MJ: "I would never have called up Larry, Magic & say lets get together."

That is so badass he said that. Love it!

 

Bleedin_RED86, if you want to compare Pippen and Grant to Jamison and Mo Williams because of their similar scoring output, go right ahead. I sure wish all the other GMs not named Morey based there decisions like that.

Now Mo Malone and Wilt forced exits upon their squads to play with other great players to get rings (and Hakeem very nearly did). Tainted legacies? Would you rather have Miller's?

 

It doesn't matter what you do in the regular season, when you play a team better with more talent, you willprobably lose. Unlike in football when a team gets hot, they can go from wild card to ring. In basketball, you have to win 16 games. Its easy to find a overacheiving regular season team and can tell theywill fail. Look at the rockets vs utah in 06. Did anyone look at utah and say the rockets had more talent? I can say the 92 blazers had as much talent as the 92 bulls and they lost. The 05 mavs had more talent than the heat that year and lost too. For the most part though, the best team wins. If you can't even get you best friend or one of your best friends to come hoop with you, who can you get? KG told lebron he stayed 4 yrs too long in minny and i think that was the biggest deciding factor of it all.

 

<Your original statement was he quit because he said his goal was to win a Championship in Cleveland but he failed to do so.>

Re-read post 62.....I never said this. I said, paraphrasing " James said he would bring a title to Cleveland and he left before this happened. That is, by definition quitting."

I never said "failed to do so" until you said this.

<By your logic of using the dictionary any quits when he gets released or traded.>

No....if he was traded/ released that would mean that Cleveland had decided to quit using LeBron to achieve their goal.

Quiting is voluntary and that is what he did.

<Jordan quit in the middle of his career. Which he literally did because I think he was still under contract right?>

I was a young Jordan fan at the time so knowledge of contracts was something that I didn't have. I don't know off the top of my head but I could look that up.

But even if Jordan was under contract, what does this have to do with anything I said about James quiting on his dream of bringing a championship to Cleveland?


*********

Let me ask everybody a question.

My dream is to become a Dentist and open up my own practice in the South. If I all of a sudden decide that I would rather set up a practice in L.A, have I not quit on my dream of setting up a Dental practice in the South?



If that is not quitting, what is it?

 

To be 100% honest with you......I don't really care about having a legacy. Give me money so I can take care of members of my extended family that can't afford health care.


But....I don't see how any of this has to do with what I said about James quiting. I never said that he wasn't justified in quiting on his dream......I simply said he did in fact quit on the dream. Do you disagree?

 

I think you're taking athlete-speak and turning it into fact. Everyone in this ridiculous drama is/was basically playing to their audience. It's doubtful that Lebron ever really cared about winning a title *in Cleveland*. He said that because he played for Cleveland, so what else is he going to say? If he really cared about winning there, he would have committed longterm to them a long time ago.

Similarly, Jordan can take a shot at Lebron, and everyone will eat it up. But really, he never had the need or probably the opportunity to create a super-team whenever he was a free agent (without sacrificing $$). Since he never had to face the situation, it's easy to say "I'd never have done that" - and it may be true. But him piling on and saying it now doesn't really lend credence to that.

 

To say that Lebron had no help is rubbish. The regular season is 82 games and its enough games to determine if a team is good enough or not. You can not simply win 60+ for 2 straight year with a trash team.

Cleveland was unfortunate that they ran into a Boston team that peaked at the right time. KG in that series was pretty good, thanks to the days off in between games.

As much talent as LBJ has, I can only recall a few games in the post season where he was outstanding. He puts up huge numbers throughout most of the game but I have never seen him score huge chunks of points in the closing minutes of a game.

 

So when a wife leaves an abusive husband though wedding vows say "through the bad", they "quit".

If you work for an a-hole boss and take another job, you "quit".

I am not saying the Cleveland Cavaliers are an abusive husband or a-hole boss (though Dan Gilbert gave us supporting evidence)--but life is full of "quits". It is called being human and decisions are complicated.

And if your future partner says "please set up your practice in California, I am lonely taking care of our young ones here alone from my family, and there are more opportunities there and we will have a better life", I hope you would consider "quitting".

 

wrong.. Jordan never had 2 top 10 players on his team, he never defected to another superstars team in search for help.. lebrick teams the past 2 seasons had the best record in the nba so that weak argument that ''lebron had no help'' is weak as hell, he didnt do it by himsel, james jump shot is broker than a homeless man he couldnt elevate and will his team to victory the way Jordan did,lebron is incapable of that.. james is a robin who needs batman (Wade) to finish and and have that killers insticnct.. who the hell cares that theyre friends? Jordan, Bird, Magic and Barkley were friends but they were gona kill each other pn the court.. todays nba is soft and friendly as hell, most players today wouldnt survive in the old nba where u can put ur forearm on the hip of the perimeter player and rough them up, players get fouls if theyre breathed on these days, soft

 

True, maybe he didn't really care about bringing a championship to Cleveland. Idk.....I'm not in his inner circle or his head. I can only go by what James said.

