2014 Miami Heat Offseason Thread (Rumors/Reports) 5.0

[mopper8]

Chris Broussard: "if anyone tells you they know what's going on, they're lying"

[Heat_Fan_87]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

[MiaFLSurf]

Regardless of his initial intentions Lebron has to feel the pressure to go back now.

He can't take another PR nightmare hit in screwing over Cleveland again. And this has gone past that point. He'd destroy that city again.

Blame rich Paul or whatever but I think Lebron knew this all along.

The day he say and didn't sign a contract or say a word in 8 days except cheering for soccer spoke volumes.

He doesn't really care about the heat anymore. The whole world will love him for going back to Cleveland. Enough that he won't have the storm of being compared to Jordan anymore etc.

They will praise him for trying to bring the cavs a title.


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[IggieCC]

Offseason Thread 5.0... that's over 500 pages of people talking and still zero FA signing.

It must be some sort of a record

****

[mopper8]

After more than two years of planning, the Cleveland Cavaliers believe they have LeBron James legitimately listening to their pitch to leave the Miami Heat and return to his home state in free agency, according to sources close to the process.

There has yet to be a firm indication that James actually is ready to leave Miami after four years and two championships with the Heat, but sources told ESPN.com that the four-time MVP is increasingly considering the Cavaliers as an option as he moves into the final stages of deciding which team to sign his next contract with.

LeBron James is becoming more interested in the Cavs' free-agency pitch, according to sources. However, James will meet with Heat president Pat Riley sometime this week to receive Riley's plan for the Heat's future.
A critical face-to-face meeting looms with Heat president Pat Riley on a day to be determined this week, sources confirmed Sunday night, so that James can hear the Hall of Famer's plans for the Heat's roster.

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/11184 ... ng-sources

[JesusHCoxMd]

Nothing is over yet guys. Too much speculation all over the place.

[r15mohd]

great article by Dan Le Batard on the Miami Heat and just how ridiculous the rumors have been getting:

Dan Le Batard: Resolution for the Miami Heat’s free agency situation is just a phone call away

The panoramic view of the Miami Heat’s free agency has been interesting to watch from all angles. Sports agents lie anonymously to manipulate reporters and inflate the dollars market. Under-pressure journalists look for ways to fill the void with something, anything. Rival executives won’t attach their names to information but whisper convenient stuff that plays defense against Miami’s free agent chances by creating a perception of uncertainty. It is speculation and mystery and hope and espionage masquerading as news. It is also not unlike how high school students might gossip about the popular kids.

LeBron James got into a lot of trouble for creating a television show around this fun spectacle four years ago. But we are in the middle of showing you that we’ll create this programming with or without his help.

Nobody from the Heat, meanwhile, has uttered so much as a public syllable since the start of free agency. Miami is one of the most private organizations anywhere in sports, with precious few leaks, Pat Riley surrounded by loyalists and lifers. So the feces storm gathers strength around Miami’s silence, in spite of it, because of it, and the three very famous Heat players have grown so comfortable with this noisy nonsense that they literally vacation right in the middle of it.

Maybe the first night or first week you can’t sleep if the car alarm keeps going off outside your window. But you’ll sleep fine after it has been in your life every night nonstop for four consecutive years.

The words we have from them before this all started? That information doesn’t seem to matter right now, not when cracks and mystery can be perceived, and we can fill the holes where the nonexistent information would go with anonymous hypotheticals that are less boring and intriguing than the three players just returning to Miami as planned. Facts? On-the-record information? Ehhhh, whatever. Sports are just the soap operas males are comfortable admitting they watch. Cue the dramatic music, and let’s go out in search of the sexy and sinister, even if we don’t have proof.

So it doesn’t matter that Heat owner Micky Arison put the chances of retaining the Big 3 at “100 percent.” Doesn't matter that Chris Bosh said publicly again and again that he’d play in Miami, and only Miami, for a discount. Doesn’t matter that they, you know, put their names on that. Doesn’t even matter that Dwyane Wade opted out of $42 million guaranteed dollars he wasn’t going to get elsewhere as confirmation that he’s working to help the team create flexibility, and Udonis Haslem again risked millions out of loyalty to Miami for the same reason.

