a lot the guy could do. Find me an example of one Hall of Famer and a bunch of below average guys winning a championship, and I may reconsider my stance on this.

I think I'm missing your point. To me it seems like if you clearly are NOT the best player on your team, and you're playing with an all-time great, that this would hurt your chance of making the hall more than helping it. Since you aren't the team's first option, you get fewer opportunities, given less credit, and fewer accolades. In exchange, you get championships, so maybe they balance out in the end. But McHale and Worthy finished with great career numbers DESPITE playing on teams where they weren't the offense's first option.

 

The SP gremlins must of got me.... I meant Robert Parish. Larry Parrish was the baseball player of the 70's. My bad.

Aldeth,

I will always have respect for the atheletes who played for an organziation throughout their careers. Championships or not. Like Tony Gwynn, Cal Ripken, Dan Fouts, Marino, etc... The NBA players don't seem to do it these days. Duncan, Kobe...Not many others. How do you as a fan respect a guy who leaves a franchise for the money and glory?

I won't completely knock his move to Miami, I know he was frustrated, but to celebrate like a jackass on national TV, acting like the next 6 or 7 rings were already theirs? That was wrong. It immediately made me want to root against the Heat.

Off the top of my head, there is one team that had a superstar w/out a ton of other help that won a championship. The 77 Portland Trailblazers. Bill Walton was a monster that year. What other help did he have?

 

I don't necessarily respect it, but I understand it as a sign of the times. As you said, it happens so infrequently that a players stays his entire career. Also, while it can hurt your team, it can also benefit your team. I didn't see you complaining much when the Phillies signed Cliff Lee for example. The free agency gods giveth, and they taketh away.

Oh, I did bash him for that. I disagreed both with the televised decision day, and with the post-signing celebration. But I was less upset by what he did than how he did it, if that makes sense.

Your memory is much better than mine. I wasn't even following the NBA in 77. I know Bill Walton, but I cannot even name another person who was on the team that year, so I don't know where they would fall on the spectrum of good/bad players. I looked up the all-star game for that year, and the other all-star selections from Portland that year were Maurice Lucas and Lionel Hollins. Never heard of them, but evidently they had a pretty good year too.

I also have to agree with some of dmc's comments. There were way fewer NBA teams in the 70s and 80s. There were 22 teams then, 30 teams now. The teams that exist now that didn't exist then include Miami, Orlando, Charlotte, Toronto, New Orleans (although the current Utah Jazz played in NO at the time), Minnesota, Memphis, and believe it or not, Dallas. (Although Dallas came into existence in 1979, so the NBA strangely had an odd number of teams for several years.) So teams were better stocked with players because there were way fewer teams. I doubt you could put together teams today that you saw back then. Not only is the talent spread thinner, but there was no salary cap back then.

 

TBH, I was excited, but I did feel a bit guilty later after thinking that they were stacking up like the Yanks and Sox usually do. But since my boss is from Utica, NY and a big Mets fan, it was nice to be able to rub it in just a little. Ok, maybe alot.

I believe it was Lucas's rookie year. Or possibly his sophmiore year. He was good that year and lead them in scoring I believe. But Walton won the MVP with 14.4 RPG and great Defense, let alone 18.9 oper game. He was tenacious that year. Especially in the playoffs. Too bad injuries shortened his career. At 100%, he was a monster inside. Lionel Hollins wasn't a great scorer.