He said that he wanted to bring a championship to Cleveland and quit pursing this goal this offseason in order to pursue one with Wade and Bosh. That was his right....b/c he was a UFA but he did have to quit pursuing his stated goal to bring a title to Cleveland in order to pursue one in Miami

All I'm saying is that what James did by ,the accepted definitions, is quiting. I really can't speak about what James feels deep inside.


As for Jordan's comments...I pretty much agree with your stance. But hey, as we all know James loves attention

 

LBJ's teams during his first 6 years were better than the ones MJ had.

 

<So when a wife leaves an abusive husband though wedding vows say "through the bad", they "quit".>

Eh..thats stretching it a bit but yes...in that situation the wife did cease to stay in an abusive relationship. And thats a VERY good thing!!!! A man doesn't have the right to hit a woman "just because he felt like it" or she "got out of place" I hate men who use that logic.


This isn't related to basketball but I applaud women who leave abusive relationships. That is a very hard thing to do....I've heard many stories of women who stay in such relationships for years and are often seriously injured or even killed. My gf's aunt has been in such a relationship for almost 2 decades. I hope she will eventually just give up on that relationship and move on to a more healthy one....before its too late.

Men who abusive their wifes/girlfriends are on the same level as rapists...in my opinion. Frankly, I hope men like that burn in hell.

<If you work for an a-hole boss and take another job, you "quit".>

Yes......you ceased to work at your previous place of employment because you did not like the conditions at work.


<but life is full of "quits". It is called being human and decisions are complicated.>

That is very true. Sometimes you have to quit doing certain things. Quitting isn't always a bad thing depending on what you stopped doing. But..if you quit, you quit. It is what it is. No need to avoid the fact that you did.

<And if your future partner says "please set up your practice in California, I am lonely taking care of our young ones here alone from my family, and there are more opportunities there and we will have a better life", I hope you would consider "quitting" >

Yes I would....but I would still be quitting.......even if the reasons were great

 

I have to disagree. With more NBA teams now, the talent is more dispersed than it was pre-'95. Add to that, rule changes such as eliminating hand checking and an overall favor towards the offensive player is supposed to cut down of physicality and allow players today easier opportunites to score than in the past.

As for the 2010 Cavs roster, if you add a Jordan in his prime to Cleveland, I think they would be better than LBJ's team.

Williams
Jordan
Parker
Jamison
O'Neal

Not a shabby roster. LBJ's team was #1 in the league during regular season. Put in Jordan who is arguably the best post-season performer in history.

 

Hey...I had < > around the parts of the post I was responding 2...not cool.

Now people will be

 

because lebron quit, because he left before he achieved what he said he would, he said his goal is to bring a championship to cleveland and hes here until he does that, he never achieved it, gave up and quit....to compare it to MJ leaving after accomplishing what he needed to with not one, but 3 championships? he retired...if lebron won a title and left, then it makes it not quitting as he did what he set to do

 

Jordan's version of the 1-hour press conference special:

"I'm back"

 

per AXG

Williams - something about playoffs being kryptonite.

Parker - what? "anthony" parker? you can an do better than this man

Jamison - overrated for a long time, finally exposed in cleveland. jamison sucks, bad. a couple of 40 pts games in a career doesnt make you a star

O'Neal - meh, the only thing oneal provides this days is a big body in the paint

Jordan could drop 50 and wouldn't get past the celts or magic with this lineup

 

MJ seemed to have it in for Kobe as well, when Kobe was a rookie. It was more of a challenging kind of meanness though. i remember the media kept talking about "passing on the torch" and MJ responded with "i aint passing it on to nobody. they have to come take it."

Later, MJ hits a fadeaway to put the east on top with a few seconds left in the All-Star game. Next play, Kobe hits the game winner in the All-Star game vs. MJ (his last all-star game). Kobe's reply to reporters when asked if he thought it was classy to do that? "What was I supposed to do? Let him win?"

classic.

Kobe worked for his success. He was the golden child during the Shaq years but post Colorado rape case, he had a steep uphill climb. Lebron literally has the NBA wiping his arse for him.

 

If you have the best records of the league TWO YEARS IN A ROW, you are not overachieving. You have a very good team. It's not a fluke. That's 164 games, not a small sample size.