By JUSTIN TERRANOVA
The NBA Finals start tonight without LeBron James and the Cavaliers.
“What else could LeBron do?” Reggie Miller questioned when Cleveland was facing a 3-1 deficit to the Magic in the Eastern Conference Finals.
Nothing else. James was as good as he could be in the series the Cavaliers lost in six games, but that still wasn’t enough. In his six years in Cleveland, the team simply has not put enough talent around their all-world player to make them a championship team.
In James’ six years in the league, the Cavaliers have gone to the playoffs four times — losing twice in the second round, once in the Eastern Conference Finals and once in the NBA Finals. When James was a rookie the team had Carlos Boozer, but he left to the Jazz via free agency after that season. Until this year, the team’s second best player has been Zydrunas Ilgauskas. And while I have no problems with “The Big Z”, he is not the second-best player on a title team.
This past offseason, the Cavaliers acquired point guard Mo Williams in a trade. Williams appeared to be the answer — helping the Cavs to a NBA-best 66 wins, but he disappeared against Orlando and now the Magic get a shot at the Lakers in the Finals.
“If you put LeBron on that Lakers team they might win 75-80 games,” Miller said. “And you put Kobe on the Cavaliers, I don’t know if they win 66 games with that current roster. If LeBron’s on the Lakers they might break (Michael) Jordan and the Bulls’ record of 72 wins.”
If winning is James’ only passion then the Cavaliers have one more chance to satisfy him. Because while the Knicks and practically the rest of the NBA have started clearing cap space to afford “King James” in 2010, the Cavs have had him right there for half a dozen years and haven’t take advantage of it yet.
The Bulls didn’t make that mistake with Jordan.
And Miller, who did say that he would like to see James stay in Cleveland, has confidence Knicks president Donnie Walsh has them pointed in the right direction with or without LeBron.
“Donnie Walsh was with me for my 18 years in Indians and always surrounded me with great talent and always assured me we were always going to be going forward to win a championship,” Miller said. “That’s exactly what he’s going to be doing for Mike D’Antoni and the players there. He’s going to get them going in the right track, so I know he’s going to get the Knicks in the right direction.”
Miller and the Pacers did not win a championship, but as great as Miller was he is not James.
This is not to say James should come to New York, but he just shouldn’t stay in Cleveland. But for fun, who do you think would have been better this season — the Knicks or the Cavs without James?
Here’s what the lineups would like.
Knicks:
PG — Chris Duhon
SG — Quentin Richardson/Larry Hughes
SF — Wilson Chandler/ Danilo Gallinari
PF — Al Harrington
C — David Lee
Reserve — Nate Robinson
Cavaliers:
PG — Mo Williams
SG — Delonte West
SF — Sasha Pavlovic
PF — Joe Smith/Anderson Varejao
C — Zydrunas Ilgauskas/ Ben Wallace
Reserve — Daniel Gibson
It’s a toss up at best for the Cavs and gun to my head, I am taking the Knicks in that neutral-site game. And the Knicks were the laughingstock of the NBA until this season.
That’s how much of a difference James makes — a 32-50 team and a 66-16 team. Three seasons ago, James carried the Cavaliers to the Finals with Hughes as the team’s second-leading scorer. In his 25 games with the Knicks, Hughes was the team’s seventh-leading scorer.
Now Walsh has another offseason and draft to put the proper pieces in place to make New York the most attractive place for James. The Cavaliers should be thinking the same way.
