Hard Hitting Windhorst Exclusive!!

[peeker643]

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/truehoop/ ... id=5707475

Brian Windhorst should wear a fucking skirt. This is exacly the kind of shit that makes him look like a knob-gobbling, douche bag, pilot fish, punk-ass-queen.

Hell of a piece Brian.

[Cerebral_DownTime]

Yeah! And he's all fat and stuff.

He really loves LeBron and wants to have like 10,000 of his babies.

"I just want you guys to see it also," James said after the Heat's practice Wednesday afternoon. "To see what type of words that are said toward me and towards us as professional athletes. Everybody thinks it is a bed of roses and it's not."

Is this guy really that much of a "Love Me" Whore?

In another message James made public he was called a "fraud" and a "bitch" and in another tweet the writer wrote "why don't u speak by laying ur head under a moving car."

That is just unoriginal.

[Larvell Blanks]

How come James didn't make public the tweets asking him why he quit in the playoffs?

Today even James Harrison thinks James is a bitch

[peeker643]

Yeah! And he's all fat and stuff.

He really loves LeBron and wants to have like 10,000 of his babies.

"I just want you guys to see it also," James said after the Heat's practice Wednesday afternoon. "To see what type of words that are said toward me and towards us as professional athletes. Everybody thinks it is a bed of roses and it's not."

Is this guy really that much of a "Love Me" Whore?

In another message James made public he was called a "fraud" and a "bitch" and in another tweet the writer wrote "why don't u speak by laying ur head under a moving car."

That is just unoriginal.

And he doesn't try and hide his "ghettoness". It's name is Gloria.

For God's sake, Delonte banged his "ghettoness".

Is 'Ghettoness" a word? I know it's a differrent world with twitter, but there should be some standards, no?

Oh yeah, back to the point. Brian Windhorst is a sycophantic jizz licker who literally sold his soul and reputation.


That is all.

[motherscratcher]

Oh yeah, back to the point. Brian Windhorst is a sycophantic jizz licker who literally sold his soul and reputation.


That is all.

I didn't want to really think that at first. I kept thinking I would do the same thing under those circumstances. You know, extra money and all. (BTW - do we know what kind of pay bump he got?).

But after reading that, it's hard to argue that you weren't right about him all along Peek.

Seriously, one of the first things he "reports" is some "look at what poor Lebron has to put up with" bullshit. Unbelievable.

[papacass]

Windy is writing to his new audience, which is chock full of LeBron and Heat bandwagoners who send LBJ Twitter messages like "WHUT UP BRO U STIL THA KING!!! HEAT4EVAH!!!"

If we were expecting him to go down there and be some highly-critical voice of the jilted Cavs fan in Miami, we were wrong.

If we think Windy is a jizzlicker, well, he's writing for a jizzlicker fan base now. Chock full of people who didn't know they liked the Heat until about 8:29 p.m. on July 8.

My reaction? Let me sulk back to my PD and read Mary Schmitt Boyer in peace. That's our reality in Cleveland. AFAIC, Windy might as well be covering Pakistani cricket.

[peeker643]

Windy is writing to his new audience, which is chock full of LeBron and Heat bandwagoners who send LBJ Twitter messages like "WHUT UP BRO U STIL THA KING!!! HEAT4EVAH!!!"

If we were expecting him to go down there and be some highly-critical voice of the jilted Cavs fan in Miami, we were wrong.

If we think Windy is a jizzlicker, well, he's writing for a jizzlicker fan base now. Chock full of people who didn't know they liked the Heat until about 8:29 p.m. on July 8.

My reaction? Let me sulk back to my PD and read Mary Schmitt Boyer in peace. That's our reality in Cleveland. AFAIC, Windy might as well be covering Pakistani cricket.

I know Cass. I get it. And it's a big part of LBJ recovering from LeMockery of LeDecision. Nothing wins back people like sympathy and 99% of the world will see Cleveland fans as the heavy here with this one. Even without names/cities associatd with those tweets the assumption will be it originated here and not in Linclon, NE or NYC.

But while that's all true, it doesn't take any kind of talent or ability as a writer to write that piece. And if that's what kind of piece you're getting paid to write then you're a jizz-licking sycophant like I said. We can call a spade a spade here on these boards and we can call Windy a dotted line PR firm for LBJ too. It is what it is. You take the money you take the criticism that comes with.

It ain't a personal thing with Windy. If Adande or Woj woulda written it I woulda had the same opinion of them.

