I was trolling around on Facebook when I came upon this interaction between two sports fans amidst the potential Melo to the Lakers trade. I've changed the names of the individuals to protect the innocent and insane.
Lebron Enthusiast: If melo is traded to the lakers I give up on basketball. Because this trade will be the pau gasol deal all over again a.k.a. highway robbery 2.0
Delusional Laker fan: And you say your a lebron
LE:Totally different. If melo goes to the lakers he gets traded for bynum and like a 1st round pick. Melo is a future h.o.f And he gets traded for a bum with no knees?
DLF:No same s*** what did cleveland get? a 25 game losing streak
LE:Thats the s***ty team that was put around lebron and proves that he is great. You take away ONE player and the team goes on a historic losing streak.
DLF:he went to the finals already?? he can win. he doesnt want to work for s***.
Hmmmm. This definitely got me thinking. This one conversation brought two things to my attention; the "Melo-drama" just got a whole lot more interesting and people are still peeved at Lebron.
As soon as the Melo/Lakers news broke people went crazy. Lakers fans peed their pants and the rest of the league and their fans also soiled themselves as well, just not in a good way. My first instinct as a Suns fan was anger. We are making deals for Vince Carter and Melo is going to fall into the defending two time champion Lakers lap. Not fair, not at all. However, then I started to rationalize this potential trade. My conclusion, this trade won't happen and it was never the least bit serious. First off, it just doesn't work for the Lakers. Melo doesn't fit. He needs the ball too much and guess what, the Lakers already have a guy who really needs to have the ball. We've seen this before. The Melo/AI experiment didn't provide the results it was attempting. Granted Kobe is a totally different animal than Iverson, but not by much. Kobe doesn't fare well with other superstars, it's more than well documented. So both players have struggled playing with another superstar and both have had their most success with allstar teammates; Gasol, Odom, Billups, Nene. All of the concerns everyone had about Miami's big three, magnify that by ten. Second, do you really think Kobe will allow this? Kobe Bryant is going to embrace a young scoring machine as a teammate? Good luck with that. As much as Kobe hates Bynum, he will handcuff himself to him before he trades him for Melo. To be honest with you, I wouldn't be surprised if Phil Jackson leaked this information. What better way to light a fire under Kobe and the rest of the Lakers than by suggesting they need a player of Anthony's caliber to save their season. Undoubtedly, the Lakers aren't playing up to his standards. If he didn't leak the info to toy with the Lakers minds, he is certainly going to use the media to mess with their heads. Bottom line, this trade talk is probably a hoax and definitely not happening. The funniest part of the Lakers fans argument, he feels like he is entitled to get Melo for a sack of magical beans and hes not the only one who feels like that! All Lakers fans feel they are owed a player of Melo's skill. They don't care if they are the most successful franchise in the league. They don't care they are the two time defending champs. They don't care that they got away with grand theft Gasol. They feel they should get Melo. Aside from Yankees and Cowboy fans, no other team in sports has the sense of entitlement that the Lakers fans do. But sorry guys, Melo won't be donning the people purple and gold any time soon.
Now for Lebron. OK, you can be mad about "The Decision." You can be mad about his karma tweet. You can even be mad that he left Cleveland high and dry. What you can't do is try to say he isn't a great player. If he wasn't great, you wouldn't be upset that he teamed up with Wade and Bosh. If he want great, the Cavs wouldn't have gone from championship favorites, to historic losing streaks in one offseason. Aside from maybe Nash, no other player in the league is good enough to have such an impact on a team by leaving. Even Nash would only have such a large impact because everything offensively is run through him. In all of sports, Peyton Manning is the only other athlete that would have a similar effect if he left the Colts. If Kobe leaves the Lakers, they still make the playoffs. When Melo leaves the Nuggets, they won't lose 25 straight. Take Dirk off of the Mavs, they still probably make the playoffs. No player has ever had a greater impact than Lebron. Even Tom Brady, who is arguably as good a quarterback as there has ever been, didn't have that impact of the Pats. He missed an entire season and they still won 11 games with a guy who hadn't started a game since high school! Fact of the matter is you can hate Lebron for a billion reasons, what you can't do is not respect him. There is no doubt in my mind that when his career is said and done, he will be top five all time in points, rebounds assists and quite possibly to 15 in blocks. Can you fault the guy for taking less money and teaming up with better players to try and add championships to his legacy? The Cavs never brought him a Pippen or a Gasol. So he went and found them himself.
