Tag: Kobe Bryant

LeBron remaining a free agent shouldn’t be as surprising as it sounds

The media wants to say everyone is waiting on his decision, but it’s far away from 2010

Let’s go back to the summer of 2010, when the NBA was entering what was known by many as the biggest free agency period in the history of the league. Headlining the list was LeBron James, who had spent his first seven seasons with the Cleveland Cavaliers. At the time, the 25-year-old James was thought of as the best player in the league (along with Kobe Bryant, who just finished leading the Los Angeles Lakers to back-to-back titles), and wherever he chose to go, championships would soon follow for the receiving squad. LeBron would choose to sign with the Miami Heat, and two titles resulted from his four-year stay in South Beach. Fast forward to this summer, and the same discussion about James and where he wants to play is back in spades. If ESPN is telling the story, they would have everyone believe the stakes are the same as they were in 2010, making it like the NBA will be forever changed after this choice (no surprise seeing how they have been the conductors of the LeBron train). The network has gone as far as calling this the fourth part of “The Decision,” a throwback to when they aired his choice to join the Heat like it was National Signing Day for high school football recruits. While ESPN stays in fantasy land, let’s come back to reality and understand James being a free agent is where the similarities end. He’s now 41, and while he’s still good at his age, he’s not the man who shifts the balance of power in the league anymore. Teams aren’t waiting for his decision, and the number of trades that have transpired shows that. In other words, this is far from 2010, and the fact LeBron remains unsigned speaks loudly.

That doesn’t mean the “chosen one” would miss a moment where he can control the narrative. On June 30, it was James who announced he wouldn’t return to play for the Lakers, through his agent, Rich Paul. This would lead everyone to believe LeBron is the one dictating the terms, but a reading of the tea leaves would tell a much different story. There have been moves made by L.A., mainly the trade that acquired Luka Doncic from the Dallas Mavericks in February 2025, that signaled the team was ready to go in another direction, one that wasn’t centered around the aging James. There were numerous reports that said the Lakers’ governor, Jeanie Buss, became frustrated with (among other things) LeBron’s ego and the overreach of his camp. It’s one thing to think James should have a say-so in the decisions L.A. makes, but there better be some titles won along the way, and the Lakers haven’t come close to one since winning it in 2020 (nothing wrong with the COVID bubble championship). So why wouldn’t the team explore other directions? Nothing is happening except James setting more longevity records, which is good for history, but not increasing chances for competing with the best in the Western Conference. It’s probably not a reach to say the front office wasn’t in the mood to muddle in mediocrity, especially with the standard being as high as it is in Los Angeles. Whether it was LeBron or the Lakers making the announcement on the breakup, how that moment arrived started a long time ago.

So here it is, more than two weeks after the back on the market announcement, and James is still out there. For a quick reminder, this is 2026, not 2010, so if we can remove the name for a little bit, it shouldn’t be a shock if these options are limited at best. This is a young man’s league, and the rush to sign someone in their 40s, regardless of the achieved status, is probably lacking. Putting the name back into the equation, multiple reports say there are three teams in the race to sign LeBron. Those squads include Miami, the Cavaliers (funny how these two would be among the choices), and the Philadelphia 76ers (The Golden State Warriors are also on the radar, because of LeBron’s wanting to pair with Steph Curry). Looking at those squads, the fit if James was to be in the mix would be questionable. The Heat just went all in on a trade getting Giannis Antetokounmpo from the Milwaukee Bucks. They have to figure out how to put players around Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo. Cleveland just signed Donovan Mitchell to an four-year extension worth close to $70 million per season (annual average), and the 76ers just acquired Jaylen Brown from the Boston Celtics to join Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey. As much as we hear about LeBron’s team-first mentality, there’s no denying how ball-dominant he has been in his career. That scenario probably doesn’t happen under any of these circumstances, which means a sacrifice has to happen somewhere. Based off of history, who would believe a man that is used to having the ball in his hands would be willing to accept anything less?