All that matters now is what LeBron James hasn’t said because that’s where we can invent the cracks — even if it means James would kind of be betraying the people who did these things with and for him, and won championships (plural) doing them with and for him before.

James is by consensus the most unselfish superstar in sports, Ray Allen saying he’s never had a teammate give such great gifts, sharing his corporate sponsorships. James would not merely need to have a better roster option (Houston? Phoenix?) to leave Miami for a city where he doesn’t know the president, general manager and coach. He’d need for it to be better enough that he’d be willing to again be Mercenary Guy with his repaired image and endure some of what he did four years ago … and leave behind his championship friends in doing so.

James’ agent taking meetings? That’s the guy’s job, and this is his first commission, James continuing to empower his friends. See something sinister and scary in it if you like, but his agent better do something to earn that percentage of a max contract. That agent percentage is worth millions and millions of dollars. Taking a few meetings is almost literally the very least his agent could do … and good practice for one of James’ buddies as he has surrounded himself with the crew from Entourage. Heat fans need not worry until James himself is in one of these meetings, but what’s being waved around as news in the interim by nameless sources and needy reporters is what has been said privately by anonymous people who might not be telling the truth instead of what has been said and done publicly by the informed participants because … well, that’s the interesting part, isn’t it?

The transaction often usurps the action in sports in 2014. Tomorrow’s hope can feel better than your team’s today. Everyone is a fantasy general manager, and ratings monstrosities such as the NFL Draft show how we can’t get enough of the abstractions about tomorrow’s team, tomorrow’s changes, tomorrow’s hope. The possibility of James leaving is only 1,000 times juicier than the probability that he’s staying. You’ll notice that none of these reporters using these anonymous sources dares call any team other than Miami a front-runner for James’ services even while constructing the tapestry to frame these stories.

This should be noted, though: Privately, Heat management is not worried. Privately, management would be blindsided by any of the three leaving. Privately, management says nothing has changed in the past week except for the volume of media noise, and nothing unexpected has happened beyond players they might have wanted, such as Jodie Meeks, going for $10 million to $12 million more than expected. Privately, management believes what James has said — that he and his family love Miami — and that he doesn’t take for granted the difficulties and blessings in making four consecutive Finals appearances.

Truth be told, management was a lot more scared in 2010 about what would happen with the Big 3. Back then, management only knew and had a relationship with one of these three players. And 2010 was so loud and scary that Stephen A. Smith — not exactly short on confidence and bombast — vowed to never do it again. He has recused himself from the present mess, refusing to add to a growing noise that management now views as flies around an elephant’s tail.

Still, many people are seeing chaos in this free agency for Miami. They are seeing it because 1) They want to; 2) Miami hasn’t signed anyone yet; 3) The silence is scary; 4) The silence is being replaced by rampant speculation because the media will not abide silence; and 5) The Big 3 breaking up puts more hope on the market for other teams. Those five things create the perception that Riley is working at a disadvantage with uncertainty about how much he has to spend. But that ignores something major:

All this was also so in 2010, the last time Riley pulled this off, before the championships and before building relationships and providing proof for these players. Riley didn’t have firm numbers, and the Big 3 also wanted Mike Miller and Haslem, so Riley worked with them and their discounts to make that so. But he needed to find out what Haslem and Miller needed first, so he could come back to James, Wade and Bosh with those figures. That’s what he’s doing now with Pau Gasol and Luol Deng — finding out just how much they need, same way he did it with Miller and Haslem back when things were actually uncertain.

Riley would be working with James and Bosh on this pre-championships, without knowing them, but not now? What sense does that make when you are running a billion-dollar corporation/partnership with these players? What is seen as a disadvantage in the noisy frenzy of the moment — Riley doesn’t know how much he has to spend! — would be the kind of advantage craved by any of those other executives who have yet to secure even a meeting with James. Riley is the only basketball executive in the world who can call James, Wade and Bosh and ask, “It’ll take about $7 million a year to get Gasol. OKC and the Spurs are offering $5 million. You guys want to make that work?”

All around the silent Heat a noisy media makes it sound like things could be coming apart. But the ability to make that one phone call — an ability available in this climate to one and only one of best closers in the history of sports leadership — is all the time it takes to very quietly and very quickly put this all right back together.

