Runaway Slave

Did Jesse Jackson go too far in saying that Gilbert viewed LeBron as a “runaway slave?” Not at all. That’s exactly what I thought nearly twenty-four hours before Reverend Jackson said anything. How dare he turn us down? After all we did for him? Who does he think he is?

Fans complain that it’s only about money to the players, but the owners love it that way. As long as free agents go to the highest bidder, the owners still maintain a decent level of control. “If you pay him, he will come,” if you will. Gilbert was allowed to offer LeBron more money than any other owner, yet James still walked away. Gilbert could not deal with that. He had to have asked himself, “What more does he want?” Clearly, LeBron James wanted much more than just Cleveland’s dollars. Dan Gilbert was unable to buy LeBron off. Essentially, Gilbert offered the player the best he could give, and LeBron still chose to go elsewhere. Gilbert’s best was not good enough, and that, more than anything else, is what set him off.

Gilbert is delusional with power. Once the season was over, LeBron was no longer a Cavalier. Sure, he was technically under contract until July 1. But let’s be real here; LeBron became a free agent the moment the Celtics eliminated the Cavs in the second round of the playoffs. Yet in an interview, Gilbert cited LeBron not meeting with a prospective head coach as one of the things the Cavaliers “let him get away with.” How exactly did Gilbert let LeBron get away with anything when he was no longer part of the team, meaning no longer under his employ? That’s another example of entitlement. “Let him get away with?” Get out of here. If that’s not a statement of ownership, I don’t know what is.

Some people called Gilbert’s rant a case of sour grapes. Sure, that’s part of it. It was also a classic case of being upset that someone had the nerve to turn him down. The rich and powerful are not used to being turned down. They are used to people holding hands out willing to accept whatever scraps they are lucky to be offered. Like so many in the world, Dan Gilbert could not accept being told no.

If you’re one of those people who has a problem with Jackson’s use of the word “slavery,” think about this: if the statement was made in reference to a White player, would you have been upset? When that word is brought up in America, people automatically think in terms of Black & White. This is a shame, and it’s something of which we are all guilty. We are so conditioned to think Black people when we hear the word slavery, but any type of person can be a slave. The fact that everyone jumped took Gilbert being described as a slave owner as the equivalent of him being called a racist is another tragic effect of this country’s legacy of racism. Gilbert’s words exemplified feelings of ownership. It doesn’t have to be about color; it’s about one man trying to exert power over another—but you and I both know, this has a lot to do with color.

But it’s not just Dan Gilbert. It’s everyone else, too. I know it when I see it.

When I was a senior in high school, I applied to about twenty colleges. Among those twenty was an application I sent to Harvard. As part of the application process, I agreed to an interview. One Sunday afternoon in late Winter, my father drove me up to Trenton to my interviewers’ house. They were a married couple in their early-to-mid fifties. They were both Harvard alumni. And they were both psychiatrists. Harvard accepted me, but due to a number of factors, I decided not to accept. When they received word that I had decided to attend a different school, the man and woman who had interviewed me sent me a letter telling me to let them know if I was dealing with any emotional issues.

Even at the age of seventeen, I knew the deal. It was Harvard arrogance. These two people could not believe that I had the nerve to refuse admission to their prestigious university. No guy in his right mind would turn down Harvard, so obviously something must have been wrong with me. My decision could not possibly have been the result of sound reasoning and decision making.

As I see it, this was the case with Dan Gilbert and Cavalier fans’ hurt feelings regarding LeBron James’ decision to leave the Cavaliers. Because he grew up in Akron, the fans in Ohio feel as though they’ve raised LeBron from birth. Never mind that those people had nothing to do with his development as a man or basketball player. Never mind that ninety percent of them never saw LeBron play one game in high school. They’ve cheered for him his whole life and helped him become the player he is (yeah right), so they feel entitled to his loyalty. They gave him their adoration and cheers, and for that, they feel, LeBron James owes it to them to spend the rest of his career in Cleveland.