[Triple-S]

Windy is writing to his new audience, which is chock full of LeBron and Heat bandwagoners who send LBJ Twitter messages like "WHUT UP BRO U STIL THA KING!!! HEAT4EVAH!!!"

If we were expecting him to go down there and be some highly-critical voice of the jilted Cavs fan in Miami, we were wrong.

If we think Windy is a jizzlicker, well, he's writing for a jizzlicker fan base now. Chock full of people who didn't know they liked the Heat until about 8:29 p.m. on July 8.

Very much so on this.

say what you will about RCF sometimes and some of the members there like Cmophostre and Chardon (both are quite terrible), but from what I've seen on the Heat forums, they make it seem like the Physics Discussion on the Columbia University site. Most of the posters there look like they have the writing skills of a 3rd grader, and even that's being really insulting to someone from 3rd grade.

Sadly these are the people that ESPN and co. have decided to pander to, no longer is it about the average joe who studies up on the game, actually has followed their team for more than two minutes and remains loyal to their hometown. It's about being ultra-hip and cool and on the edge of things.

also, that video on lebron is the most ball-licking thing I've seen, and trying to spin it in a way to make it seem like LeBron is still popular? Bullshit. He's hated.

[GodHatesClevelandSport]

I was wondering if this would be considered a story by anyone.

I think it is, in a non-breaking news way. I was online when the LeBron account retweeted the racist tweet. I Googled the person's name who sent the tweet, and it turned out to be a Strongsville HS senior. I also searched his name on Twitter, and his account name, and hundreds of people were sending him nasty messages.

Two hours after his racist tweet was retweeted, his account was gone. Also, searching his name on Google revealed three hits on the front page that linked him with racism. There was a small article on the Miami Herald's site about his tweets. Today there are even more.

I have no idea what this kid is like in person, if he really has this racist attitude toward people who are different than him or what. On one hand I can think he is a stupid kid just saying something to get attention. On the other hand, I can think stupid kids turn into stupid adults. Also, I found a lot of vile stuff from him on MySpace. And someone who follows me on Twitter told me she has a daughter who graduated from SHS last year and said the kid is "a tool."

So the story in my opinion isn't so much that LeBron retweeted this stuff, but that a HS kid in the space of two hours went from some anonymous person to someone probably forever linked to racism on Google. In the same way that Douchebag McGee went to an Indians game in a LeBron Heat jearsey was a story, so is this.

[Cerebral_DownTime]

I don't think I care for "jizzlicker", i'm no prude, but it's missing a certain genesequa.

[peeker643]

So the story in my opinion isn't so much that LeBron retweeted this stuff, but that a HS kid in the space of two hours went from some anonymous person to someone probably forever linked to racism on Google. In the same way that Douchebag McGee went to an Indians game in a LeBron Heat jearsey was a story, so is this.

Maybe I should change my name to Devil's Advocate or plain old 'Dick'. But if that's the story then why not write that instead of sucking off the Queen with a "Woe is me/No bed of roses" angle?

'Strongsville Teen Accused of Harrassing LBJ with Racial Tweets'

There ya go.

Nope. The basketball biographer gave us a glimpse of the hatred poor LBJ is exposed to and the pain it causes. Validated his horseshit 'Race is always an issue' stuff and intimated Cleveland is a mean spirited, grieving ex-wife.

Like I said before (or maybe I didn't); fuck Brian Windhorst. He's a fucking PR man for ESPN whose duties include being a porn fluffer for James.

[motherscratcher]

C'mon dude, the shit he has to put up with, it's like Jackie Robinson all over again.

[peeker643]

C'mon dude, the shit he has to put up with, it's like Jackie Robinson all over again.

Dammit you're right.

I've been a dick all along and your quoted response was like a light being turned on Mother.

Can I call you mom?

[peeker643]

I don't think I care for "jizzlicker", i'm no prude, but it's missing a certain genesequa.

You see 'Clerks'?

Is jizz-mopper better? As in the guy who cleans up the peep show booths.

Your choice CDT. I trust you on this jizz issue.

[GodHatesClevelandSport]

So the story in my opinion isn't so much that LeBron retweeted this stuff, but that a HS kid in the space of two hours went from some anonymous person to someone probably forever linked to racism on Google. In the same way that Douchebag McGee went to an Indians game in a LeBron Heat jearsey was a story, so is this.

