As LeBron James continues his quest for a third NBA championship with the Miami Heat, teams with salary cap await and salivate at the thought of LeBron possibly opting out of his final year of his contract this off season. You have teams like The Dallas Mavericks, The Los Angeles Lakers, The Atlanta Hawks, and The Cleveland Cavaliers with quite a bit of cap space to make a run for James. All could be somewhat intriguing story lines to follow if he does opt out. If James does opt out though I don’t expect him to be out there too long. Pat Riley is way too crafty to let a player of James’s caliber hit the open market to try and avoid what happened to Cleveland in 2010.
One team that will be the most aggressive in pursuit of James is in fact the one he left. The Cleveland Cavaliers.
With Cleveland in a rebuilding stage since his 2010 departure The Cavaliers have had no luck building a core to compete for a championship. It started off well with the pick of Kyrie Irving, and eventually would derail with poor drafting along the way. Cleveland is now in a interesting spot after winning the number one overall pick and with plenty of cap space they could make an effort to try and lure LeBron back to his home state of Ohio. With a younger nucleus than Miami and being able to add a potential star player in this years draft he may have a choice to go along side Wade and Bosh who have won two straight championships together and possibly a third, or does he fear the health of his sidekick Wade and leave Miami.
Cleveland’s chances of landing LeBron James this summer are slim, and here’s why. The Cavs may not be able to hire a coach with the kind of experience and that would have LeBron’s respect to lure him away from Miami. The only candidates I can see that fit this description would be a George Karl or a John Calipari (not happening). Also Clevelands had all sorts of locker room issues. You can argue a Kyrie Irving and LeBron James duo would be fun to watch, but would take time to develop.
Miami is fighting for a championship now and James will do his due diligence and listen to other teams once the seasons over I’m sure. After all this is his last contract that he will be in his prime for so you’d expect nothing less. He will have owners like Dan Gilbert and Mark Cuban chasing after him, and you can’t fault them for chasing the best player in the NBA. You’ll also have a franchise in The Lakers and possibly The Bulls if they can get creative with some contracts chasing after him in hopes of telling James he can be the next great one to lead them to a championship.
The choice James will face though is what backlash he will get if he ends up leaving Miami for another team. What team that is able to sign James will have a better roster then Miami does at this point? If Miami repeats how could he leave risking not winning a championship for the team that he leaves for? Another team may get their shot to sign LeBron later in his career but James’s time with Miami isn’t over and won’t be over for the foreseeable future. We all know James wants to be the greatest of all time and that’s more of a reason to stay in Miami where they have yet to be dethroned.
