Written by Jesse Lamovsky

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… And don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.

Right here, right now, I can’t feel any other way.

I guess I could feel a sense of sorrow that any opportunity for the Cavaliers to win a Championship in the near future (or ever) has slipped away. But it’s not as if they won a Championship when LeBron was here. They really didn’t even come that close. They made one fluke appearance in an NBA Finals they never had a chance to win and that was it. LeBron has as many Finals-game wins on his Cavaliers docket as Keith Lee, Randolph Keys and Wrong-Way Ricky combined- zero. Their 127 wins over the last two seasons didn’t even buy them a seventh game in a conference final.

He wasn’t good enough to bring a Championship to this city. That’s right, he wasn’t good enough. Not Mo Williams, not Anderson Varejao, not whatever sad-sack “supporting cast” member might get chucked under the bus. LeBron wasn’t good enough.

He’s the guy who shot 35 percent against the Spurs in the ’07 Finals; who shot 2-for-18 and committed ten turnovers in Game One of the Boston series in 2008, in a game the Cavaliers lost by four points, a series-turning game they would have won with even a mediocre outing from King Nothing; who despite being the same size as Karl Malone never even attempted to learn how to play with his back to the basket; who was a better free-throw shooter as a freshman at St. Vincent-St. Mary than he was at the end of his Cavaliers career; who would rather dribble out the shot clock and chuck up a wild three than play smart, winning basketball.

And at the end, in the last two games of the Boston series, LeBron wasn’t even trying.

I can’t disallow the possibility that LeBron purposely tanked that series- threw it, just to grease the skids on his way out of here. Sure, he had that triple-double in Game Six. But he also had ten turnovers and they always seemed to come at the worst time- such as that ball he dribbled off his foot on the break with the Cavaliers down by four, midway through the fourth quarter. You don’t have to be completely awful to throw a series. You just have to be bad enough to lose it. Hell, Eddie Cicotte won a game in the 1919 World Series.

Do I really want a guy who at the very least quit, and at the very most out-and-out threw, a playoff series? Do I want a guy like that on my team? To ask the question is to answer it.

I suppose I could feel anger at LeBron putting a shiv to this entire region on national television. But really, when has this guy ever shown any kind of identification with the city of Cleveland? If anything he’s done more damage to our city’s reputation, in a sporting sense, than anyone in the long history of C-Town Sports. At least when Art Modell moved the Browns in 1995 everyone knew it wasn’t us. It was him.  

LeBron on the other hand has been inviting ridicule on this town ever since he wore a Yankees cap to a Tribe playoff game in the most ostentatious manner possible. By twisting us in the wind, by taking almost every opportunity to separate his real hometown of Akron from his NBA hometown of Cleveland, by flashing his non-Cleveland bona fides where he knew everyone could see them, and finally by going on national television to essentially say we aren’t good enough for him, even though the Cavaliers can pay him more than anyone and he grew up in the area, he has made us into a punching bag, a running joke.

Really, we should feel glad it’s over. LeBron James has done his best to make us look like chumps for the last three years. He can’t do that anymore. We’re out from under.

I suppose I could feel heartbreak that this might be the first domino that sends the Cavaliers off to Seattle or Las Vegas. But if NBA basketball in Cleveland was so dependent on one man that it can’t survive without him, well, maybe Cleveland never deserved to have NBA basketball in the first place. Besides, we aren’t Portland or Salt Lake City or San Antonio. This is a big-league town. We have other teams. Such as they are.

And who knows? Maybe this will all work out. Maybe we’ll suck for a year or two, dip down into Lotto-Land where we’ll draft some excellent players who are solid character guys that fit in with this town’s blue-collar ethos a little bit better than LeBron ever did, and we’ll be back in contention with a team we can be proud of, a team that we can identify with a little bit easier; one like those old Price-Nance-Daugherty teams… except a little bit better, hopefully.

And if not? Hey, training camp starts in three weeks. Life goes on.

Besides, it was 1964 when LeBron got here and it’s still 1964 now. Nothing has changed. Can’t cry over losing something you never had to begin with.

So like I said- good riddance, LeBron. You’re a quitter with no character, no substance and no guts. You had the greatest challenge in sports sitting in front of you, one any true player would have relished- and you bailed on it. Take your mother and your would-be-jockeying-the-drive-thru-at-the-Burger-King-on-Vernon-Odom-Blvd-if-they-didn’t-know-you “team,” get gone- and stay gone. And may you never, ever, enjoy a freshly-made Galley Boy and Orange California again.

That’s all.