Maybe I should change my name to Devil's Advocate or plain old 'Dick'. But if that's the story then why not write that instead of sucking off the Queen with a "Woe is me/No bed of roses" angle?

'Strongsville Teen Accused of Harrassing LBJ with Racial Tweets'

There ya go.

Nope. The basketball biographer gave us a glimpse of the hatred poor LBJ is exposed to and the pain it causes. Validated his horseshit 'Race is always an issue' stuff and intimated Cleveland is a mean spirited, grieving ex-wife.

Like I said before (or maybe I didn't); fuck Brian Windhorst. He's a fucking PR man for ESPN whose duties include being a porn fluffer for James.

Agreed, it would be a much more interesting story.

I think there's also a bit of "12 Monkeys" concern here. By writing the story you make it the story. Because, really, what happened here? A kid wrote that to LeBron and LeBron retweeted it. And almost no one in the world knows about it.

In order to write about Strongsville teen accused of writing racist tweets, you need to contact the kid and get reaction, etc. At that point, are you actually creating the story itself? Because the story at the moment doesn't exist much more than Windhorst and the two Miami newspaper websites I've seen it on wrote it. But if there's blowback on the kid and he's forever linked to racism on Google and it affects his life, that's a social media cautionary tale.

But there's danger in the writer actually creating that tale by writing about it because at the moment it doesn't truly exist, except that his name is on Google linked to racism whereas a day ago it wasn't.

All very meta.

[Orenthal]

Nothing wins back people like sympathy and 99% of the world will see Cleveland fans as the heavy here with this one.

As a true Clevelander that doesn't bother me one bit. I relish it...

[Orenthal]

Windy is writing to his new audience, which is chock full of LeBron and Heat bandwagoners who send LBJ Twitter messages like "WHUT UP BRO U STIL THA KING!!! HEAT4EVAH!!!"

If we were expecting him to go down there and be some highly-critical voice of the jilted Cavs fan in Miami, we were wrong.

If we think Windy is a jizzlicker, well, he's writing for a jizzlicker fan base now. Chock full of people who didn't know they liked the Heat until about 8:29 p.m. on July 8.

Very much so on this.

say what you will about RCF sometimes and some of the members there like Cmophostre and Chardon (both are quite terrible), but from what I've seen on the Heat forums, they make it seem like the Physics Discussion on the Columbia University site. Most of the posters there look like they have the writing skills of a 3rd grader, and even that's being really insulting to someone from 3rd grade.

Sadly these are the people that ESPN and co. have decided to pander to, no longer is it about the average joe who studies up on the game, actually has followed their team for more than two minutes and remains loyal to their hometown. It's about being ultra-hip and cool and on the edge of things.

also, that video on lebron is the most ball-licking thing I've seen, and trying to spin it in a way to make it seem like LeBron is still popular? Bullshit. He's hated.

Like Democrats... ah shit wrong forum. Someone start a season record prediction thread, I am too lazy.

[Orenthal]

Even local hacks get hate mail, death threats. What makes Supastar athlete turned Benedict Arnold (which was well within' his FA status) think he would be immune? Why the victim story, oh yeah, fat jizzlicker/guzzler Windy. Gawd fuck that guy. Lead no need for the get over it post. Thanks.

[Larvell Blanks]

I'm more interested in the thousands of tweets LBJ received days/weeks after he made his decision. I'm sure those were a 100x more vile than the one he just retweeted on Monday and I'm sure at least half commented on his mommy.

It seeems that James is trying to equate anonymous people hiding behind a computer screen to what players like Robinson, Doby, Russell, Robertson had to face in person back in their playing days. Somehow I don't see some kid in his room on his Dell laptop making slurs equal to O. Robertson having to stay in a dorm room on a black college while his Cincy teammates stayed at the local hotel. Hell, he wasnt even even able to go into a movie theatre that was just yards away from the arena he played ball in b/c of the color of his skin.

[papacass]

Even local hacks get hate mail, death threats. What makes Supastar athlete turned Benedict Arnold (which was well within' his FA status) think he would be immune? Why the victim story, oh yeah, fat jizzlicker/guzzler Windy. Gawd fuck that guy. Lead no need for the get over it post. Thanks.

Jizz licker, Jizz guzzler, Jizz mopper, Utah Jizz.

CDT is right, this thread is missing a certain something. That doesn't involve man protein.

