Transcription
The Cleveland Cavaliers actually did a great job pairing players around LeBron James and finding talent.
So, why do you think those Cavs teams never got close to winning?
LeBron James wasn't good enough or versatile enough. What it do? Welcome to the JB Sports podcast. Please like, share, and subscribe if you enjoy the content. Make sure you click that notification bell so you don't miss anything that we're pushing out here. Also, if you can help a brother out by using the hype points, I greatly appreciate it. We're going to jump right into this, but actually, you know what? Hold on one second before we do that. Just want to remind you to check out this video. It'll be in the pin comment. How Kobe punkked LeBron at the All-Star game and in KG's opinion, it changed everything. Getting close to 20,000 views. Make sure you check that video out.
Jumping right into this now. Um, this has been a myth that's been going on for a long time that's always bothered me. But I want to first start by saying this is not a video where I'm going to sit here and straight up bash LeBron James. That's not what this is about. This is about truth and honesty. And one of the biggest lies that the media has consistently told to make it okay for why LeBron James ran to Miami is that the Cavaliers were not trying to help him. All right? They were not that good and everything that they did was not to help LeBron James. That's a lie. And I'm going to dispel that myth right now. But I'm gonna start by using a hot take that I saw from this guy Omar and IG. He does these hot takes. Notice he doesn't even give his opinion in this one. He kind of ran away. Looked like he was a little scared. I'm going to give you my actual opinion and also facts to explain why I feel the way I feel. Let's jump right into this video.
Was that the Cleveland Cavaliers actually did a great job pairing players around LeBron James and finding talent.
So, why do you think those Cavs teams never got close to winning?
LeBron James wasn't good enough or versatile enough. If you actually look at the players that they've gotten, if I compare that to Kobe Bryant's Lakers, Kobe Bryant's Lakers players did not really accomplish anything before winning the championship. Pau Gasol had one all-star with him. Trevor Ariza was not great and didn't wasn't known on the Orlando Magic. Um Jordan Farmar was unknown. Smush Parker was unknown. Shannon Brown was unknown. Luke Walton was unknown. Andrew Bynum was unknown. So the fact is that the Lakers really what they did was they just chose to get different type of players that haven't done anything but through Kobe Bryant's leadership they actually won. But no, they were not known to have done anything before then.
Okay, funny enough, this is a big deal. I just want to make sure you guys remember this as the video continues. The Cavaliers decided to choose people that were already good. Now, he's going to go into this and explain it. The Lakers decided to choose people that they thought Kobe Bryant could help reach their highest potential, lead them to greatness, minus one person in Gasol. That's the only person that kind of did, you know, did did that's the only person that had some things under his belt. But we're going to talk about that a little further in a second.
Now, let's break down LeBron's teammates. Everybody they've got had success from somewhere, which is obviously the better out of the two to choose someone who's had proven provenance proven success compared to ones that haven't. So Žydrūnas Ilgauskas was an all-star before LeBron got there. Right after that, Larry Hughes is averaging 22 points per game on the Washington Wizards, who's a second round draft pick. They got him for free and signed him. That was supposed to be a big three. That didn't work out, but it's okay. They also got Wally Szczerbiak, which an all-star three-point shooter from the Minnesota Timberwolves. They also got Mo Williams, as I said, who was averaging 18 points per game on the Bucks to replace Eric Snow. They also happened to get Antawn Jamison, who was an all-star for the Wizards.
Let me know what you guys think.
So, that is actually a great breakdown, and that's why I added it to the video. Okay, he explained exactly what I've been trying to say for a long time to anybody that would listen. The Cavaliers were not this horribly run organization that didn't try to do anything to support or help LeBron James. First of all, when LeBron first got there, there was already two all-stars there. I think Ricky Davis was an all-star. Uh, let me just double check. In fact, let me double check that right now to make sure we're on the same page here. Was Ricky Davis ever an all-star? Ricky Davis.
Okay, so Ricky Davis was never an all-star, but also Ricky Davis, um, from what I see here, Ricky Davis was actually averaging like 20 points a game at one point, but they had Ricky Davis, they had Darius Miles. Let me see. Did Carlos Boozer play on that team? Was Carlos Boozer on the Cavs when LeBron James was there?
