The Enigma known as LeBron

  I’ll admit, I sound like an NBA meatball when it comes to LeBron James and that whole sideshow of opulence and self aggrandizing that’s going on with him and the Miami Heat right now.  I don’t know why it gets under my skin when LeBron James is compared to Michael Jordan but it does.  I know, it shouldn’t.  Begrudgingly, as I’ve begun to watch the NBA game with a more objective eye, I can see that James is a better player than Jordan is.  James can take anyone at any time and he can take them inside or outside.  And if you need proof that LeBron is a better athlete than Jordan, you can go to NBA TV and watch game six of the recently concluded NBA Finals between the Heat and the Spurs.  LeBron not only defended three of the five positions on the floor, he RAN the floor in transition AFTER defending the hell out of Tony Parker.  Never in the modern NBA has there been a more versatile athlete with that rare gift of athleticism and power and pure skill.  But then, even after all this is factored into the equation, the so called “King” makes me scratch my head.  James, in my view, is a man who either doesn’t know how great he is or simply is incapable of realizing it.  It took 38 minutes for the so called greatest player on the planet to wake up and realize that there was no tomorrow for his either his team or his legacy for that matter.  Can you really put a fellow, however gifted as LeBron is, into the elite level of the NBA when he has to be TOLD to take a game over; when he has to be TOLD that he can dominate anyone once he shows the will to actually do it.  Michael Jordan never needed an alarm clock.  For Michael Jordan, every game was game seven.  You can compare the physical tools between Jordan and James and James would win hands down.  But then you get to the intangibles and that’s where Jordan is far superior.  What am I talking about?  I’m talking about heart and I’m talking about will.  The great ones don’t quit on their team in times of adversity.  Remember LeBron’s last playoff series as a member of the Cavaliers?  The great ones don’t need to be TOLD when to take over and the great ones don’t need to be TOLD how great they truly are.  Yah, LeBron won two championships in Miami but guess what?  He had to outsource a crew of mercs to help him get it done.  So what do we have here in this freak of athleticism known as LeBron James.  We have a man who can dominate an NBA game like no other, whose talent and skill can leave mere mortals in a dizzying blur when he’s so inclined.  And we also have just another self involved, oblivious millionaire who betrayed the loyalties of a city that bent over backwards for him.   What we have in LeBron James is a dazzling freak of nature that, like the tin man, lacks heart.   If the kid had any heart or any will, he would’ve stayed in Cleveland and finished what he started.  But alas, the King built a palace somewhere else.  And for that, he will be, now and forever, THE most talented, the most polarizing, and THE most frustrating enigma in NBA history.