Fans are fanatical. We expect this kind of irrationality from them. The team’s owner is a different story. LeBron was Dan Gilbert’s golden goose. Whatever millions LeBron earned from his contract with the team, he earned ten times that amount for Gilbert. In return, the owner catered to the player’s every whim…except providing him with a championship level supporting cast. Now that LeBron is gone, Gilbert feels left out in the cold. For all the money he spent on him, Gilbert feels entitled to James’ services. Entitled. That’s the only way to describe the language of the letter Gilbert wrote to Cavalier fans in the wake of LeBron’s leaving.

Furthermore, the rage expressed by fans toward James implies that they feel he should have never left Cleveland. As Henry Abbott wrote on ESPN.com ( http://es.pn/crHVmj ), these people seem to have an issue with free agency in general. Damn those players for having the right to play where they want to play.

What makes the bull’s eye on LeBron’s back so much larger than any other free agent I can remember is that he did not leave for more money. He left, in part, to play ball with his friends. Both owners and fans dislike this. LeBron took control of his situation. He did not let the desires and priorities of other people guide his choice. A friend of mine often quotes an old classmate of his: “Once you have enough money, going to work every day has to be about enjoying your job.” LeBron’s decision was to play with his friends on a team that has a chance to win championships. He did not take the most money. He did not choose to stay with the comfort of the status quo. No, he chose the path he wanted. I applaud the man for having the self-confidence and self-assuredness to follow his own mind. In Abbott’s column, the writer references a column by Ken Berger, who quotes an anonymous NBA executive as saying, “It’s an incestuous, friend-ridden business.” The statement was made in reference to players discussing their futures—and desires to play with each other—among themselves. Friend-ridden? Yeah, I think that says it all.

Ownership and, therefore, slavery are not about racism, per se. They are about control. Dan Gilbert, and anyone who is upset with LeBron, are expressing their frustrations that a young man dared to take control over his own life. I even heard one person say that he would have preferred to see LeBron stay in Cleveland and become a Charles Barkley-like player who never won a championship than to see him win one in Miami. See, everyone all over America is talking about what they wanted him to do or what they think he should have done. They talk about what he did to the people of Cleveland. As Jesse Jackson said, “LeBron honored his contract.” That’s right. He honored his contract. Fans complain all the time about players trying to renegotiate their contracts before they run out. LeBron James did not. He waited until his contract expired and then sought a new one, where he wanted and with whom he wanted. He followed the protocol and still draws ire. A Black man can’t win for losing, can he? Fuck yall.

The Chosen One

One of the recurring themes of Richard Russo’s Empire Falls is the idea that one must take advantages of opportunities when they are presented or else life gets in the way—life has a way of killing dreams before they ever get started. More than once, we are told that Miles Roby, the protagonist, makes his mother, Grace, furious because he drops out of college to care for her while she is terminally ill. Grace is emphatic about her desire for Miles to escape the small, formerly industry-filled succubus of a town in which he grew up; Grace wants Miles to get out, live life, and find happiness. He has dreams, and she is afraid that by staying and caring for her, Miles will lose his chance to fulfill them. She tells him that choosing to stay will get him trapped in the town forever, and that he will never get another chance to escape. The desire of the novel’s antagonist is to keep Miles from leaving home and chasing any of his dreams.

Who can’t relate to that story? Only a bad parent wants for his/her child to grow up and never leave home. Only the most selfish of parents want to keep their children from living out their dreams.

Similarly, it is only the bad and selfishness in humanity that allows people to be upset at LeBron James for leaving Cleveland. I’ve heard a few people say they aren’t upset that James left, but rather by how he left. These people are just ignorant to the reality that brought about the one-hour ESPN special that occurred last Thursday night in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Do you remember how hard it was to leave home the first time? It can be a frightening convergence of excitement, sadness, fear, and melancholy. It is an emotional event. Only in rare circumstances can it be called easy.

Have you not yet left home? Do you know someone who has never left? As each day passes by, it gets much more difficult to make yourself walk out the door. It is very much like trying to quit smoking. Or ending a bad relationship. Let’s ride with that metaphor for a minute. Who hasn’t been in a bad relationship? Sometimes they are easy to end. Others, not so much. We’ve all known that person who was in a situation everyone knew was damaging. Yet, that person stays. And stays. And eventually, that bad relationship just becomes part of who that person is. That relationship becomes his/her identity. We don’t know that person outside of it. If only he had gotten out of it early, we wish. She should have left him months ago, we lament.