[fundamentals]

Windhorst's work continues with this beauty:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoopmiamihe ... ing-inside

I didn't realize LBJ was motivated by all the angst toward him.

[Larvell Blanks]

Windhorst's work continues with this beauty:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoopmiamihe ... ing-inside

I didn't realize LBJ was motivated by all the angst toward him.

Sad that it takes negative backlash to motivate him to become the best and a champion. I guess promising to win a championship for Cleveland wasn't enough. Maybe that's what we should have done before the playoffs, negative chants, etc. That way the different beast we saw in the playoffs would have actually shown up.

[Dellucci TailGator]

Windhorst's work continues with this beauty:

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoopmiamihe ... ing-inside

I didn't realize LBJ was motivated by all the angst toward him.

"Great story. Compelling and rich."

Dear God, he went from being one of the best beat reporters in the business to THAT? THAT wasn't story. THAT wasn't even a column. It had not point of view. It had no reporting. It had no insight. It was a Bleacher Report article from a 14-year old in South Florida. That's what it was.


And I bet ESPN's editors thought he knocked that one out of the park.

Ugh.

With apologies to the guys at FJM:

MIAMI -- There’s something you might want to understand about LeBron James as he gets ready to start the season.
Awesome, I'm really craving some LeBron James news. Really, really been missing out on what the guy's been up to since the playoffs. Did he buy a boat? I bet he bought a boat. Lake Erie is great during the summer.

It’s something that he might deny publicly but that goes right to the heart of what you can expect to see out of him on a nightly basis.

You're talking about Red boning his mom, right?

A part of James is hurting. And it is changing him. And it is driving him as he’s never been driven before.

When did Brian Windhorst start writing movie preview scripts for Michael Bay movies?

At the core, that is why, this week, James shared some of the hateful and racist tweets he’s been getting. He wants people to know that he reads and hears the still-massive volume of venom. And he wants them to know he’s going to feed on that energy.

So he's going to eat venom. This guy really is the chosen one.

Whether all of that ends up in a championship season depends on so many factors, many of which no one can foresee.
Like whether his team wins enough games to get to the playoffs, then wins enough games to win through every level of the playoffs. Very hush-hush stuff.

But although James has found motivation from various sources before, this isn’t a normal preseason template. This is the first time you are going to see him motivated, at least in significant part, by hate.
LeBron was motivated by the unconditional love he was shown by the people of Detroit and that bastion of understanding, Rasheed Wallace.

On Wednesday, James said the hatred he reads on a regular basis on his Twitter feed “doesn’t affect me at all.” But that isn’t the complete truth. He might ignore a lot of it, but he’s also taking some of it in and letting it fester.

You just said he's thin skinned. Now he has the wisdom of Soloman to choose that amount of hate which is for good, that which is for bad.

Anyone who has spent significant time around James understands how highly aware he is. In fact, his awareness is one of his best attributes. Most can see it simply on the court, where he’s able to dart passes to teammates, read plays, jump passing lanes and figure out angles for chase-down blocks.

What do court awareness and emotional maturity have to do with each other? Nothing. But he needed something to transition, so I guess that works.

With such keen awareness, James has heard the hecklers in the crowd over the years and responded to them often. He knows, by peeking at side scoreboards, whether he was not given an assist when he felt he deserved one and sends an objection to the stats crew. He’ll know which player the coach is about to bring into the game. In interview sessions, he’ll scan the crowd to identify the reporters and prepare for certain lines of questioning.

So he's a fucking baby. Good to know.

Once in a game in James’ rookie year, he was waiting to check in at the scorer’s table when a voice caught his attention. A female fan in the front row was calling to him, yelling “Lee-Bron.” As he got up to check in, he leaned over to a person at the scorer’s table and said: “Tell her it is pronounced ‘La-Bron.’”

You know who wouldn't stick a knife in Cleveland's back on national TV? Lee-Bron. Lee-Bron would never do that.

As he was doing it, he looked over at the opposing bench and saw the coach make a hand signal. A second after he finished giving his pronunciation request, he trotted onto the court and informed his bench the other team was switching to a zone defense.
John Lucas thought Del Harris was using sign language.

That is how James operates. He consumes information and processes it in remarkable time.

This is what happens when people think the earth is 4,000 years old and we appeared out of the whim of a guy in the sky. They become completely enraptured by being told in five words how the human brain works.

Good God, he's a real-life human being! Can he walk, too?

