Thank You, Terry Pluto . . .

for writing this, in response to pieces like this, in which the authors seem to rejoice in LeBron's recent proclamation that New York is his favorite city and that Akron is his fifth favorite City. Cleveland didn't make his top five list. These authors point fingers at the Cavs, saying things like "Thus far the Cavs have looked like the same old bumbling franchise that had the enormous fortune of winning the 2003 lottery when an otherworldly talent from just down the road happened to be available."

Same old bumbling franchise? Really? The same Cavs who were a LeBron missed layup away from taking the NBA Champion Celtics to a Game 7 overtime in the Eastern Conference semis? The same Cavs who were the second to last team standing in the NBA two seasons ago? Sure. Why let logic get in the way of the "let's watch LeBron crush Cleveland by leaving" meme?

Thankfully, Mr. Pluto intervenes:

"Listen to the talking heads on TV, most of whom don't believe James actually likes Northeast Ohio. They can't imagine anyone really wanting to live here. We're Devil's Island, only with worse weather. So James has to leave, because they would leave if they were James.


Some media types insist they've heard "from those close to James" that the Cavs star will head east the moment his contract expires in 2010. They point to how the Knicks and Nets are cleaning up their salary-cap situations, creating room to bid for James in 2010.

How about this scoop? James is now hanging around with SpongeBob SquarePants, and the two were spotted chomping crabby patties at the Krusty Krab. He must be ticketed for Bikini Bottom in 2010, not just making a cartoon for kids stressing the need to exercise.

Here's a little logic: NBA rules say the Cavs can offer James one more year and about $20 million more than any other team. This is not baseball, where Boston (Manny Ramirez), the Chicago White Sox (Albert Belle), Philadelphia (Jim Thome) and Texas (Kevin Millwood) can outbid a Cleveland team for its stars on an open market.

Here's a little history: The last player to walk away from a maximum contract (the kind James will be offered) to sign for less with another team was center Shaquille O'Neal, when he left Orlando for Los Angeles in 1996. When other big-name free agents such as Steve Nash moved in the summer, it was
because their teams did not offer a maximum deal."

Good points, all.

Dan Wetzel at Yahoo Sports, rightly points out in the above linked Danny Ferry hit piece that "LeBron doesn’t need New York to cash in as a media superstar or a marketing sensation – he’s making hundreds of millions in endorsements in Northeast Ohio. This is a different era and as big and bold as New York is, it isn’t the only place anymore. The guy signed a $105 million Nike deal out of an Akron high school, after all." Yet Wetzel persists, like others, in explaining LeBron's Newyorkophilic proclamations as digs at the Cavs front office -- "shots across the Cavaliers' bough," and sure signs that he'll leave for the East Coast in the summer of 2010.

The point that nobody makes in these "LeBron is leaving" pieces is that LeBron has every incentive to make New Yorkers and Clevelanders think that he might leave for the Knicks or Nets. Look at all the love he gets from these folks. If he plans to stay in Cleveland, it certainly doesn't hurt him any to have New Yorkers weak-kneed for another few years at the prospect of him joining their team. It only helps him sell more shoes, and whatever else he wants to sell. It only gets him more attention. One might say that if this were the case, LeBron wouldn't want to put the Cavs front office and fans on edge in such a way. But we don't know what LeBron has told the Cavs front office behind closed doors. And he knows that the fans here will always love him while he's here. And a little anxiety probably even helps. And if he does decide to stay in Cleveland, it will be that much more of an emotional victory for us here. He'll be that much more of a hero after getting us all worked up. And he can sit back at a press conference, wink, and tell us that he was going to stay all along -- that he was just pumping the New Yorkers up to sell more shoes. This might not be the case, but we have no idea that it's not, and given LeBron's incentives to make everyone think that he would leave, it's foolish to discuss LeBron's statements about New York without keeping this in mind.

Thanks to Matt Sussman at Deadspin for the links and the photoshopped image.

Update: Excellent piece on this topic here at Waiting for Next Year, and Greg Doyel of CBS Sportsline weighs in nicely here.