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April 17, 2008
LeBron James Captures First Scoring Title
You know, in many ways, it was poetic justice that this regular season ended with LeBron James sitting on the sidelines in street clothes. Somehow, LeBron’s greatness this year was relegated to the sidelines. For all of the Cavaliers struggles and issues as a team, lost in the fog of mediocrity was the great, and I mean GREAT, regular season that LeBron James just put in. It’s almost tragic that this franchise wasted such a historic season.
Just take a look at the overall numbers LeBron put up this year. First of all, he won his first scoring title. The final numbers ended up as follows:
- LeBron James (30.0 ppg)
- Kobe Bryant (28.3 ppg)
- Allen Iverson (26.4 ppg)
- Carmelo Anthony (25.7 ppg)
- Amare Stoudemire (25.2 ppg)
But scoring only tells a fraction of the story. LeBron also averaged 7.9 rebounds per game and 7.2 assists per game. He added 1.8 steals per game and 1.1 blocks per game. Do you know how many other players in the history of the NBA have averaged 30-7-7? Try two. Oscar Robertson, who did it 5 times, and Michael Jordan, who did it once. LeBron is the only player in the history of the NBA to score 30 ppg, average 7 rpg, 7 apg, and 1 bpg. The only one. That’s it. Nobody has ever had this kind of season before.
Just how well rounded was LeBron’s season? Well, consider these numbers. LeBron finished the year first in field goals made, 2nd in FG attempted, 5th in FT made, 3rd in FT attempted, 10th in assists, 6th in steals, 2nd in total points scored, 3rd in minutes per game, 1st in points per game, 8th in assists per game, 10th in steals per game, 1st in Player Efficiency Rating (PER), 1st in Usage Pct, 4th in Offensive Win Shares, 6th in Defensive Win Shares, 2nd in total Win Shares, and 2nd in Win Shares Above Average. LeBron also won his 2nd All-Star game MVP award this year.
With such an amazing season, you would have to assume LeBron will win his first NBA MVP award, right? Wrong. LeBron has no chance to win the award. In fact, he will likely finish 3rd or 4th in voting. Kobe, CP3, and KG are all likely to finish ahead of him. This all comes down to the lack of talent around LeBron and the atrocious coaching job Mike Brown did this season. The Cavaliers ended up with only the 13th best record in the NBA. They finished 4th in the (L)eastern Conference, 21 games behind Boston. They finished 2nd in the Central Division, 14 games behind Detroit. As a team, they played mediocre defense and awful offense for most of the season. They completely overhauled their roster at the trade deadline. They traded bad players (Larry, Donyell) for even worse players (Wallace, Wally). This was such a heartbreaking and disappointing season for the Cavaliers. They were killed from the beginning with injuries and hold outs. This team never found their stride, and with the exception of LeBron and Zydrunas, nobody played consistently average basketball, let alone consistently good basketball (ok, ok….Devin Brown was close to playing consistently average basketball with some very good games thrown in). After getting embarrassed in the NBA Finals against the Spurs last year, we all had hopes that Mike Brown would bring in an offensive coach. Well, that didn’t happen, and the offense actually looked worse this year than last year for most of the season. When Danny Ferry made the trade, I applauded the trade, because I was happy the team tried something. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like this was the answer.
It’s just sad, because LeBron carried this team all year long. It’s no wonder he’s having back issues after carrying the team on it all season (I know, that was too easy). It’s sad because LeBron deserves better. It’s sad because it cost him the MVP award which should be his. How many games would this team win without him? 10? But most of all, it’s just sad because time is ticking on LeBron in Cleveland, and this season feels like a wasted season to me. I will be rooting with all my might for this team to somehow come together and find their stride in the playoffs this year, but the realist in me is not holding its breath. I don’t know how I will look back on this season in the future….I imagine I will forget a lot about this season. But I will never forget the season LeBron had and the enjoyment he gave us all as we were priviledged enough to watch him disect and dominate every team he played this year. It was a season for the ages, and we now just have to wait and see if LeBron can once again put the team on his back and lead them to unexpected heights and glory in the playoffs.
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10 Comments
I want so much to love Mike Brown but I’m beginning to think there are some coaching issues here. Nice article – this is is for my scrapbook. Could not have summed up the year better myself.
I honestly think th trade was the right move. Here’ to Mike Brown finally realizing he has no idea what he is doing on offense
I know it is too early to talk about the off-season, but with Wally’s massive expiring contract to go along with the expiring contracts of Snow and Damon Jones, Ferry will have the weapons necessary to go after just about any star out there. Expiring contracts are what make blockbuster deals, just ask the Memphis Grizzlies. It might not happen this offseason but by the next tradeline we SHOULD (or better) have a legit superstar to put next to lebron
Thanks Carolyn. I think as a person, Mike Brown is an outstanding individual. I, too, really want to believe in him. But his stubborness and refusal to bring in someone to help coach offense is inexcusable to me. There were so many factors working against this team this year (holdouts, injuries, roster changes, etc), but as I wrote in one of my earlier posts, it just seems like this team never responded to Brown this year, and I think if the Cavs have a quick exit from the playoffs, the outcry from the community will make his seat awfully hot.
Nice story & I agree. I feel the clock is ticking as well. If the Cavs would ever lose LBJ, my interest in the NBA would probably be lost as well. I grew up in Brook Park cheering for the Cavs in the pathetic Stepian years (I moved to C’bus in 1990 to attend OSU & never returned to the Cleve-area). Hell, my 9th grade basketball team (Midpark) had to run gassers because our coach caught us launching 3’s World B. Free-style prior to practice. He nearly had a heart attack! Anyway, as Cavs fans, we all obviously enjoyed the Price/Daugherty/Nance years. But the latter part of the 90s were atrocious as well as the early 2000’s. I had lost a lot of interest in the NBA & focused more on Buckeye & college hoops. This was also the time C’bus got the NHL (Blue jackets), so I paid more attention to that. But when we were blessed with LBJ, I started dusting off my Cavs gear & got into it again. Last year was amazing & a lot of fun. I didn’t expect the Finals, so I wasn’t as disappointed in getting run out of them as say the Buckeyes’ losses to Florida & LSU in the BCS. This year was a bit disappointing, but I’m still not ready to mail it in…just because we have #23 & they don’t. But if there would ever be a day when LBJ is wearing another jersey, I don’t think I can take it. Let’s just hope I don’t have to make that decision to give up on the Cavs/NBA.
I couldn’t agree more. while I don’t think the trade helped us for this year, it didn’t hurt us for the future. The only real problem I see will be replacing Mike Brown. Getting past the fact that Dan Gilbert probably won’t fire Brown, who would the right coach be?
I doubt Dan D’Antoni would leave Phoenix, but the way he develops young players for Phoenix (most notably Barbosa), makes me think he’d make a great coach. But I could be wrong about that.
As I mentioned to Rockking earlier, the main reason LeBron isn’t getting any credit for this season is because the media feels this is expected of him. The other teams came out of nowhere to have great seasons. It’s really unforunate the spin the media puts on things, but i guess it’s expected when it’s a media who awards the thing.
Great Article Rock.
That begs an interesting question, Matt. What is more valuable….a player who takes a team from an 8 seed caliber team and makes them a 1 seed (Kobe) or a player who takes a team from a lottery caliber team and makes them a playoff seed (LeBron)? I’m not sure what the answer is, but I would tend to say LeBron’s feats are more valuable to the team and franchise.