With MVPs in hand, James’ legacy still needs titles

he sky’s the limit for this guy.Youhere and where hear that said all the time about LeBron James(notes), the Cleveland Cavaliers’ star forward who, in a public celebration Sunday at the University of Akron, was named the NBA’s Most Valuable Player in 2009-10 for the second consecutive season. Just the otherflyingbird day, for instance, Cavs coach Mike Brown said: “He can continue to grow by leaps and bounds for as many years as he has left in this league. … The sky’s the limit for him.”Or assoftware life James himself said in accepting the award again in his hometown at a party open to all: “The way I approach the game, I know the sky’s the limit with an individual accolade like this.”You hear it so much—the sky’s the limit for this guy—you start to wonder if maybe it’s backwards.brave What if LBJ is the outlier, the one at the extreme, the force establishing the boundaries for all others and everything else, including the sky? As in:This guy’s the limit for the sky.Say ithonest fast and it starts to sound right.
The folks in the stands at Rhodes Arena Sunday—the “second home court” for James’ high school team at St. Vincent-St. Mary’s, given the overflow crowds drawn to SVSM’s too-small gym to see him then—simply went with the “M-V-P! M-V-P!” chant that, in this case, was as accurate and timely as it was redundant.You hate to surrender to a shoe company’s slogan but we are, in fact, all witnesses. To a multiple MVP winner, something only 11 other men in league annals can claim. To a back-to-back honoree, one of just 10 and the first since Steve Nash(notes) in 2005 and 2006. To a fellow who has a shot now to join Larry Bird, Wilt Chamberlain and Bill Russell as the only players to win three in a row (MV3s, if you will) and who—if Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy is to be believed, rather than filtered as impassioned lobbying on behalf of his guy Dwight Howard(notes)—has a stranglehold on the Maurice Podoloff trophy for the next decade or more.“LeBron will win the MVP every year until he retires,” Van Gundy said this spring. “LeBron has to go into the year and basically lose the MVP. You guys have decided he’s the MVPhttp://forum.brighthand.com
http://wirednewyork.com/forum
http://www.rfidsb.com
http://www.6zap.com/forums
http://forums.smallbusinesscomputing.com