Yes.
Yeah. So, Carlos Boozer was there when LeBron first got there. All these guys were were talented, but it didn't work out. Maybe they didn't, you know, it just didn't work out. Carlos Boozer, uh, most specifically just decided to leave. I remember that. And in free agency, and then he went on to be a multi-time all-star, was really good with the Jazz. I say that to say, they still brought in other pieces to help LeBron. Žydrūnas Ilgauskas was an all-star before LeBron got there. That's a fact. And then Larry Hughes, they brought Larry Hughes on who's an all-defensive player. Uh they bought him from a rival actually. He was on the Wizards and he was balling out. So, and then we're going to get further into it, but they actually bought in somebody they didn't mention was Antawn Jamison. And I'm going to go really deep into why that is interesting. But before we do that, I just want to take a look.
This is Kobe's team. The same team that Kobe took to beat the teams LeBron James couldn't beat. So in this 2007 to 2010 111 window, okay, this is the team primarily that Kobe Bryant was was winning with. Okay, they showed you some of them. Derek Fisher's up here at the top left. Next to him is Smush Parker. Derek Fisher was never an all-star, never close to it. He's a solid player. Love Fish, all-time Laker. Kobe made a lot of these guys though known. Fisher was with Kobe on the first couple championships. Then you have Smush Parker here. Smush Parker was on the Cavs with LeBron, I believe. Didn't play. Jordan Farmar. Jordan Farmar was good on the Lakers, but he's a backup guy. Never close to an all-star. Really didn't do anything on any other team except the Lakers. Adam Morrison is next to him on the top right, I guess you could say. Never played. Sasha Vujačić, my guy, played for the Knicks, went over there with Phil Jackson. Really didn't do much. His time was the Lakers. That's where you know him from. Come down a little bit. Underneath him is Josh Powell. Josh Powell. Lamar Odom is right there. Lamar Odom. We love L.O. But L.O. struggled on the Clippers. Then went to the Heat. And I say struggled. I mean, he was good, but not he wasn't winning nothing. The Clippers were trash on the Heat. I think he he had one year with Dwyane and they did all right. They won like one playoff game or a series. I don't remember. But all most of Lamar Odom's career to that point had been underwhelming for the 6'11 ability that he had. Pau Gasol, we're going to get into Pau Gasol as well. Pau is nice, but I'll explain more to that in a second. Josh Powell's next to him. Come down. Sun Yue or whatever that guy's name is. I think it's Sun Yue. Next to him is Luke Walton. Luke Walton was not a good coach obviously, but he was an okay player for the Lakers. He knew what his role was, you know. I give him credit for that. Ariza is a dog. We love Ariza. Kobe helped make Ariza who he was. Ariza even said that Andrew Bynum without Kobe Bryant nothing. Just absolutely nothing. And then we're going to start from there with some of these statistics.
This is Andrew Bynum in the finals. People talk about Kobe, you know, and Kobe had Andrew Bynum. Andrew Bynum was killing it. Was he? First of all, he has hurt a lot. Secondly, he averaged 6.8 points, 4.8 rebounds and one block in 12 games in the NBA finals in his career. Does that sound electric to you? Does that sound amazing to you? No, shouldn't be. Now, let's touch base on Gasol a little bit. Now, we love Gasol if we're Lakers fans, right? We love Gasol. Uh he did help save our organization. He's one of the pieces to help save us that gave Kobe a reliable guy. But what we have to understand about Gasol is he was good but not great. And he was for the most part somewhat reliable. But when I say reliable, in the 2008 uh playoffs against the Spurs, he averaged like 13.5. Kobe dang near averaged 29 points a game or 30 something like that in that same series. Gasol was our second highest scoring player at 13.5. Kobe's averaging 29. So emphasis on once again he was reliable, right? No, Pau Gasol did not make the All-Star game though in 2008. 2008 is the year he got sent over to the Lakers. So he didn't make the All-Star team. Also, he had never won a playoff game before coming over to Kobe Bryant. He was like 0 for 8 in playoff games. He did help the Grizzlies get to the playoffs, I think twice, but they never won a game. They just got there. and he didn't make the All-Star team in 2008. He didn't make the All-Star team again until he joined up uh with Kobe the next year he made it. Okay, this a big deal. I'm going to explain why all this matters.
