In light of all of these 'veterans' (and novice ass fans) speaking/comparing what Lebron did with what 'wouldn't have happened with themselves', I thought this was pretty interesting. Not all the way valid (Then again, NEITHER IS THE COMPARISON BUT I DIGRESS..) but it brings up some very good points. I am surprised the writer didn't bring up Kobe basically FLAT OUT REFUSING TO PLAY FOR CHARLOTTE and LA subsequently trading away a VERY GOOD CENTER to get him. I can hear (and actually saw) some of the pleas copped with this article. 'He (The Lakers either) had NO WAY OF KNOWING HE WOULD TURN OUT TO BE WHAT HE IS...That's funny 'cause NOW MOFOS want to say 'Lets not speak in absolutes'. But it is okay to 'speculate' on what a team of Wade,Lebron and Bosh are going to turn out to be ABSOLUTELY, in particular when we want to talk about 'whose team it will be', it won't work and the like....Ya'll (everyone) are some funny motherfuckers when you want to prove your 'points'. Anyway, there is no backing down the following statements made by one Earvin Magic Johnson. Cop (pleas) away though. Act like he and Bird weren't basically the 'John Wall/Kevin Durant/etc/etc' of their day. Act like we only JUST STARTED TOUTING COLLEGE STARS as the 'next big thing'. I know that is what your uncle or father told you. Or maybe even what the 'vets' are saying now when they 'reminisce' about the 'old days'. It is IN PRINT THOUGH. Definitely fawned over. Definitely thought of as the 'next big thing' for the most part. In particular, Mr. Johnson as he was a 6'9 POINT GUARD. They didn't have those back then remember? So again, act like he wasn't 'expected' to come in and star. I dare you. Act like his team wasn't LOADED to begin with. You could make that case for Mike though. That is where the 'all the way valid' part of my statement comes in. Most of this article doesn't apply to Mike because truthfully, even as a fans, none of us thought he would be THIS GOOD. Not me. Not most true TAR HEEL FANS. We thought he would be freed up more and all but the 'LEGEND' take wasn't put on him....Still doesn't give him a pass on the statement to me like I have said before though. So I am not saying it is 'okay' that he spoke out on it either. I didn't forget how he wanted his GM gone. How Krause didn't fire him. How he bristled at coach after coach. Thought he TOO could do it alone. He had to be 'coaxed' into buying into a whole new system. Difference between him and Lebron is that he didn't have THE GUTS TO LEAVE. Yes, I said it. Sue me. Fuck all that 'I wanted to beat Larry and them..' talk. Back then, that would have been endorsement suicide. His jerseys would have had to been changed. Brand all messed up as he was the FIRST PERSON TO BECOME A 'BRAND'. Remember? He COULDN'T DO WHAT LEBRON did for that reason alone. It WOULD HAVE MESSED UP HIS BRAND because up until then, what he was doing HAD NOT BEEN DONE BY ANYONE on the scale he was doing. It can be done now because a firm would know how to cross market and change with the times. Back then? It would have taken MONTHS to redevelop a plan and get his brand back on track. No Internet. No cable access WORLDWIDE. None of that. Different time. Different era. He was told he needed a big man to win. At the time, THAT WAS TRUE. They didn't get one. We all know what happened now don't we? So 'conventional' wisdom doesn't always hold true. I would like to 'wait and see' about Wade, Lebron and Bosh because of things JUST LIKE THAT.
.If you haven't read what Magic said back in '91 about 'turning pro' (Titled appropriately, 'The Decision Was Beyond a Coin Flip'), lets get back in the time machine.....
I will post up most of the article. The rest is here...
TrueHoop reader Mike, however, takes special exception to the idea that Johnson would stick with a mediocre roster over playing with superstars. He e-mails:
As much as I admire and respect these players, it becomes hard to take them seriously when none of them had situations comparable to LeBron, and all of the them got to play with other great, Top-50 All-Time players. The quest to play with other elite talent is basically universal amongst stars, be it Wilt going to join Hal Greer and later Jerry West and Elgin Baylor or all the way up to Kobe openly flirting with the Bulls and Clippers and threatening trade demands until the Lakers acquired Pau Gasol.