Which brings us to LeBron himself. Let’s not forget it’s about more than what he wants. Teams have to want him also, and it appears nobody is waiting for his fourth decision episode. Surely, a squad would welcome him, but they still have items to tend to, such as worrying about the players that are actually on the roster. Meanwhile, time will tell how much James is about winning a championship. The recent contracts signed to stay in L.A. says he’s still trying to get top-dollar (nothing wrong with that, but remember what was said about sacrifice) and doing things on his terms. He’s still very good, but not someone a team should back up the money truck for, even if it is just for a season. Simply put, LeBron’s not the man anymore, and that reality might be too much for him to admit. Accepting a lesser role can be hard for someone who is routinely in the greatest-of-all-time conversation, but it’s either that, or continue to keep playing while demanding all the money and compiling longevity records. If he’s the complete player we’ve seen over the years, then this is where those other skills start to show. The teams mentioned have clearly stated the direction they’re going. James would have to be a piece of the puzzle, not the piece the whole puzzle centers around. The bite isn’t keeping up with the bark at this stage in his career.

All of this is said expecting LeBron to sign somewhere soon, or maybe, he quietly retires without the farewell tour (I seriously doubt that, but the option is there). Whoever signs him needs to understand they’re dealing with someone who is used to being the center of the universe, which could bring another set of headaches. For most, the fact James is not on a team more than two weeks after “the announcement” is shocking, but it shouldn’t be if those who can’t believe it allow themselves to look at this situation logically. If this wasn’t one of the best players in league history being the topic of discussion, a franchise bringing a 41-year-old player into the equation is as close to a non-starter as possible. As good as he still is, LeBron does not control the NBA universe like he might have years ago. Life goes on and evolves over time, and in this case, so does the league. Someone might want to let James know, but even if he was told that, his ego might say it’s just like 2010. The narrative says teams are waiting on him. Reality is telling us something different.

The NBA title asterisk argument, and why it doesn’t make any sense

Here we are, in the middle of the 2021 NBA Finals, coming close to crowning a new champion. As it stands right now, the Milwaukee Bucks have a 3-2 series lead over the Phoenix Suns, with Game 6 scheduled for Tuesday night in Milwaukee. Both of these teams have been through a lot in their journey to the championship series, and whoever wins deserve the time to be celebrated. It’s been said nobody can ever take a title away from a team who wins it. Unfortunately, there are many who will try to take it away, or at the very least, attempt to lessen the legitimacy of the triumph. Regardless of who wins, either the Bucks or Suns will have to hear how (among other things) teams they faced along the way were not at full strength, which is basically saying their paths were made significantly easier. The 72-game regular season is also something that will be thrown in to dump dirt on the potential victory. All of this equals the mastery of the halfway acknowledgement, where you have people admitting the championship run happened, but with an asterisk. Words like phony and cheap are constantly thrown around to explain a team’s quest when it’s perceived they did not exactly “earn” it. Come with me as we look at other title runs that commonly have an asterisk by it, and then talk about why these cases against the winners equate to glorified excuse making.

1999 San Antonio Spurs – Going into this particular season, there was serious doubt a season would even take place. The NBA and the Players Association were in the middle of a lockout, and a deal wasn’t reached until January of that year. As a result, the season was shortened to 50 games, and the All-Star Game was cancelled. With the campaign compacted, it was the Spurs, lead by future hall-of-famers Tim Duncan and David Robinson, who would emerge as the team to unseat the Chicago Bulls as the new heirs to the throne. Of course, the Bulls looked totally different from previous years, as Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Dennis Rodman all left the team, and the Los Angeles Lakers, with young superstars Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant, weren’t quite ready to ascend to the throne just yet. To top it off, the Spurs defeated an eighth-seeded New York Knicks team to win the franchise’s first trophy. Bottom line is whoever won the title in this campaign was going to get grief simply because it wasn’t the normal 82-game format. It just happened to be the Spurs. Being a teenager who was growing up in San Antonio at that time, I can say first hand the fans down there didn’t care about the way victory was claimed by their team.