Now, let's jump over to a guy Antawn Jamison. Now, Antawn Jamison wasn't in the video. Okay, they didn't have Antawn Jamison in the video, but the thing that you need to understand about Antawn Jamison is that Antawn Jamison, when the Lakers got Gasol, Jamison was another player that people were really, you know, trying to get. He was supposed to be the piece like Gasol was to the Lakers. That's why the Cavs went out and got him. He was a rival of LeBron James. You don't believe me? Let me show you. Check this out. This is Antawn Jamison head-to-head versus Pau Gasol, right? Antawn Jamison's best season, this is before he joined the Cavs, was 24.9 points, basically 25, 8.7 rebounds, basically nine, two assists in 82 games. Okay, which means he played a full 82 game season, too, which is impressive. Pau Gasol's best season before he joined the Lakers, okay, was 20.8 points, 9.8 rebounds, 3.4 assists. So, 21 points, 10 boards basically. Um, and uh, he did that in 59 games. First of all, look at the resiliency there. Antawn Jamison played 82 full games. All right, Pau Gasol played 59. That's a big difference right there. The other thing to keep in mind, I will say this is Pau Gasol. This is right before he went to the Lakers. Like pretty close. Jamison. This is a little bit further back before he went to um before he went to the um before he went to the Cavs. But the thing to keep in mind is this is when he was on the Warriors and he wasn't playing with Gilbert Arenas and Larry Hughes. Larry Hughes was one of the people they already showed you went over to LeBron James with the Lakers. I mean, excuse me, went over to LeBron James with the Cavs. Okay. He was kind of playing on a three-headed monster, uh, I believe with Larry Hughes at one point, Caron Butler was there, Gilbert Arenas, some type of combination of that. So, his scoring went down, but not that down. All right? Not that down. All right? And you know how we know that? Let me help you. So, this is Antawn Jamison right before he went to the Cleveland Cavaliers. If you look here, you'll see that in all these games, right, he averaged 22.2 points per game, basically nine rebounds, basically two assists. Similar numbers. Scoring's down a little bit, but again, he's playing with more dominant players scoring wise. I believe at that time he was playing with uh Caron Butler and Gilbert Arenas. Gilbert Arenas, great scorer. So, he's still averaging 22.2. He's got, look at these games, 23 points, 24, had seven. That's a stinker. 23, 19, 28, 29, 21, 27. The boy was a scorer and he got close to n 10 rebounds every game and a tough era, right? That was a tough era, right? This is the year before he goes to LeBron James, mind you. The year before.
Now, where this also gets tricky is I'm going to show you something else that I think is interesting here. Okay? I'm going show you something else that I think is interesting. This is him when he was on the on the Golden State uh Warriors. This is a big game he had against Kobe Bryant. If you go back and watch this game, it was amazing. All right, Golden State actually beat us because Antawn Jamison went off 51 13 assists, 72% field goal shooting. Kobe had 518 and 51% and it wasn't even it wasn't special. That's how good Antawn Jamison was at times. Don't get it twisted. That's how good Antawn Jamison was at times. You understand? Then we're going to go here. This is Antawn Jamison the year before against the Cavs. The year before he went there. In those playoffs, he averaged 32 points, basically 10 rebounds, 1.3 assists, one block, okay, on 47.6% field goal shooting. That's what he averaged against the Cavs the year before he went to the Cavs.
