The Unforgiven: A Scribe's Take On...LeBron James

I know a lot of people would not expect the subject matter of my next blog to be what it is, hell neither did I.  To be honest I was outlining a three part series that in all honesty would have kept me busy for the next month.  And then it hit me.  Well two words hit me right on the top of the head.  “LeBron James!  I need to write about LeBron James.”  I tried to pass off the thought was one of the many distractions that happens to me as a writer when trying to write.  I’ll sit down and think about every subject under the sun besides what I sat down to do.  Bad habit, I know, welcome to life as a writer.  The more I tried to push it out of my mind the more thoughts jumped in my head.  It was like trying to kill weeds in a beautifully landscaped yard.  So here we go.  Enjoy the ride.

Contrary to popular belief, I_____ (insert my government name if you know me) do not hate, dislike or have a lack of respect for LeBron James the basketball player.  Matter of fact I am very much so a fan of his as far as what he brings to the table, basketball wise.  

I have more of a problem with his fans for which there are two types, the ones who for the most part are on the media/ESPN hyped bandwagon, which in actuality I should embrace.  It makes the casual NBA observer a fan, and being that the NBA is my favorite sport that is good for the popularity of the game.  Who knows maybe one day the NFL draft or college spring football won’t be the top headline during the most important stretch of the NBA season, which is March and April.
The second kind of fan is the “follow whoever is the most exciting player in the league” fan. Now I know you’re asking “well isn’t that the same thing as someone on a bandwagon?”  Well reread what I said about the first type of fan, I stated that they are the casual fan.  They couldn’t tell you the name of the high school LeBron went to, the college Dwayne Wade attended or know who David Stern is.  This second tier for fan typically has a team resume that reads like this: Bulls, 76’ers, Magic, Heat, Cavs and Heat.  If you need me to decipher that code, its means their favorite players over the years were Jordan, Iverson, McGrady, Wade and LeBron.  Now I’m not saying you can’t be a fan or love to watch more than one player at a time.  But to switch and pull for different teams every few years….that’s against man law in the world of sports and on serious grounds of having your man card placed on permanent suspension.  I know me personally I can’t have too many conversations with musical chair fans.  Consistency people, that’s all we ask for.

As in the words of the Great Ice Cube “I was taught back on my block, that you don’t ride on nobody’s jock.  For anything they do, F__k him and his crew, unless you were getting paid too” lol



Now back to LeBron Ramone James.  If there ever were a prototype sent from another planet that had the parts and make of the perfect basketball player, it would be LeBron James.  The guy has the speed of Scottie Pippen, the court vision of Magic Johnson, drives to the basketball with brute force like Charles Barkley, rim shattering dunks like Dominique Wilkins oh and is 6’8, 260 pounds, the same size of Karl Malone.

O.K. let me put it like this, if we were playing NBA Live 95 on Sega Genesis and I created a player the same size as Karl Malone and gave him the attributes of Pippen (because MJ wasn’t on Live 95) you’d look at me like I was crazy!  And that’s the kind of talent LeBron has, CRAZY.  I mean the guy can do everything on the court… maybe not everything….yet; he still has to become a more consistent shooter… which he will.  But if you look at his game which is light years beyond 99% of the league and then you add to the mix that he is a genuine unselfish player, I mean c’mon he’s the perfect basketball player.


I remember reading how Wilt Chamberlin was so dominate that sometimes he let up on his opponents because he himself felt it was unfair.  I get the same feeling with LeBron at times.  If you want to be a star player you have to be a killer, this passive aggressive mentality is unacceptable, you have to want to dominate.  But… if they have too much of a dominant personality you end up with a Stephon Marbury… and really… who wants that?  I’ll take LeBron’s shorting comings any day of the week over a selfish player like Marbury.

But I have to be honest, I do see some insecurity in his game at times.  Well maybe not his game, his confidence.  It’s like a young lion getting punked out by an antelope.  The young lion hasn’t realized that lions eat antelope for a living.  That’s what LeBron has to realize when it comes to those big moments, get his lion on!
Do I think James is full of himself, yes I do.


