{"id":564,"date":"2010-07-10T09:35:05","date_gmt":"2010-07-10T14:35:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=564"},"modified":"2010-07-10T09:37:05","modified_gmt":"2010-07-10T14:37:05","slug":"lebrons-not-perfect-but-is-he-a-villain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=564","title":{"rendered":"LeBron&#8217;s Not Perfect, But Is He a Villain?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Anyone else that has a space to write about sports on the internet is surely waying in on &#8220;The Decision&#8221;, so I guess we should as well.<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" hspace=\"5\" vspace=\"5\" border=\"1\" src=\"http:\/\/static.guim.co.uk\/sys-images\/Sport\/Pix\/pictures\/2010\/7\/9\/1278660963757\/LeBron-James-announces-hi-006.jpg\" alt=\"lebron\" align=\"right\" height=\"276\" width=\"460\" \/><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>I watched the ESPN spectacle at my favorite sports bar in Manhattan.\u00a0 It was easy to grab a couple seats at the bar at about 8:25, then the place steadily filled up as 9PM approached.\u00a0 When the show started, the small bar was completely packed.\u00a0 It was a strange atmosphere.\u00a0 What were we all hanging around in a sports bar to watch?\u00a0 Weren&#8217;t we all being really stupid for caring about this so much?\u00a0 Yes, yes\u00a0we were.\u00a0 But I&#8217;ll say this, even though I&#8217;m somewhat ashamed to say it, it was gripping television.<\/li>\n<li>Most of the TVs in the bar were tuned to ESPN, I was definitely the only person trying to also keep an eye on the one TV showing the\u00a0Phils-Reds game that was heading into the late innings of a tight game.<\/li>\n<li>I agree with just about everyone else in the world that announcing this decision in a one-hour special was a mistake by LeBron.\u00a0 Had he announced that he was staying in Cleveland, it would have been great, but to go on national TV and use his decision to leave Cleveland behind, using this situation\u00a0to self-promote, was not just narcissistic, it was dumb.\u00a0 The old adage of &#8220;any press is good press&#8221; does not apply here.\u00a0 He has all the press he needs and more right now, no matter how he made this announcement.\u00a0 This was bad press, and it didn&#8217;t help\u00a0his &#8220;global icon&#8221; mission.<\/li>\n<li>One of the people I watched with, though not a Cavs fan per se, lived in Cleveland for five years.\u00a0 He&#8217;s very aware of the relationship the fans there have to LeBron.\u00a0 After LeBron made the announcement and started explaining the decision, the guy I was with kept saying, &#8220;It doesn&#8217;t have to be like this.\u00a0 He&#8217;s saying the wrong things.\u00a0 He should take some time to say how much Cleveland means to him and that he&#8217;ll always be a part of the community.&#8221;\u00a0 I agree with him.\u00a0 LeBron could have salvaged this televised debacle, somewhat, by saying to Jim Gray, &#8220;Before I take any more of your questions, I just want to take a minute to say how hard this decision was for me, and how much I hate leaving Cleveland without having brought them the title that I tried so hard to win, yadda yadda yadda, I love Cleveland and I&#8217;m sorry for leaving.&#8221;\u00a0 I think that would have counted for a lot.\u00a0 There still would have been plenty of LeBron jersey burning in Ohio, but at least he would have given a\u00a0lot of Cavs fans reason not to completely hate his guts.\u00a0 He hinted at things like this in the interview, but he should have said it more explicitly.<\/li>\n<li>All that being said, I&#8217;m not ready to call LeBron a villain.\u00a0 The way he announced the decision was a mistake, but I can&#8217;t blame him for the decision he made.\u00a0 A lot of people, most notably Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, have thrown around terms like &#8220;traitor&#8221; and &#8220;shocking disloyalty&#8221; and &#8220;betrayal.&#8221;\u00a0\u00a0I think that&#8217;s way off-base.\u00a0 LeBron&#8217;s closest friends\u00a0are\u00a0still his friends\u00a0from Akron,\u00a0that he grew\u00a0up with.