In his mansion outside his hometown of Akron, one of James’ favorite rooms has an entire wall of TVs. On off nights, he enjoys watching every NBA game that is going on. Often all at once. Perhaps a college game or two, as well.
Ed Harris had this in The Truman Show. Things didn't work out for him too well. If LeBron ever starts wearing a newsboy cap, his fame is about to go down the crapper.

As he watches, he can sometimes predict plays before they happen because of how well he knows the league and its personnel. He’s been known to call out a play, such as a backdoor lob, before it happens. It is because he’s always watching and reading and absorbing.

LeBron James is now the Linux kid from those IBM commericals. Creepy. "HE"S GETTING STRONGER!!!"

When getting stretched out before games or after workouts, James often will listen to music and rap to himself while cycling through two BlackBerrys sending texts and reading the Internet at the same time. He reads the box scores. And the transactions. And the rumor pages.

Ah, so you're establishing he can do many tasks at once. Like bicycling. Okay, cool. Like reading two things simultaneously. Wait...that's fucking impossible. Does he chew gum and sunflower seeds at the same time? Does he pedal the bike while running, too?

For more than a year, James resisted the urging of friends to start using Twitter, saying he wanted to keep his privacy. He relented in July, just in time for several hundred thousand people to get a direct line to him. When he was asked Wednesday why he even looks at his responses, something that is merely an option in the Twitter program, he basically said he has to see it.
Know what ensures privacy? Not having yourself put on a 20-story building.

“Once in a blue moon, you need to see that, no matter how many good things you do, you’re going to have people that downplay the things you do,” James said.
Who's downplaying, other than Skip Bayless, anything LeBron ever did on the floor? It must be the bodyless voices that told him The Decision was a good idea.

That awareness and those consumption habits simply didn’t allow him to get through the summer without feeling a significant portion of the backlash of his decision to come to Miami. Sure, he knew that in Cleveland he would face an angry and intense reaction. But, according to friends, he was taken aback by the national response.

So he was just fine with fucking over his home town. BUT DEAR LORD, WHEN YOU'VE LOST DES PLAINES, YOU'VE LOST THE COUNTRY!!!!

Yet he kept taking it in, kept reading, listening and watching. A month after signing with the Heat, James fired off a tweet verifying that. He wrote, “Don't think for one min that I haven't been taking mental notes of everyone taking shots at me this summer. And I mean everyone!”
Jenna Jameson ironically tweeted that exact statement a few months ago.

He’s still taking notes and still reading at least some of the hundreds of negative Twitter messages that come in by the day. And there’s no doubt he’ll listen to the hecklers who are sure to arrive nightly, especially in the cities where he turned down contract offers this summer.
Santa Claus ironically tweeted that exact statement a few months ago.

More racist messages arrived Wednesday afternoon after James talked publicly about the Twitter responses. There also were plenty of messages of support, and James surely reads and sometimes even retweets those, as well.

But all those negative vibes seem to have some effect. This preseason James has been more withdrawn than in the past, putting some of his trademark bombastic personality away. There isn’t as much laughter. There isn’t as much horseplay. So far, there’s been no sign of dancing. Frankly, it appears to the observer that there isn’t as much fun.
Or maybe he's growing up. And it's okay to say 'me', Brian. 'The Observer' is you.

James does seem happy with his decision to come to the Heat. He has said that playing alongside Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, even for the little time he’s been on the floor with them, has been uplifting. But his hardened demeanor is unmistakable.

Some believe that is exactly what James needs; there was plenty of criticism that James seemed to be too loose the past few years in Cleveland. He led teamwide goofing around in the regular season but didn’t seem to bring enough intensity at times when a ruthless personality seemed necessary in the playoffs.

All he needed was smidge of racism! That's what got him going! That's all he needed! Racism, America's picker-upper! I bet that girl next to me in the office would work 50 percent harder if I was completely misogynistic!

Only time and games and pressure will tell whether that has changed within James. But something certainly has in his first few weeks in South Beach. This is a more edgy and focused James. And all the hatred he’s taking in certainly appears to be the leading cause.
Oh god, he's going to put out a grunge album, isn't he?

[Orenthal]

Since DT already gave the play by play I was about to give I'll stick to one or two points.

"Anyone who has spent significant time around James understands how highly aware he is. In fact, his awareness is one of his best attributes."

Is this the same guy that was aware of the negative reaction the whole ESPN show and Dance Dance intro show would garner? IMO...