You have to be cocky to be a successful pro athlete.  Hell some of my favorite athletes of all time are Kobe Bryant, Deion Sanders, Magic Johnson, Dennis Rodman, Brett Favre, Michael Jordan and Reggie Miller.  Those are all some cocky sons of bitches, so clearly I don’t have a problem with that.  But there is a line and a having Chosen 1 tattoo, SERIOUSLY referring to yourself in the third person (and by your nickname at that) and holding a press conference about your free agency is crossing the line.
While I’m on the whole decision thing I’ll touch on that.  Do I think he should have stayed in Cleveland, I don’t know.  In a three year span the Cavs went to the finals and posted back to back 60 win years, that’s amazing considering it was Cleveland.

I know he and Wade said that Boston coming together influenced them into joining forces and forming a super team.  Boston’s super team is a little different.  In Boston you had three aging superstars who were not going to get it done by themselves.  Boston had three players who at the most were 75% of the player they were in their prime and you can argue KG was about 60% of what he was.  The Celtics had a three year widow to capitalize on that move, and it panned out.


I believe if LeBron stayed in Cleveland and this year played out like it did, LeBron would still be in the position he is in right now, on a team in the Eastern Conference finals having gone through Boston.  One could argue he had the same chances if not better chances of beating the Bulls with that Cavs team than with the Heat.  The Cavs were built around his game, and each role player knew their position and played it well.  They had size to close down the paint, speed to keep up with the Bulls shooters and years of experience playing together.  If LeBron would have brought a championship back to Cleveland, it would be one of the greatest sports stories of all time, I truly believe that.  I’m not saying he should have gone or stayed, but it would have been really interesting if he had.  Every great player has a team or two they have to go through before they break through.  He got past the Piston hurdle and the Boston one was next.  But we live in a microwave society where we want everything now.

Over his career I’ve had a number of conversations with people who were trying to write him off for play off failures, after being fans of his.  “He really isn’t that dude”.  I would have to take off my hater hat and be real with them.  “Man, chill he’s only 23….” (Or whatever year he was when ever he said it).  “He’ll figure it out”.  “Most professional athletes don’t figure it out until their late twenties, he will be no different.”

But I have to say that teaming up with Wade, who I believe is a fantastic player, was kind of weak in my opinion.  No one can win a championship on their own, we all know that.  But two of the best players at their positions, in their prime teaming up…hey, it is what it is.  You can say what you want about past Laker teams but they drafted a lot of their star players.  When one would get older, they they’d add a piece.  West got Wilt and Kareem got Magic.  They took a risk drafting Kobe and it panned out for Shaq and the organization.

But when I really sit and think about the Heat situation I really think it boiled down dealing with pressure.  I don’t think LeBron wanted to deal with the pressure of being the “man” anymore.  He wanted someone he could lean on.  Wade was a perfect fit, he’d been there before and when the going gets rough, he’ll be able to take some of the pressure off of LeBron.  That’s why LeBron and Wade do their press conferences together win or lose.  I’m not mad at that.  It was LeBron’s way of being humble as to say “look, I myself don’t believe I can handle being on this stage alone, I need some guidance”.  He can’t admit that kind of stuff publically or everyone would trash him.  Now that I think about it the chosen 1 tattoo, the talking in 3rd person, the over the top cocky comments screams of a super insecure person who’s trying to convince people that he is secure in himself.  He’s human.
The further these play offs have gone the more confidence we see in LeBron.  It’s like taking the training wheels off your kid’s bike and holding that seat while they try to ride.  At some point you let go of the seat and the kid doesn’t know they’re riding on their own.  That’s how he looks right now.  And I as a basketball fan enjoy watching it.

When it’s all said and done I think he will be the best small forward of all time, if he continues to grow.  Do I think he’ll be better than MJ, Kareem or Magic when it comes to the best player of all time?  No.  In my opinion that ended when he left Cleveland for Miami.  He has the chance to be a top five player off all time talent wise that’s for sure.