2012 Miami Heat – Like the ’99 season, the 2011-12 was also shortened by a work stoppage. The difference is the powers that be were able to salvage a 66-game season instead of 50, with the games starting Christmas Day. The Heat, with the “Big 3” of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, were coming off of a crushing loss to the Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 Finals. With everything on the line, they were able to come through and get the elusive title James sought after in coming down to Florida from the Cleveland Cavaliers in the summer of 2010. Having said that, the championship didn’t come without its doubts. Besides the season being 66 games, people wonder to this day whether or not the Heat even get to the Finals if the Bulls, who had the best record in the Eastern Conference that year, didn’t lose point guard Derrick Rose to a injured knee in the first round of the playoffs. In the conference finals, Miami needed all seven teams to get by a Boston Celtics team that had Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Ray Allen all on the downsides of their respective careers. With the team the Heat had, it was not a huge surprise seeing them win, but for the haters out there, these are the excuses they put in front to justify the asterisk.

2015 Golden State Warriors – Unlike the first two case studies, the Warriors actually played a full 82-game season. They also had the league’s best record at 67-15 and the Most Valuable Player in guard Stephen Curry. On the surface, this is the team that should have won it all with all things considered, but the argument comes against them because of their opponent in the NBA Finals, the Cavaliers. It was the first year in James’ return to Cleveland after being in Miami for the last four seasons, and he had another version of the Big 3 in the form of himself, guard Kyrie Irving and forward Kevin Love. On the way through the East, Love suffered an injured shoulder and was lost for the rest of the season, and Irving hurt his knee in Game 1 of the Finals. Now here come the questions. What would the result have been if Cleveland was healthy (One can ask the same question in reverse when it comes to the Cavs’ title win the year after)? It’s always tough because injuries are part of sports, and we never know when, where or who they can happen to. It’s probably fair to say it’s often not the best team who rises to the top, but the healthiest. For LeBron (and the few remaining Cavs) fans everywhere, health will always be a question, but isn’t that the case for many teams in the history of sports?

2019 Toronto Raptors – In a time where we are always looking a story to captivate us, this version of the Raptors was one a person can get behind with ease. Forward Kawhi Leonard was traded to Toronto from the Spurs before the year started, and with that move, the whole country of Canada was being carried on Leonard’s back. The end saw the Raptors winning the title, defeating the Warriors, who were trying to become the first team since the Lakers in the early 2000s to win three straight league championships, 4-2. With this run, there are two glaring points some fans and media will point out to take away from Toronto’s accomplishment. One, James left the Eastern Conference to sign with the Lakers, and teams that had him playing for them had made the Finals eight straight times. Two, the Warriors saw Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson go down to catastrophic injuries. Yes, Golden State was favored to win it all going into the season, but to say they would have won just off of projections ignore the original reason why games are played. It just goes to show why there is an element of luck, good or bad, that goes with the skill, and for the people in the city of Toronto, I struggle to see any evidence of care about how the Raptors brought a title back to not just that metropolitan area, but the country as a whole.

2020 Lakers – I probably don’t have to explain why this case is questioned, but for research purposes, here it goes. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the season, and sports in general, stopped as we know it, and there were questions about the season being canceled altogether. From March 11 to July 30, the season was in limbo, but it did return to resume playing in Orlando, where teams met to play in the NBA bubble. Needless to say, the circumstances the players were facing were unlike any they have faced before. So with that being said, mental and emotional toughness was going to be key for the team that could rise to the top. It ended up being the Lakers, but people would be quick to point out how the “break” really helped James and newly-acquired forward Anthony Davis by helping their bodies recover from the grind of the regular season. Davis has a detailed injury history, and James, as great as he is, was showing signs of the wear and tear of a long career that has seen countless runs to the Finals in previous years. In other words, critics say L.A. would not have won the title if it wasn’t for the pause in action.

So there are five cases detailing why some fans and media want to put an asterisk on these title runs, but to be honest, the people who have these opinions sound dumb and jealous. If their favorite team, or in the case of the media, their pick to win, came through for them, they are not complaining or talking about the perceived pitfalls they want to throw on the winners. They would put a more positive spin on it, saying how their team was tenacious and showed the heart and grit necessary to complete such a task. Also, it’s quickly forgotten all of the other squads had the same circumstances to deal with. It’s not like there was a different set of rules put together for the team that hoisted the Larry O’Brien trophy. To sum it up, the asterisk argument holds no water with these scenarios, and it won’t when the Bucks or Suns get their moment to shine sometime this week. That does not mean people won’t try to fill the broken cup with BS. We’re just left to decide if we want to take the cup, and that decision should be easy if things are looked at by principle instead of who is involved.