"He knows, by peeking at side scoreboards, whether he was not given an assist when he felt he deserved one and sends an objection to the stats crew."

SELFISH...

And wow as to the rest Windy had to wind alot of that man blow off his fat titties cause that piece was pure blow-job.

[leadpipe]

Even local hacks get hate mail, death threats. What makes Supastar athlete turned Benedict Arnold (which was well within' his FA status) think he would be immune? Why the victim story, oh yeah, fat jizzlicker/guzzler Windy. Gawd fuck that guy. Lead no need for the get over it post. Thanks.

No need to repeat a point for some of us O, others, I've come to realize could use it about every day.

Your welcome.

[StewieG]

I guess Windhorst forgot to pack his credibility when he moved to Miami. Wasn't he the one who said he was gonna take it with him?

2 articles, and not an ounce of journalistic integrity among them.

[Madre Hill, Superstar]

Sad that it takes negative backlash to motivate him to become the best and a champion.

Assuming he's correct and not because he's making more excuses for embracing his inner Vince Carter.

[JacksonDysonJackson]

Lebron just needs to stop talking.

James later tweeted that he was not speaking specifically to Cavaliers' fans: "Let's clear this up! I never said to the Cavs fans to 'get over it.' I've never and will never say anything bad about them. 7 years of joy!"

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/truehoop/miamiheat/news/story?id=5712833

[Triple-S]

look ledouche, if you really respected "cavs fan". You could have handled this way better

first off, you could have told dan gilbert and the organization that you had no intention of staying here around '08 or whenever you and the other three stooges planned this. At the very least, a third team could have been involved in the deal, allowing Cleveland to get something to remain competitive.

2nd off, You would have shitcanned any tv special involving this, and making sure, at the very bare minimum you got off in your first press conference (one that would have been much more lowkey and done at like say...1 pm est) that "you wouldn't blame cavs fans to be upset", "understands their frustration and that maybe someday they'll get that championship, and that you appreciated them showing up and supporting him, not only for the 7 years that he played pro ball, but for everyone in northeast ohio that helped him since he was a kid on the streets of akron".

I guarantee the anger would have simmered quite a bit over the summer and the reaction would have been significantly less.

[GodHatesClevelandSport]

look lebron, if you really respected "cavs fan". You could have handled this way better

first off, you could have told dan gilbert and the organization that you had no intention of staying here around '08 or whenever you and the other three stooges planned this. At the very least, a third team could have been involved in the deal, allowing Cleveland to get something to remain competitive.

2nd off, You would have shitcanned any tv special involving this, and making sure, at the very bare minimum you got off in your first press conference (one that would have been much more lowkey and done at like say...1 pm est) that "you wouldn't blame cavs fans to be upset", "understands their frustration and that maybe someday they'll get that championship, and that you appreciated them showing up and supporting him, not only for the 7 years that he played pro ball, but for everyone in northeast ohio that helped him since he was a kid on the streets of akron".

I guarantee the anger would have simmered quite a bit over the summer and the reaction would have been significantly less.

I'm beginning to believe nothing would have worked. Not doing the TV special would have kept the anger down, but this is a city that holds grudges. LeBron would have been persona non grata no matter how he walked. If he made it known ahead of time that he was leaving and the Cavs were forced to go through the Carmelo Anthony breakup ala the Nuggets, then people would have been bitching the entire time while the Cavs were pursuing a title. There are people that hate Art Modell for firing Paul Brown. People would hate LeBron no matter what. He's the best player the Cavs ever had and ever will have. That's why people are so mad. He will never be replaced, and we all know it.

[Triple-S]

I'm beginning to believe nothing would have worked. Not doing the TV special would have kept the anger down, but this is a city that holds grudges. LeBron would have been persona non grata no matter how he walked. If he made it known ahead of time that he was leaving and the Cavs were forced to go through the Carmelo Anthony breakup ala the Nuggets, then people would have been bitching the entire time while the Cavs were pursuing a title. There are people that hate Art Modell for firing Paul Brown. People would hate LeBron no matter what. He's the best player the Cavs ever had and ever will have. That's why people are so mad. He will never be replaced, and we all know it.

Grudges would have been kept, no doubt. But at the very least, if presented with two realities to Cavs fan, guaranteed they would have preferred the one I just stated.

He would have never been replaced yeah, but if we had some building blocks to become a more team-oriented franchise, that would have been nice to have seen happen.