Well I started writing this about three or four weeks ago and now the Heat are in the finals verse Dallas.  The Heat’s defense is some of the best defense I’ve seen in a while.  I’m not going to start talking about the Heat, this is a LeBron blog.


Oh, O.K. I will say this to the Heat “fans”:  When they win a championship or more like a couple, I don’t want to hear fair weather Miami fans rejoicing like they went through the trenches with this team.  It’s not hard pulling for the best team or thing, ever.  Pulling for the Heat is like pulling for the only Ferrari in drag race full of Buicks and then jumping around for joy when it wins.  It’s like a grown man playing dodge ball with 4th graders and getting excited when you peg one of those kids in the head.  It’s like playing with the Dream Team on that EAsports game Team USA Basketball, and getting happy when you beat Canada.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Team_USA_Basketball   It’s like….. O.K. you get the point.  Your joy and trash talk will not be heard or respected.  That is all on that rant.

Well I had fun writing this one, took a while but oh well.  It’s not easy to fit blogging in with writing other stuff.  Hope you enjoyed it and oh… Go LAKERS!!  LOL.  (You knew I wouldn’t talk about LeBron this much without some kind of Laker reference)

A Dream Deferred 2008

A lot of people know that I write scripts or what not,and most recently started a blog.  But I do write poetry at times too.  I hardly ever share them.  I don't know why, maybe because they're pretty personal and may reveal a lot about me, good and bad.  Well I was going through my vault, a vault that is a decade plus in the making and thought I'd share one.  Who knows maybe I'll put together a book one day...





A Dream Deferred 2008



I tell you what happened to the dream deferred

It went in hibernation until it got the word



That it was time to awake because it’s our turn

It’s working all night until the candles burn



A dream deferred is now a dream that’s here

A dream that’s real, that has nothing to fear



The only question now is there enough room

For all these awakened dreams the worlds about to consume



A dream deferred is now a dream that’s “now”

It’s matured past a dream and now asking the question... “how”

What Happened in Vegas...my take on the 1990 UNLV Running Rebels

I just finished watching a great documentary on HBO about the UNLV Running Rebels basketball program, and to say it didn’t bring back fond memories of my youth would be an understatement.  Not only was that one of my favorite basketball teams of all time but it was one of the teams that shaped my view of basketball and life really.

Growing up in basketball country, Indiana, as many writers have said before me, we’re pretty much born with a basketball in our crib.  As soon as you can dribble about four times in a row without picking the ball up you can join a league.  We don’t play basketball, we think it.  This is how I grew up.

I remember around the age of 7 or 8 thinking that the game that I saw on TV wasn’t the game I was experiencing.  I was being taught how to throw a two hand chest pass, while seeing people on TV getting dunked on.

I believe it was the year of 1987, my parents had just enclosed the porch in our back yard and my Dad would take what had to be an 8 inch television out there and watch sporting events, mostly basketball.  It was on the porch where I first experienced magic…. Magic Johnson that is.   The famous hook shot, and a few days later the Lakers winning the championship.   I remember asking my Dad “who is that?”  He turned to me and said “Magic Johnson son.”   For some reason I knew I liked that guy, and it wasn’t because of the hook shot, the flashy passes or cool looking uniforms he and his teammates wore, it was because he looked like me.  I’ll write another blog later about my love for the Lakers, lol.

Growing up in Indiana you were bombarded with images in those days of Larry Bird, Steve Alford, and at the time local media darling Damon Bailey.  They represented Indiana basketball at its finest, and what every coach wanted us to play like.   For some strange reason I didn’t relate to it.  They didn’t fly in the air like Jordan, throw no look passes like Magic nor did play  the game like my friends and I played in our parents drive way.  I don’t want to say I began to dislike the game of basketball, but my coaches back then did not like my interpretation of the game,  which took away from the joy of playing it.