The fact that LeBron simply exercised his rights as a free agent to leave Cleveland to do what countless other players have done, rather than demand trades or refuse to play for the team that drafted him, should not be held against him.
I'm not even a fan of LeBron, but at this point I think he's getting dumped on pretty unfairly.
And in the case of Magic Johnson, Mike has done his homework. He found a Mike Downey L.A. Times article from 1991:
Magic Johnson would have returned to Michigan State rather than play for the Chicago Bulls.
"I'd have stayed in school," he said here Tuesday, standing alone outside Gate 3 1/2 of Chicago Stadium, the house that could have been his. "A coin toss changed the course of my whole life." Chicago called heads in a 1979 coin flip with Los Angeles for the No. 1 pick in the NBA college draft. It came up tails.
Johnson signed with the Lakers after his sophomore year of college and proceeded to win five championships. The Bulls picked second, took UCLA's David Greenwood and have won no championships.
"I wouldn't have played here," Johnson said on the eve of Game 2 of the NBA finals between his team and the team that could have been his. "The only reason I came out was to play with Kareem and the Lakers."
Then Mike gets to comparing the Lakers who played with Johnson in his first seven years to the Cavaliers who played with James over the same period. Johnson's teammates, in aggregate, had:
* Two first team All-Rookie selections (Byron Scott, James Worthy)
* 11 All-Star appearances (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar seven times, Norm Nixon twice, Worthy, Jamaal Wilkes)
* Four All-NBA first team selections (Abdul-Jabbar)
* Two All-NBA second team selections (Abdul-Jabbar)
* Five All-Defensive first team selections (Michael Cooper three times, Abdul-Jabbar twice)
* Four All-Defensive second team selections (Cooper three times, Abdul-Jabbar once)
* One MVP Award (Abdul-Jabbar)
* In addition, Abdul-Jabbar, Worthy, Wilkes, Nixon, and Cooper all got votes for MVP at one point in time or the other during Magic's first seven years, and Cooper won defensive player of the year in Johnson's eighth year.
Mike does a similar analysis on James' Cavs' rosters:
* Zero first team All-Rookie Selections
* Two All-Star game appearances (Mo Williams, Zydrunas llgauskas)
* Zero All-NBA first team selection
* Zero All-NBA second team selections
* Zero All-Defensive first team selections
* One All-Defensive second team selection (Anderson Vareajo)
* Zero MVP Awards
Mike adds, in conclusion:
In order to have a situation even comparable to Magic's, LeBron would have needed to be drafted onto, say, Tim Duncan's team (to parallel Abdul-Jabbar), played the last six years with a prime Bruce Bowen (to parallel Michael Cooper), and had the Cavs draft Danny Granger in his third year (as a parallel to Worthy), and that's ignoring guys like Scott/Wilkes/McAdoo etc.
I mean, let's be real, if LeBron had been in a situation like that does anyone doubt that he would have stayed? That he would already have multiple titles and that we'd be talking about his place amongst the top 10-15 players of all-time instead of dumping on his competitive fire? Magic had it easy, which make his comments seem absolutely ridiculous.
I'll acknowledge there's a chicken and egg thing here. I can hear the argument now: If James had been a better leader, then the Cavaliers would have won more titles which would have earned his teammates more accolades. Even leaving aside entirely the reality that James has been about as productive as any player in NBA history, let's concede that point, and merely say: It's still not even close.
In fact, there's a debate to be had about whether James' current SuperFriends team in Miami is as good as the one Johnson played for. Is Dwyane Wade more valuable than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? It's an insane question without a real answer, but I think we can agree there are strong cases to be made on both sides of the equation, and though Wade has a much better PER (around 30 last season) Abdul-Jabbar's was still insanely high in the mid-20s through Johnson's first seven seasons, and Abdul-Jabbar almost never missed a game.
What it really comes down to is that Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson can say they wouldn't have stooped to seeking out teammates as good as Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. But bear in mind they also never had to confront the reality of seven years with the kinds of rosters James played on in Cleveland.
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