Now, it didn't work out 100% the way they wanted it to. It didn't work out that way with Larry Hughes the way they wanted it to, but again, they had Žydrūnas Ilgauskas. They had uh Mo Williams. The Cavaliers won 60 games back to back. They just couldn't get the job done. They couldn't close couldn't close the deal. You understand? So, so a lot of this is people not paying attention to the fact that the Cavaliers gave LeBron James a lot. They gave him everything that they could to make him happy. They got him a lot of new players. They took players from rivals that just cooked them and brought them over to help him. And at the time, the Wizards were one of the best teams in the East. The East was not good. Don't get it twisted. But the Wizards were one of the teams that actually had enough talent to somewhat rival the Cavaliers. They just never put it together. And Gilbert Arenas isn't a leader. We like Gil's Arenas. Gil's Arenas is cool and everything like that, but Gil himself is not a leader. He could not lead those guys anywhere. He didn't. You know what I mean? The way you see him now on TV and he says some thing, you know, or or on YouTube and you you may like Gil. I like Gil, but he's an entertainer to me. If he was on my basketball team and I was elite like that and I was trying to get him to buy into something, he's just going to tell jokes and be funny. and that's not what wins championships. So they poached the Cavaliers poached players from that team because that team was a team that was a rival. So LeBron James has a history of making, you know, rivals weaker, which is I guess smart and they did that. And so this idea that LeBron never had help is a lie. They had Anderson Varejão, they had JJ Hickson. All right, all these guys were good players. They had Jamario Moon was a good player. Uh they had um what's it? Candace Parker's brother, Anthony Parker or Tony Parker? No, it wasn't Tony Parker. I think it was Anthony Parker. Um they had him who was a dynamic shooter. They had Wally Szczerbiak like you saw who was a dynamic shooter and an all-star for a long time with Kevin Garnett over in Minnesota. So they had Shaq, they had Ben Wallace. Now these are not prime Shaq. is not prime Ben Wallace, but this version of Shaq specifically played really good against the Celtics in the playoffs, you know, the super team Celtics, I believe. So, did LeBron James have this like d overall super team that was unstoppable? No. But was his team much worse than Sorry, I didn't want to go there. But was his team much worse than this team? I remember before they were the the Lakers went to the playoffs one year, the Cavs blew us out on Christmas and people were like booing the Lakers. The own Lakers fans were booing them and then we had the last laugh. That's always what happened. People will bring up the 16 and six with Kobe Bryant and LeBron. But here's the funny thing again. This team right here that you see, there's no This is not a super team, man. This is a team that Kobe Bryant pushed, pulled every day to greatness. He made them good enough to win no matter what. They beat a s a super team Celtics team. The same one of the same teams that made LeBron James pack up his stuff and run away from the grind, right? One of the teams that made him do that was that Celtic super team, but Kobe took that team, took this team and beat them anyway. Now, switch out Ariza with Ron Artest and that's that's how they won. So, it wasn't it wasn't about having a super team. It wasn't that LeBron James didn't have any help. It wasn't that the Cavaliers weren't trying to help LeBron be successful. They tried to do what they can do to help him. He didn't finish the job. In 2007, when they got to the playoffs or got to the finals, he couldn't shoot. Tim Duncan, that was Tim Duncan's worst finals ever. Tony Parker had to take over and become MVP. They held Tim Duncan in check. Žydrūnas Ilgauskas, JJ Hickson, um Drew Gooden, and Anderson Varejão held Tim Duncan in check. They were like one of the best defensive teams in the league, if not the best. LeBron just couldn't shoot. He couldn't get it done. He was barely averaging 20 points. They just backed up and he couldn't shoot. Couldn't make a jump shot. Couldn't put his moves together. That's why they lost. The year after Kobe took again this team and smacked the Spurs off the face of the earth gentleman sweep 4-1 with this team which was not completely different than the teams that LeBron had built.
