By Joël Pütz | Sports journalist
LeBron James is not one to wait in the title race, and that also concerns his teammates. One of them quickly paid the price when the Chosen One still wore the Cavaliers jersey, according to a former player.
Some evil tongues will say that this is seen less and less every month, but one observation still prevails after 22 seasons: having LeBron James in his team makes you a natural candidate for the title. Because if the winger continues to play even though he will be 40 in a few days, if he continues to give everything in terms of physical maintenance, it is because he has not given up hope of gleaning a fifth championship ring NBA.
Crowned in three different franchises, the King lives for competition and above all success, he who wants to cement his status as the best player in history which is anything but unanimous. Suffice to say that the challenge he set for himself by returning to Cleveland in 2014 was significant… because the franchise had suffered greatly from his departure four years earlier, becoming one of the worst teams in the league with two first picks in 2011 and 2014.
Given his great influence over management, Bron wasted no time in shaking things up, trading Andrew Wiggins for Kevin Love in order to obtain a Big Three that they would form with Kyrie Irving. The latter, like a good part of the roster, was still very young… but the Chosen One had shown no mercy towards those who did not want to give their all, according to Brendan Haywood’s story.
The ultra-brutal departure of Dion Waiters from Cleveland
Podcast guest Run Your Racethe former pivot spoke about the relationship LBJ had with his young teammates, whom he was trying to improve as quickly as possible:
I saw Bron teaching them (Dion Waiters and Kyrie) or at least trying to teach them how to win. Like, “Hey man, this is how you should go about it.” He let them lose games their way, then he came back to them and showed them how to improve.
Unfortunately for him, one of them did not manage to learn quickly enough… and it was then paid for in cash, again according to Haywood who was still stunned by the affair:
Then he would see who was going to understand and who was going to learn from it, and some guys learned and some guys didn’t. Dion didn’t want to learn so he had to leave, they traded him… He’s also from Philadelphia. They traded him during a game in Philadelphia during the national anthem. It’s a true story.
They took him out of the major five. They cut the lights, they started singing ‘Oh say can you see’ and we saw the security guards come out and grab him and say, ‘Hey, you, you, and you. Get out of here.” Dion Waiters was traded in the middle of the national anthem in his hometown. His whole family was sitting in the front row, Meek Mill, everyone.
Never really living up to expectations, often weighed down by weight problems, Dion Waiters was no longer unanimously appreciated by the Cavaliers before the arrival of LeBron. The latter therefore wasted no time in getting rid of the guard once back in Cleveland, not wishing to burden himself with a burden in the quest for the title.