Lebron Enthusiast: If melo is traded to the lakers I give up on basketball. Because this trade will be the pau gasol deal all over again a.k.a. highway robbery 2.0
Delusional Laker fan: And you say your a lebron
LE:Totally different. If melo goes to the lakers he gets traded for bynum and like a 1st round pick. Melo is a future h.o.f And he gets traded for a bum with no knees?
DLF:No same s*** what did cleveland get? a 25 game losing streak
LE:Thats the s***ty team that was put around lebron and proves that he is great. You take away ONE player and the team goes on a historic losing streak.
DLF:he went to the finals already?? he can win. he doesnt want to work for s***.
Hmmmm. This definitely got me thinking. This one conversation brought two things to my attention; the "Melo-drama" just got a whole lot more interesting and people are still peeved at Lebron.
As soon as the Melo/Lakers news broke people went crazy. Lakers fans peed their pants and the rest of the league and their fans also soiled themselves as well, just not in a good way. My first instinct as a Suns fan was anger. We are making deals for Vince Carter and Melo is going to fall into the defending two time champion Lakers lap. Not fair, not at all. However, then I started to rationalize this potential trade. My conclusion, this trade won't happen and it was never the least bit serious. First off, it just doesn't work for the Lakers. Melo doesn't fit. He needs the ball too much and guess what, the Lakers already have a guy who really needs to have the ball. We've seen this before. The Melo/AI experiment didn't provide the results it was attempting. Granted Kobe is a totally different animal than Iverson, but not by much. Kobe doesn't fare well with other superstars, it's more than well documented. So both players have struggled playing with another superstar and both have had their most success with allstar teammates; Gasol, Odom, Billups, Nene. All of the concerns everyone had about Miami's big three, magnify that by ten. Second, do you really think Kobe will allow this? Kobe Bryant is going to embrace a young scoring machine as a teammate? Good luck with that. As much as Kobe hates Bynum, he will handcuff himself to him before he trades him for Melo. To be honest with you, I wouldn't be surprised if Phil Jackson leaked this information. What better way to light a fire under Kobe and the rest of the Lakers than by suggesting they need a player of Anthony's caliber to save their season. Undoubtedly, the Lakers aren't playing up to his standards. If he didn't leak the info to toy with the Lakers minds, he is certainly going to use the media to mess with their heads. Bottom line, this trade talk is probably a hoax and definitely not happening. The funniest part of the Lakers fans argument, he feels like he is entitled to get Melo for a sack of magical beans and hes not the only one who feels like that! All Lakers fans feel they are owed a player of Melo's skill. They don't care if they are the most successful franchise in the league. They don't care they are the two time defending champs. They don't care that they got away with grand theft Gasol. They feel they should get Melo. Aside from Yankees and Cowboy fans, no other team in sports has the sense of entitlement that the Lakers fans do. But sorry guys, Melo won't be donning the people purple and gold any time soon.
Now for Lebron. OK, you can be mad about "The Decision." You can be mad about his karma tweet. You can even be mad that he left Cleveland high and dry. What you can't do is try to say he isn't a great player. If he wasn't great, you wouldn't be upset that he teamed up with Wade and Bosh. If he want great, the Cavs wouldn't have gone from championship favorites, to historic losing streaks in one offseason. Aside from maybe Nash, no other player in the league is good enough to have such an impact on a team by leaving. Even Nash would only have such a large impact because everything offensively is run through him. In all of sports, Peyton Manning is the only other athlete that would have a similar effect if he left the Colts. If Kobe leaves the Lakers, they still make the playoffs. When Melo leaves the Nuggets, they won't lose 25 straight. Take Dirk off of the Mavs, they still probably make the playoffs. No player has ever had a greater impact than Lebron. Even Tom Brady, who is arguably as good a quarterback as there has ever been, didn't have that impact of the Pats. He missed an entire season and they still won 11 games with a guy who hadn't started a game since high school! Fact of the matter is you can hate Lebron for a billion reasons, what you can't do is not respect him. There is no doubt in my mind that when his career is said and done, he will be top five all time in points, rebounds assists and quite possibly to 15 in blocks. Can you fault the guy for taking less money and teaming up with better players to try and add championships to his legacy? The Cavs never brought him a Pippen or a Gasol. So he went and found them himself.
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