My grade school and junior high had different leagues that represented the different levels of experience.  The “A” team was designated for the kids who knew the game, the “B” team was for kids who could play but hadn’t quite figured it out yet and the “C” team was for kids who just wanted to put on a uniform.  I was always on the “B” team.  Their reasoning, was because  “he plays out of control”.   Now the irony of that story is that out of everyone who I went to school with during that time never made their high school team,  where I on the other hand, played at one of the most prestigious basketball programs in the country, but I shall digress.

In 1990 I discovered ESPN and began to watch a lot of basketball.  I was never a Big Ten fan.  Teams like Indiana University, Ohio St, and Purdue played boring basketball.  To me at that age it looked like a bunch of robots moving extremely slow on the court.  I remember experiencing something different one night while watching ESPN. like the saying goes “what is seen, can’t be unseen” and what I saw was exciting.  I saw a team that ran!  A team that dunked!  A team that dunked on people!  They played with passion!  They yelled when they blocked a shot!  Their jerseys were un-tucked!  Some of the players wore high top fades, while others rocked a low fade with parts in it.  Hell, they even wore Nike Air Flights, at the time my favorite shoe (and not those boring Adidas that IU wore).  But most importantly I experienced a college team that looked like me!  Not only did they look like me, they played like me and my friends as well as.  Our heros, who we tried to be like in our driveways were this team the UNLV Running Rebels.

I’ll never forget that team, Greg Anthony, Anderson Hunt, Stacey Augmon, Larry Johnson, George Ackles  with Jerry Tarkanian aka “Tark the Shark” as the coach.  This team was magical!  I didn’t know what I was watching, but I sure as hell knew it was way more exciting that what was being forced upon me living in Big Ten country.  I did everything I could to get a glimpse of that team.  I would try to stay up and watch their games late at night.  I’d check out every Sport Illustrated from the library, cut out their articles and hang them on my wall.  I even began to buy the USA Today because our local paper would only provide a box score.  Larry Johnson was my favorite player on that team, but I tried to be most like Stacey Augmon, since he was tall and lanky like myself.  Though I did steal the pause at the top of my free throw motion from LJ (side note I stole Michael Jordan’s free throw preparation, spin, three dribbles, spin, shoot).  Before any of my friends begin to talk trash, (even though I wasn’t a good shooter in the game, I was always decent at the line, I’d say around 75%), so take that! Lol.

To say that UNLV team had an influence on how I viewed basketball would be an understatement. I now had a group of players to watch and want to be like.  They were all around the same age as my older cousins, so that’s how I looked at them.

I do remember the media not liking them so much.  I remember all those people back home who liked Bird, Alford and Bailey and me not liking them as well.  I remember a lot of IU fans saying they were ruining the game.   Bobby Knight fans were saying that Tark was coaching a team full of thugs and criminals.  I remember thinking “well I don’t really care for Bird, Alford and Bailey, I love how UNLV plays and these guys look like my older cousins and their friends, not criminals, so I don’t know what you all are talking about,  I’m following this team”.

As we know that team went down in history as one of the greatest college basketball teams ever.  Three of those thugs, oops I mean starters from that team went on to have long successful pro careers.   Stacey Augmon is now an assistant coach in the N.B.A. and Greg Antony is now an analyst for college basketball on C.B.S. (side note Greg Anthony thug’d it up real hard while at UNLV, starting his own T shirt business while being the president of the young Republicans on campus, ahhh if only we all could be thugs).

Thinking back, I do appreciate how I was raised and taught the game of basketball, matter of fact that is what stands out now about my game today.  A nice crisp bounce back, a hard “V” cut, a solid pick on the wing.  I also appreciate what Bob Knight brought to the game as well and ended up liking the guy the older I became (I could have played for him, no intimidating here Coach).  I would just mix in the flash, the excitement, the heart and soul I picked up by watching the Rebels.

What I really learned from watching the Rebels was pride on the basketball court.  That it was ok to be myself, love myself and love my game.  Basketball is an emotional sport, which means you express yourself emotionally.  I wasn’t taught that back at home, that’s something the Rebels taught me!