Well, that’s what LeBron did. He got out. The Cavaliers were a bad situation for him. Seven years was long enough for us to see that team management could not build a team that was going to win a championship with him. At the end of each postseason, though, all he hears is how Jordan would have won with that roster. That franchise—more specifically, that city—could not attract high quality free agents. Really, how many of you would choose Cleveland when more attractive destinations are on the table? As far as basketball goes, Cleveland was a losing proposition for LeBron. Why wouldn’t he leave?

Cavalier owner Dan Gilbert said to Sports Illustrated’s Ian Thomsen, “For him, I think he does not like that burden, that pressure…” To quote Thomsen: “Now he wonders if the burden of leading his hometown franchise was too much to ask of James.” Of course it was. The man was a boy when he was drafted first overall by his hometown team. From the moment the Cavaliers won the draft lottery in 2003, the burden placed upon James was to (a) revitalize Cleveland’s economy, (b) stimulate the downtown area around the arena, (c) resurrect interest in the failing basketball team, (d) lead the Cavs to NBA championships, and (e) be the bright and shining face of Cleveland for the whole world to see. That is a lot to ask of anyone, especially a teenager. To his credit, LeBron embraced it all, though.

As the years went by and the playoff losses mounted, it had to wear on him. Optimistic as he may have been three years ago, the past two seasons had to have taught him the reality. His team’s management wasn’t doing a good enough job of building a champion. He had to wonder if they ever would.

After Game 4 of the Celtics series, I believe he knew his chances to win in Cleveland were over. Do you realize how heartbreaking that had to be? I do not at all excuse his listless performance in Game 5, but I most definitely understand it. He had to be asking himself, “What more can I do?”

Meanwhile, the city put together a video begging him to stay. For me, that would have been the final straw. At 25 years old, could I have forced myself to remain in a situation that led me to lose at my job with little to no hope for winning while being held responsible for the economic fortunes of so many people?

LeBron wants to become a global icon. How exactly was Cleveland helping him achieve that goal?

He had to go. If he didn’t leave now, when was he going to? In 2013, when he was 28 and even more firmly entrenched in the community? He never got to leave the area. Not for college, like Derrick Rose. Not for a stint in the minor leagues like Joe Mauer. If LeBron James did not walk away from Cleveland in the summer of 2010, he was never going to leave. Never. You know I’m right.

The decision to leave Cleveland, I imagine, was one of the most difficult of his life. Frankly, I did not think he would have the balls to go through with it. That is why I always thought he would go back to the Cavs. I applaud him for joining the Heat. I have a lot more respect for him now than I did this time a week ago.

Once he made that decision, he had to deliver the news in a cold, calculated manner. There could be no press conference in Cleveland or Akron. That could have made it impossible for him to walk away. Just as Miles’ mother told him to stay at school and not come visit her, I would have advised LeBron to make his announcement as far away from Ohio as possible. The smallest measure of emotion may have been too much for LeBron for him to allow himself to go through with leaving. He knew he was creating ill will. But he had to do it. That slight moment of emotion when the fans burned his jersey looked like a slip-up to me. He expected it to be bad. He had practiced his stone face. But when the moment arrived, he lost control for the briefest of moments. It meant something to him. If that event took place in Ohio, I don’t believe for a moment he could have spoken any team’s name other than Cleveland. He did what he had to do to preserve his dream for his life.

By choosing Greenwich, Connecticut, LeBron made a statement. Greenwich has the highest per capita income of any American city with at least 50,000 residents. LeBron had given his all to Cleveland, but it was time for him to move on to bigger and better things.

Maybe people are upset because they know they are neither bigger nor better. Perhaps they are just jealous that he was able to get out and chase his dreams while they never had the opportunity. Do these people really feel justified in trying the lock a young man into a bad situation just because he happened to grow up there? How un-American is that?

Like many of us, Miles Roby was never able to live the life he wanted. LeBron James has the chance. I know I’m rooting for him.