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| David Richard- USA Today Sports |
Cavaliers fans could be
forgiven if during the early part of this regular season they were fearful of
having been sold a bill of goods as to the LeBron James who returned to Cleveland last July. They watched a seemingly docile and less athletic LeBron fail to
explode and fail to elevate like they had remembered him doing in his first
stint here and during his time with Miami.
Cavs fans longed to see
the human freight train who could and would explode to the rim whenever he
wanted, elevate like few others are able, and then finish with power. Instead
they saw a guy who routinely took plays off, occasionally took games off and
who, as the calendar turned to 2016, took two entire weeks off to rest his mind
and body.
But time passes for all
of us. Whether we are just south of 50 or whether we’re 30 years old and a
veteran of 12 NBA seasons, age and gravity affects us all.
LeBron James is no
different in that regard.
The days of a
consistently high-flying James playing above the rim are over. And they aren’t
coming back.
You’ll still get
breathtaking moments of athleticism. James can call on those when he needs to
do so. He can still elevate and play the game above the rim. Just ask Derrick
Rose, whose shot to tie Game 5 was swatted by James on one of those chase-down
blocks that James has become famous for. James actually blocked that Rose shot
attempt on the way down and with his wrist. His head above the rim at one time,
James displayed that elite athleticism, having called upon it at the precise time it was
required.
And that’s the thing
about James now. He can still go to the elite athleticism house when he needs
to or wants to, but he doesn’t live there anymore.
James now resides in an
even more upscale neighborhood. It’s the one where athleticism and experience,
as well as a maturity that wasn’t evident during his first tour with Cavaliers,
resides. Right now, he owns the only home on that block.
You can say what you
will about James’ leadership characteristics. God knows I have. James was a guy
that would go out of his way to discuss his humility and his
leadership skills when he was here for the first seven years of his career.
That was a tempest in a teapot. James was often temperamental and selfish
during that time, and his hollering about his humility was hypocritical, if not
completely misplaced.
He was clearly the best
player on those teams as well as the dominant personality, but that didn’t
translate to leadership. He could and did throw teammates and coaches under the bus,
displayed his emotions on the floor by way of eye rolls and pouting, and he
didn’t demonstrate the ability to inspire his teammates.
But as his physical
dominance has subsided, his leadership skills have increased.
Make no mistake, James
is the leader of this Cavaliers team in every way. He may have struggled in
that role early in the year when his body was broken down, but as he regained
his form he lifted and elevated not only the games of guys like Tristan
Thompson and Kyrie Irving (to name but two) but also instilled in them what it
would take on a daily basis to reach the NBA’s promised land.
In the playoffs James
has taken it a step further. His toughness on the floor and his calm in the
face of adversity and opponent’s runs has been tantamount to potentially putting
these Cavaliers into the Eastern Conference finals. He’s taken playoff virgins
like Irving, Thompson, Kevin Love, Matthew Dellavedova and Timofey Mozgov and
not only told them how they’ll need to react to playoff pressure, but shown
them how to do so.
That calm approach and
that maturity have, like the physical decline, come with age. That wisdom and
approach has been forged by four straight trips to the NBA Finals and two
titles. It’s born of marriage, kids, contentment with titles past and fueled by
a burning desire to get to the mountain top again.
James is still a work in
progress, as crazy as that may sound. He’s not what he was 10 years ago and
he’s not what he will be in five years, when age will have sapped even more of
his athleticism. He can still throw coaches under the bus and his “one size
fits all” method of motivating, that being criticizing and trolling teammates
like Love, simply doesn’t work for all personalities.
James is learning that.
He’s learning that while
he can kid and criticize a player like Irving to motivate him, he has to take a
different approach with someone like Love or Thompson.
But he is learning.
He’s quicker to
compliment the efforts of players like Love and Thompson who respond better to
positive reinforcement than to criticism. He’s learning that while he can
subtly (or not so subtly at times) criticize head Coach David Blatt that he
still needs to have Blatt functioning at a high level on the sideline and that
protecting his coach is also occasionally part of the deal.
James and Miami Head Coach
Erik Spoelstra butted heads famously in LeBron’s first year in Miami. But James
came to respect Spoelstra as time went on and trust was built. The same may
well happen in Cleveland, and Blatt’s Princeton Offense, which is on display
often for the Cavs when LeBron is on the bench, may play a bigger role next
season with LeBron on the floor once he trusts Blatt.
If there was a
misconception about the LeBron James we as Cleveland fans were getting back,
that was on us. LeBron knows exactly who he is and what he’s capable of. He’s
become extremely dedicated to maintaining his body and developing his
basketball mind. The cryogenic treatments, the pacing himself during games, the mid-season need for a couple weeks to recover from a whirlwind offseason filled with
stress and change, all of it was addressed and implemented by LeBron himself.
James knows he has to
pace himself at age 30 to be at maximum efficiency when it matters. At times in
the Celtics series he was passive. That’s likely because he could afford to be
while knowing that the series was critical for Love, Irving and the rest of the
inexperienced Cavs. James understood that series was a precursor to the more difficult work that lay ahead and he applied himself only when necessary to teach and carry his team.
That’s not decline or
laziness. That’s maturity and intelligence on display.
In this Bulls series
James has been front and center and far more aggressive. He (and we) laments
his inefficiency during this Chicago series, but James has set aside his desire
for personal efficiency to do again what his team needs done. Playing without Love, the
Cavs have struggled with spacing and become more reliant on James to make
plays. But Chicago is a great defensive team that knows this as well, and Jimmy
Butler, the Bulls forward assigned to guard LeBron, is a monster defensively and
is developing into one of the game’s best two way players himself.
If James gets by Butler
(and he’s been wearing that kid down over the course of five games in the
series) he’s greeted by a phalanx of Chicago big men who have no problem taking
their shots to his head, arms and body.
Yet James has still done
more than enough to give the Cavs that 3-2 series lead, even as Irving has been
relegated to more of a decoy role due to injuries.
Should the Cavs advance
you may well see the retro version of James. Neither Washington nor Atlanta
will present the same physical obstacles that Chicago does.
What’s abundantly clear
to those watching is that at 30 years old, James is simply not physically and
athletically the same player he was at 20. But every other aspect of his game
is beyond anything the 20-year old James was. And that still makes for a
dominant and elite basketball player who remains the very best in the game.
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