What I should have did in this video and I didn't do I apologize is I should have actually um gotten a picture of some of those Cavs teams but I mean they went through a lot of them right? So that was the goal was just to make sure you understand like who they were for the most part. So again, this idea that that the Cavaliers never did anything to try to help LeBron, it's not true. And if it was true, why would he go back? And then he potentially is about to go back right now. So again, like it's all word salad to make you believe something that's not true. And that's my that's my problem with LeBron James and his and Clutch and Rich Paul and all these media members that they have underneath them. At times I feel like, dang, man. Am I am I putting am I just being unfair to Bron? Am I putting too much pressure on him? But then I'd be like, no. Because his his team of people are responsible for butchering Kobe Bryant. They can't help themselves because they need Kobe to be out the way so that LeBron could go this way. They need Kobe out. So, they didn't feel bad for butchering LeBron. I mean, Kobe. LeBron never stopped them from doing it. He sees it. He's not dumb. He knows what's going on. He let it happen. He He probably okayed it in the background. I'm sure he did. But he also paid media members to make all these lies and you know, all these lies. Tell the truth, bro. If you're that great, if you're that great, if you're this GOAT that they talk about, why all the lies? Why do they have to lie to us and tell us that the Cavs didn't try to make LeBron James happy? Didn't try to give him things. That's not true. Dan Gilbert was just as shocked as we were when LeBron did that whole decision thing and decided to go to Miami. He ran out the back door cowardly. Sorry, that's the only word that works there. He ran out the back door. And when this happened, nobody was like, "Oh man, the Cavaliers are just they just didn't do good by LeBron. They didn't do that's a narrative that came along later. Don't be fooled. Don't be stupid." That narrative came along later. At first, everybody was against Miami. They were like, even the writers, even the media people, they're like, "I can't believe he did it." But then over time, the league, I'm sure, also has something to do with it because they were always for LeBron. They were always trying to help LeBron. That's why Melo didn't win rookie of the year, right? That's why LeBron was winning MVP awards when he was playing with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. Kobe Bryant and Shaq have one MVP each because they played together. But LeBron can play with two superstar level players and he still gets MVPs. So they get to control. Again, this all goes back to what I say about legacy, controlling legacies, trying to make him better than he is, throwing awards at him, changing the game so there's no bigs in the paint so he can just become more and more efficient and stack his numbers cuz he's not he's not a great jump shooter. If you make him shoot 20 jumpers a game, he ain't walking away with the same amount of points Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan were walking away with. [clears throat] No way. So, you know, when he won the MVP in 2020, that should have been Anthony Davis's MVP. But again, we're going to do everything we can to give this to LeBron somehow. Even though LeBron switches off of Jimmy Butler after Jimmy Butler had a 40-point triple-double and beat the Lakers after that, Anthony Davis, who is a power forward/center, is now guarding a small forward in Jimmy Butler because LeBron James can't do it. And then they just forget that Anthony Davis is shutting down Jimmy Butler dang near single-handedly and we going to get an MVP to LeBron anyway because of the numbers. Even though he was getting cooked on defense and Anthony Davis had to step in and still got good numbers. Whole year Anthony Davis was killing it. That whole playoffs Anthony Davis was killing it. But we going to give it to LeBron. Steph Curry whipping whip whipping feet, right? That's what they say. Whipping feet. We don't win the Olympics without Steph and his heroics. LeBron James standing in the corner watching Steph cook. And we're just gonna give that MVP of the Olympics right over to LeBron. We're just going to give it to LeBron. Should have been Steph. If you watch LeBron's career, they've been giving him stuff. They've been making excuses for him. But this one I had to dispel. This is an excuse. The real reason the Cavaliers had trouble is because they gave LeBron everything that they could at the time. They gave him everything that they could. But the problem was LeBron James was not Kobe Bryant. He couldn't take a team like this to the promised land. He wasn't the leader that Kobe Bryant was. And you know what? This isn't even to bash LeBron. Who is the leader that Kobe Bryant was besides Michael Jordan? Who else in history has taken this team to three finals in a row? And the first one we lost, truthfully, Ariza and Bynum were hurt. And it was a full team effort that made this team nice. Everybody had to do a little something. We were not no super team. We were a bunch of good players that Kobe Bryant pushed to make really good in their roles and he dominated for us to win. So, don't get it twisted. I need y'all to understand that. Comment on this video, like, share, subscribe, hit the notification bell to all so you don't miss anything that we're pushing out. Make sure you hype it up. Greatly appreciate that. A brother would help that. Appreciate that. It helps out the channel. and make sure that you understand that the Cavaliers gave LeBron everything. All right? They gave him everything.
So, I truly appreciate you for listening this long. I'm very humble. All right? Very thankful.
The Cavaliers gave LeBron James everything.
The problem,
he wasn't Kobe Bryant.
Much love. tell that somehow [music] you never get over leaving me. And when you [music] feel like coming back, I'll [music] be gone. I'll be gone. [music]