Link: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/07/06/4 ... r-the.html

[Flash4thewin]

Regardless of his initial intentions Lebron has to feel the pressure to go back now.

He can't take another PR nightmare hit in screwing over Cleveland again. And this has gone past that point. He'd destroy that city again.

Blame rich Paul or whatever but I think Lebron knew this all along.

The day he say and didn't sign a contract or say a word in 8 days except cheering for soccer spoke volumes.

He doesn't really care about the heat anymore. The whole world will love him for going back to Cleveland. Enough that he won't have the storm of being compared to Jordan anymore etc.

They will praise him for trying to bring the cavs a title.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Im sure Lebron cares to a degree about the team and he cares about winning more. Remember the last home game of the playoffs, how did we treat our players? How many times does our coach fight for his players? Do we even use our players to get the most out of them? All of these are important issues. Still at the end of the day depending on who Pat signs i see Lebron here for at least two more season.

[greg4012]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

What I find equally humorous is that it seems the Cavs alternative plan is to trade for a big name veteran - Kevin Love - who has NEVER played a playoff game, never had to share an offense, and never played a lick of defense.

Love is a great player and that team would be talented, but you gotta think if LeBron has learned one thing these past few years, it's that it takes a lot more than talent to win it all. He'd literally be leading a roster of young players who have never sniffed the playoffs.

[dancing2thabeet]

I think if he ever plans to leave, it's now (MiaFLSurf's post), but if he stays with the Heat now, he stays forever.

[KingDavid]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

K. Love trade is ready to go if LBJ signs with CLE.

[Weigy]

LeBron will do what he thinks will win him another chip. Heat could but Pat has to pull his finger out.

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[Heat_Fan_87]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

K. Love trade is ready to go if LBJ signs with CLE.

i dont think love is that good. his numbers are very inflated being the #1 option on the wolves. maybe lebron thinks different.

[IggieCC]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

I just can't see LeBron leaving Bosh to play with Anthony Bennett. I just can't.

I mean, just look at this pathetic screen he sets bruh!


If you think Bosh is soft, this kid is on a whole another level

[dancing2thabeet]

Good luck with Love stopping any non-scrub PF in the league lol

[greg4012]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

K. Love trade is ready to go if LBJ signs with CLE.

Adding a total of zero playoff experience to bolster their roster

[MiaFLSurf]

I can't blame the guy for going to the cavs. It's the one place I could honestly understand him going to. Anywhere else would have been a disaster.

But the way he is doing it IF he is leaving (I think he is) is another black eye.

The difference is no one will care this time since he is going to Cleveland. The world wants this to happen. They hate the heat. They hate Miami for taking him away. It's been the narrative for 4 years.

Make no mistake. I'm happy he helped the heat win 2 titles. But I'm really pissed at how he is doing this. Doing us dirty.

But you Can't be shocked. He cheated on his city once with us. How can we not expect him to cheat on us? He's just really annoying me with this cheesey BS way of making it seem like he gave us a chance.

He have us no chance by not committing. He knew this all along.


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[KingDavid]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

K. Love trade is ready to go if LBJ signs with CLE.

i dont think love is that good. his numbers are very inflated being the #1 option on the wolves. maybe lebron thinks different.

That's some serious wishful thinking. Kyrie/LBJ/Love would torch the East. Sucks if it happens but such is life.

[MIA]

lebron on the cavs with a bunch of kids that never been to the playoffs is funny.

I just can't see LeBron leaving Bosh to play with Anthony Bennett. I just can't.

I mean, just look at this pathetic screen he sets bruh!


If you think Bosh is soft, this kid is on a whole another level

That first gif

[dcee101]

Regardless of his initial intentions Lebron has to feel the pressure to go back now.

He can't take another PR nightmare hit in screwing over Cleveland again. And this has gone past that point. He'd destroy that city again.

Blame rich Paul or whatever but I think Lebron knew this all along.

The day he say and didn't sign a contract or say a word in 8 days except cheering for soccer spoke volumes.

He doesn't really care about the heat anymore. The whole world will love him for going back to Cleveland. Enough that he won't have the storm of being compared to Jordan anymore etc.

They will praise him for trying to bring the cavs a title.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

So he is going to repair his image by totally screwing up the entire Miami Heat organization and his two super-friends?