What will LeBron do?
What should LeBron do?
Here's a few articles to help frame the discussion:
Windhorst: http://espn.go.com/n...s-figure-future
Most importantly, he doesn't care what anyone says or thinks anymore. He is simply going to do what makes him happy and gives him the best chance to win. He was strong in 2010. He's much stronger now.
Simmons (lots of great Spurs stuff and Finals talk here too): http://grantland.com...the-nba-finals/
Q: OK, so if you were LeBron, what would you do this summer?
We don’t know how much loyalty LeBron feels toward what Jalen affectionately calls the Miami Mafia (Micky Arison, Pat Riley, Juwan Howard, Alonzo Mourning, Erik Spoelstra, etc.), or how he feels about Wade and Bosh. We also don’t know how many skeletons are buried out there — for instance, if Wade and LeBron made a pact during the 2008 Olympics to play together, then spent the next two to three years colluding on their 2010 destination, then got Riley involved at some point during the 2009-10 season, AND MULTIPLE PEOPLE KNEW THIS WHOLE STORY, I think it would be risky for LeBron to walk away (and have that stuff belatedly come out).
At the same time, he’s all about winning titles … and that’s not happening if Miami pays Wade and Bosh $40.75 million combined next season and $44.2 million combined in 2015-16. And yet, if you’re Bosh and Wade, you’re not walking away from that guaranteed money, either.
So here’s where LeBron and agent Rich Paul have to throw their weight around — they have to convince everyone involved (not just Wade and Bosh, but Miami’s owners, too) to restructure those deals. Let’s say Wade and Bosh opt out of their 2014-15 deals, then sign for $58 million apiece over the next four seasons. And let’s say the numbers look like this: $12.5 million (next year), $13.5 million, $15 million, and then $17 million apiece for the 2017-18 season (when the salary cap will be $20 million to $25 million higher, anyway). So Bosh and Wade get slightly more than $15 million guaranteed beyond what they’re already owed.
And let’s say LeBron exercises his 2014-15 player option for $20.6 million. Throw in Norris Cole’s salary ($2 million), convince Udonis Haslem to retire (and just overpay him as a Heat employee and the newest member of the Miami Mafia), and suddenly you have nearly $20 million to spend on one more big gun (Carmelo). Or, you could go a different way and pursue one or two elite free agents (Kyle Lowry, Pau Gasol, Luol Deng, Marcin Gortat, even Lance Stephenson), combined with a couple of veterans (Paul Pierce, Trevor Ariza, Spencer Hawes, Vince Carter) and maybe one role player (Shaun Livingston, Josh McRoberts, Grievis Vasquez).
That $20 million could go a lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng way. But it can’t happen without Wade and Bosh restructuring their deals. But hey — it’s not like this is a big deal; it’s only the entire immediate future of the league that’s at stake.
Q: If LeBron does leave Miami, where would he go?
Door No. 1 (-400 odds): LeBron opts in for one more year, hopes that Miami can patch together a better bench (and get lucky with its first-round pick), then targets the summer of 2015 (when Cleveland will be a year further along and more big-market teams — including the Clippers, Lakers and Knicks — have cap space).
Door No. 2 (+400 odds): He goes back to Cleveland and convinces Carmelo to come with him. Do NOT rule this out. Especially if Cleveland hires a coach that LeBron likes. The Cavs are loaded with young assets and could create whatever team LeBron wanted. And also, you gotta love the fairy-tale ending here — LeBron coming home as 10,000 different Cavs fans make YouTube montages of him with that “I’m Coming Home” song.
(The biggest obstacle: Will LeBron ever forgive Dan Gilbert for The Letter? From what I’m hearing … not anytime soon. I’d start groveling to a connected third party right now, Mr. Gilbert, if you’re not doing that already.)
Door No. 3 (+500 odds): LeBron rolls with Doc and CP3 in Los Angeles — something that would only require the Clippers to trade DeAndre Jordan’s expiring deal, Matt Barnes’s expiring deal and Jamal Crawford’s deal (expires in 2016) to different teams with cap space (super-easy), then use last year’s first round pick (Reggie Bullock) and/or a future first rounder, along with $3 million of Steve Ballmer’s money (chump change!), to dump Jared Dudley (two years, $8.5 million remaining) on someone with cap space (also doable). Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and J.J. Redick will make about $48 million combined next season — if the Clips cleared everyone else (again, VERY doable), they could offer LeBron a deal starting at around $15 million. And he’d get to reinvent himself in Los Angeles, with a coach he loves, a superstar he respects and a billionaire owner who’s ready to splurge on a great team.
FYI: This is the most entertaining LeBron-related basketball scenario by far … (wait for it) …
BY FAR.
And don’t think the Clips aren’t pursuing it, because they are.9 So those are the options — with all due respect to Houston (which could team him with Harden, Howard, Parsons and Beverley pretty easily), Phoenix (which could sign him and build their run-and-gun offense around him) and Chicago (which could steal him for all the same reasons it’s homing in on Carmelo right now), those three teams aren’t happening. He’d look like a sellout for going to Houston. Phoenix is never happening. And going back to the Midwest but picking Chicago over Cleveland? Come on.
My verdict: If you were pointing Ray Felton’s gun at me and forcing me to make a pick, I’d still pick LeBron going back to Miami for one more year. But I wouldn’t bet on it, that’s for sure.
Elhassan (Insider): http://insider.espn....ebron-james-nba
Top 5 fits: San Antonio, Miami, LAC, GSW, CHI