Did the Mavericks start a new trend with GM hire?

Looking at the NBA landscape, there were a number of places where change was taking place, but this was especially true in the case of the Dallas Mavericks. In a span of four days, the Mavericks saw events that included a damning story published by The Athletic questioning the pecking order under team owner Mark Cuban, a parting of the ways from then-general manager Donnie Nelson and the decision by Rick Carlisle to step down from the head coaching position (Carlisle is now the head man for the Indiana Pacers…again). All of a sudden, a franchise that seemed to be stable was in chaos, and Cuban was left to make decisions that will alter the course of the team for at least the next decade. The man chosen to be the next head coach of the Mavs is Jason Kidd, the former point guard who was on the team when Dallas won their only championship in 2011. Kidd also coached the Brooklyn Nets and Milwaukee Bucks before finding an assistant coaching role under Frank Vogel with the Los Angeles Lakers. This move is the one making the headlines simply because of the pedigree Kidd brings as a player and coach, but it’s the GM hire that, at least to me, is the more intriguing.

Enter Nico Harrison, a former executive with Nike, as the man chosen to lead basketball operations for the Mavs. At face value, replacing Nelson with a man who doesn’t have any experience in an NBA front office is unconventional at the least, but there could be a underlining method to Cuban’s methods. By being a Nike exec, Harrison has been able to build relationships with numerous players, most notably being the liaison for the late Kobe Bryant in his second year with the company. One of those relationships is with Luka Doncic, the team’s budding superstar who Harrison is tasked with building a championship contender around. That in itself is a monumental chore, considering Dallas plays in the rough and rugged Western Conference, and the roster has more than a few areas needing improvement. The hope for Cuban and the Mavs fan base is some of those relationships Harrison has created can be beneficial in bringing a few of the better players in the association to Dallas, and ultimately, erase the fact the franchise hasn’t made it past the first round of the playoffs since that 2011 title run. At any rate, I believe Cuban is willing to do anything possible to bring a title back to Big D, and while the move to bring Harrison in as GM can be questioned, it may be revolutionary depending on the results.

When we looks into the inner workings of a league’s teams, most of them go with a person who has worked their way up in the franchise, or with someone who is at least familiar with front offices around the league, to be a general manager. It’s not common the people who hold these positions come from a source outside of the league. If there is a model for an awkward GM hire working to the tune of championship results, look no further than the Lakers. L.A. brought in Rob Pelinka, a sports agent whose clients included Bryant and Nets guard James Harden, to be their GM in 2017. Pelinka, was able to help sign forwards LeBron James and Anthony Davis, bring Vogel in as the head coach (along with the aforementioned Kidd as an assistant), and build a roster around superstars James and Davis to win the NBA championship last season in the bubble. When Lakers owner Jeanie Buss decided to hire Pelinka as the GM, we could perceive it was because of those business relationships he developed as an agent for a big reason why he got the job. In other words, there are other walks of life that help to get a person in tune with the landscape of a business. While the hire of Pelinka is not exactly the same as Harrison taking over as the Mavericks GM, the fact they come from different entities to operate an NBA team is.

Speaking of those relationships, I personally never believed it when people say business is just business. That theory sounds like a copout more than anything else, and here’s why. Anytime we get into business with someone, there is a period of getting to know that person or group to some degree. In that process, a certain amount of trust has to be built, or the deal will not get done. While this is going on, a friendship may grow out of that. I say all of this to point out there is always a personal aspect to conducting business, and when those relationships are produced, it can lead to bigger and better things down the line. So when we look at what Cuban did with bringing in Harrison, he understands this very narrative, because if he did not, this move does not get made. I guarantee those relationships Harrison developed with the players will be crucial if Dallas is to bring free agents in that can produce a championship contender.

If we are being honest with each other, we can say not much is guaranteed in life or business. One thing we do know is the race to stay ahead of the trends is hotter than ever. If there is a way to revolutionize an industry or organization, the powers that be are going to attempt to find that. Cuban is known as a visionary, and he obviously believes brining someone who earned his reputation at a shoe and apparel company to run his team will get the desired results he desperately wants. Such is the life of a businessman. One either wins big or loses big, and it will be interesting to see if this is a gamble that pays off for Cuban at the end.