South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
King James and his next court
Can LeBron conjure another Summer of 2010?
LOS ANGELES — You think it was easy in Michael Jordan’s shadow? Ask Scottie Pippen.
You think it was graceful growing old alongside Kobe Bryant? Ask Shaquille O’Neal. So now, with the question turning to whether LeBron James can attract top-tier free agents to join him with the Los Angeles Lakers, as was the thesis of a controversy-stoking report from Bleacher Report, why should the expectations be any different?
The difference with Pippen and Shaq is that there never was a choice, until the end, about whether they wanted play side-by-side with alphadog ego.
Now, with the Lakers holding ample cap space going forward, those who will join LeBron will do it by choice. Or not do it at all.
And yet, of Michael, Kobe and LeBron, James also is the most likely to think pass first, to hunt assists just as the others hunted baskets.
The upshot, be it the questions from Kevin Durant, Trevor Ariza and others quoted in the Bleacher Report piece, is that championship collaborations are best coordinated concurrently, such as when Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce came together with the Boston Celtics, or LeBron, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh with the Heat.
At that moment, the championship fate or failure is tied together, no matter the order of the names on the marquee.
Do it like James did with the Cleveland Cavaliers, a piecemeal compilation of revolving talent, starting LeBron James helped create one super team with the Heat. Can he do it again with the Lakers?
with the acquisition of Kevin Love, and it winds up as the overall LeBron experience in Northeast Ohio.
And while Durant reached championship heights with the Warriors, there already was a championship core of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green.
With the Heat, winning evolved because LeBron and his teammates were willing to evolve. LeBron eventually took his game into the post, Bosh took his to the 3-point line, and Wade went from on-ball dervish to cut-and-slice, off-the-ball machine.
“Anytime you play with great players, you’re going to have to adjust, period,” Bosh told ESPN in the wake of Durant questioning stars flocking to join James with the Lakers. “If I played with Kevin, I would have to change my game. I don’t think it’s worth battling to do more than you have to do.
“He’s going to take a lot of the load and, yeah, you do have to change your game sometimes. But there’s also some aspects to the game where you can
come to him and say, ‘Can you change your game?”
With the Heat, it was LeBron as alpha, Wade as beta, Bosh as gamma. Already sated with his first championship, it was easier for Wade to step aside. Having barely tasted playoff success with the Toronto Raptors, Bosh was positioned to sacrifice.
So the three built it together, with Wade eligible to otherwise walk that very 2010 offseason.
In Cleveland, it was LeBron returning to Kyrie Irving’s turf, Love added by trade instead of by choice.
Championship success is foundational. Sometimes it is immediate but also fleeting, as with the AllenPierce-Garnett Celtics. Sometimes it must be reconstituted, as Erik Spoelstra did with the Heat approach with Wade, Bosh and LeBron after the 2011 NBA Finals failure. Sometimes it takes a change at the top for the ultimate leap, as with Steve Kerr being added to the Warriors equation with Curry, Thompson and Green.
But what is happening, or what LeBron’s hope will
happen with the Lakers, is different. A reunion with one super friend already failed (alongside Wade in Cleveland). Another super friend has become lost for now in the ether (Carmelo Anthony). Another (Chris Paul) couldn’t wait and instead fell into the arms of James Harden.
It all would have been far easier in the moment and going forward if Paul George made the Lakers his July free-agency choice, or if a trade could have been consummated for Kawhi Leonard or Jimmy Butler.
If LeBron is looking to recreate 2010 with the Heat, he well could find that not one, not two, certainly not three elites are on the way this time.
Not because of who he is or isn’t.
Not because of how he is perceived as a teammate.
But rather because super teams aren’t piecemeal, or at least haven’t been to this point.
IN THE LANE
COSTLY WORDS: So what exactly did Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert say last Sunday at AmericanAirlines Arena that led to a $15,000 fine from the NBA? Here’s what he said in regards to Dwyane Wade getting the type of favorable late whistle that was denied to Jazz teammate Donovan Mitchell on a previous possession: “I just want it to be consistent, at one point. Every night is the same [expletive]. Every night has been the same [same bad word]. If you call something one way, you have to call it the other way. Once they start doing that, I’m going to have a little more respect. I’m just tired of it. Every game is the same. We’re a small market and we know it. But they got to be more consistent. It’s not even personal; they’re doing their job. We all make mistakes; I make mistakes. Tonight we made a lot of mistakes; we could have won this game anyway. They can’t be deciding the issue of a game just like that. If you call a foul on the play on D-Wade, Donovan got pushed harder right before. And he’s not Dwyane Wade; it’s fine. But just respect us, as competitors, as players. I sacrifice everything to do this job, and I would like to be respected as a basketball player.” Then, two games later, Gobert was ejected for complaining about a foul called on the opening tip against the Houston Rockets. SERENITY NOW: Not featured with the Los Angeles Lakers nearly as much as he was featured last season with the New York Knicks, former Heat 2008 first-round pick Michael Beasley says he still is in a good place with the Lakers. “I stayed engaged the same way you [in the media] stayed engaged as a fan,” Beasley told the Los Angeles Times. “I enjoy the game . ... God granted me serenity a long time ago.” The Lakers host the Heat on Monday night at Staples Center. “I enjoy life. Basketball is my job and my livelihood, but it doesn’t define me.” GOOD TO GO: Barring an injury, Heat center Kelly Olynyk said you can count him in when it comes to Canada’s roster for next summer’s basketball World Cup in China, now that Canada clinched a berth this past week. “Sure,” he said. “I can’t see a reason why I wouldn’t.” Another candidate for that roster is Denver Nuggets guard Jamal Murray, who got into a verbal clash with Boston Celtics guard Kyrie Irving earlier this season over a bid for a 50-point game. “It’s kind of weird because they call Canadians soft, and they always harp on that, and then now they call me evil,” Murray told the Denver Post.
STONE FACED: You’ve probably seen the viral meme by now: New York Knicks forward Tim Hardaway Jr. drains a jumper to beat the halftime buzzer against the Detroit Pistons and the camera pans to his father, the former Heat All-Star, and the reaction is . . . nonexistent. As the younger Hardaway explained to the New York Daily News amid the social-media scrutiny, it merely is his dad being his dad. “Everybody is reacting to that but he’s like that every day and all day,” the younger Hardaway said. “Like that doesn’t affect me. I already know how he’s going to react. He’s been like that since I was in high school and college. He knows it’s a long game, it’s halftime and he’s hit a bunch of those in his career, so he probably doesn’t even care.”
ROAD BACK: There may soon again be a Brandon Knight sighting in an NBA uniform. Sidelined since March 2017 knee surgery and traded from the Phoenix Suns to the Houston Rockets in the interim, the former Fort Lauderdale Pine Crest product is back practicing with the Rockets after a rehab stint in the G League.
NUMBER
Teams that have featured multiple former NBA Defensive Players of the Year on their rosters, which the Memphis Grizzlies now have two in Marc Gasol and Joakim Noah. The 2005-06 and ‘06-07 Heat are on the list, with Alonzo Mourning and Gary Payton.