\u00a0 He&#8217;s going to Miami to play with two guys, Wade and Bosh, that he&#8217;s become really good friends with.\u00a0 His friends and family from Akron are going to\u00a0go with\u00a0him to Miami, I&#8217;m sure.\u00a0 I&#8217;m also sure they want to see him win championships almost as much as he wants to win them.\u00a0 Who should he be loyal to?\u00a0 His friends (both from\u00a0Akron and Wade and Bosh) or the &#8220;city of Cleveland&#8221; and the Cavs organization?\u00a0 He didn&#8217;t ask them to draft him, and if\u00a0they hadn&#8217;t had the #1 pick, whoever else did would&#8217;ve taken him 1st overall, as well.\u00a0 So how does he &#8220;owe&#8221; anything to the team, or the city?\u00a0 I feel bad for the Cleveland fans, but it&#8217;s not LeBron\u00a0James&#8217;s job to bring them a title.\u00a0\u00a0We always rip athletes\u00a0today for not caring enough about winning.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s a guy who made\u00a0a decision based on mainly two things: winning and playing\u00a0with his friends.\u00a0 We should hate\u00a0him for that?\u00a0\u00a0Sure, there are fringe benefits to winning those titles (like more endorsement money), but I just don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s why he made this decision.<\/li>\n<li>Finally, not to defend the TV special, but would Cavs fans have reacted much differently had this free-agent signing been announced like any other?\u00a0\u00a0A\u00a0&#8220;news break&#8221; scrawls across the ESPN bottom line, declaring &#8220;LeBron\u00a0Headed to Heat,&#8221; followed by an announcement that the Heat are holding a press conference for the following morning to announce the signing.\u00a0 Would that have ripped their hearts out any less?\u00a0 Isn&#8217;t it possible that this one-hour special, as atrocious and offensive as it was, is being used as a\u00a0sort of scapegoat so they can feel justified in burning his jersey and declaring him\u00a0Public Enemy #1?\u00a0 Let me reiterate, I don&#8217;t blame Cavs fans for their anger and frustration.\u00a0 I know what it&#8217;s like to\u00a0not have a championship.\u00a0 I&#8217;m just pointing out that it&#8217;s asking\u00a0a lot of a 25-year-old,\u00a0raised in poverty and without any college education, who happens to be the best athlete on the planet, to also have the\u00a0life-experience needed\u00a0to see the exact way he needed to handle this signing.\u00a0 And that exact way was to go to the\u00a0Cavs first, tell them he was leaving, and then hold a press conference aired live on all the Cleveland local affiliates, in which he announced to the city that he was leaving, etc.\u00a0 That&#8217;s what he should have done.\u00a0 The fact that he didn&#8217;t was a huge mistake, a disaster.\u00a0\u00a0But is this athlete, who&#8217;s never done anything<em>\u00a0close<\/em>\u00a0 to killing a dog, raping a girl, cheating on a wife, using performance-enhancing drugs,\u00a0being anywhere near a shooting,\u00a0taking cars and money illegally from college boosters, or even shop-lifting, is\u00a0he the athlete we should all hate now?\u00a0 Just so we&#8217;re clear, the guy who chose winning and friends over money and loyalty to a\u00a0franchise that couldn&#8217;t provide him with\u00a0the roster he needed to win, and a city filled\u00a0with millions of fans dying for\u00a0a title, but the only people he\u00a0truly cares about in Northeast Ohio are the ones he personally knows and loves.\u00a0 He is no hero, he&#8217;s\u00a0far from perfect.\u00a0 He&#8217;s flawed, and he&#8217;s pretty damn fascinating, and I think he&#8217;s done pretty well for himself, all things considered.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Anyone else that has a space to write about sports on the internet is surely waying in on &#8220;The Decision&#8221;, so I guess we should as well. I watched the ESPN spectacle at my favorite sports bar in Manhattan.\u00a0 It &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=564\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[1049,206,602],"class_list":["post-564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nba","tag-cavs","tag-heat","tag-lebron-james"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}