It seems that the two most hyped things on TV so far this year have been the finale to ABC’s Lost, and this whole LeBron James/NBA free agency mess. James finally ended all of the speculation with a one hour special on ESPN Thursday evening. The hype machine was in full effect on both, but which had a more satisfying ending? I say James, and here are the reasons why.
10. No polar bears in Miami
9. Cleveland is a better metaphor for Purgatory than LA
8. Lost producers Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof deny screwing fans across the world … James only denies screwing fans in LA, Chicago, New York, and Cleveland
7. The only cork that James will be popping is on a bottle of Cristal, and not one that will release an encompassing evil that will end life as we know it
6. LeBron’s team did a better job with spoiler misdirection than Cuse and Lindelof, and that’s saying something
5. Five years from now, James will be a free agent and we can go through all of this again…. With Lost, not so much
4. Love triangle of Chris Bosh/Dwyane Wade/James surely is more appealing than one that has both Evangeline Lily and Josh Holloway with their shirts off, right?
3. Rant from Cav’s Majority Owner Dan Gilbert much more entertaining than Keith’s was
2. Population of Miami-Dade County higher than the number of people satisfied by Lost finale
1. It may have taken just as long, but in the end, at least LeBron James actually answered a question
Clacked by Ivey West 
on Jul 09, 2010 @ 10:00 EST5EDT
Hehehe
That title is teh win!
;-)
That letter from Dan Gilbert is in Comic Sans. Keith, your move!!! ;-))
My move? To use Comic Sans?
Exactly. I think it’s time for Windings :-))
Seriously, how can a guy be taken seriously who doesn’t know how to properly use quotes and writes his letters in Comic Sans? For that audacity alone to me it’s ok that LBJ left Cleveland ;-)
Though I would’ve preferred him to play with Dirk. For purely selfish reasons :-)
*shakes fist in Miami’s general direction*
LeBron may have answered the question, but his answer was the equivalent of LOST ending with: “And they suddenly realized they were all in hell and the Island was just a form of torture devised by the devil aka Richard Alpert.”
Though I’m a Chicago fan, I do feel sorry for Dan Gilbert after his Comic Sans rant (which will henceforth be known as The Letter). Next week, he’s going to feel humiliated reading what he wrote in the Heat of the moment.
*POST AUTHOR*
The decision aside (and as a basketball fan in general, and not of any one team, him going to Chicago still makes the most sense for me. That team would be STACKED), the whole orchestration of that “event” was atrocious. Hell, even the idea of the “event” aside, how it was executed by ESPN and their journalists was embarrassing. I felt bad for Wilbon and the others for having participated in it.
The first 20 minutes of Dan Patrick’s radio show sums up my feelings about the whole ordeal to a T.
They tip-toed around him. No one wanted to make him feel bad about his decision – not to his face anyway. Can you imagine if they all went at him and he broke down in tears and bawled, “I just want to play with my friends! Mommy.”
Ruby I guess he also wants to fin titles, not only play with his friends. The suggested paycuts they all have to take plays into that. :-)
I also honestly don’t get the whining (ok maybe I get it but still). Cleveland got him in the draft, they kept him for seven years unable to form a team that is able to win championships – at a certain point you have to think about yourself. Even if this was orchestrated badly it’s not worse than when Gretzky left the Oilers. And he is still The Great One.
I don’t fault him for leaving Cleveland. I think playing with D-Wade and Bosh was the most important factor in his decision, not necessarily winning (I mean, he could have been on a winning team in Chicago but he wants to be with his buddies). Those three are in love with each other, as Ivey pointed out. The truth is that they would probably have been willing to play in Chicago if all three of them could be on the team, but I think the Bulls didn’t realize that this was so important to them. Only the Heat, who has an inside track via Wade, could know how seriously these three guys wanted to play together. If these guys had just come out and said to their suitors, “We’re a package deal – all three of us – and we’re willing to take less money in order to play together,” then I think the Bulls would have shipped Noah and Deng to Toronto and made it happen.
*POST AUTHOR*
Sebastian: When it comes down to it, there’s a right way to do things, and a wrong way. This was done, by LeBron and ESPN, the wrong way. That being said, Cleveland needs to get the hell over it. Especially the GM. He’s got valid points about LeBron quitting, and there’s value to trying to pump up your fan base, but he comes across as more of a petulant child than LBJ did.
Ruby: You’re right. If it was about winning, and winning only, he’d be in Chicago. Hell, I don’t care what people say about MIA or ORL, I think the Bulls might be the best team in the East without LeBron. Miami has to put together a team, and its roster is going to be way top heavy salary-wise. I can see LaBron and even Wade taking significant pay cuts to play together, but not so much Bosh, because he doesn’t have the endorsement deals that the other two have.
If LBJ is really willing to give up this “I want to be the highest paid athlete ever” idea specifically to be all about both playing with your friends, and winning championships then sign for the mid-level exception, and really save cap space to be able to afford a bench that doesn’t include five guys from the local YMCA.
I thought The Decision had more in common with an awards show. It was something that should have been 5 minutes long, stretched into a stupidly long ordeal that you tortuously sit through just to see the end result.
*POST AUTHOR*
I felt all it needed was Ryan Seacrest, and it would be an episode of Idol.
I felt so sorry for Wilbon. Man he didn’t deserve this. Wilbon out!
Considering I can’t stand Ryan Seacrest, I wish LeBron hired him for this. His involvement would of at least forewarned me to not watch it under any circumstances. And it would of saved Wilbon of this black mark on his resume.
The whole thing was a joke. The NBA should be embarrassed.
At least, as a Chicago fan that can’t stand James, now I don’t have to figure out how to reconcile those things and cheer for him.