re: The Miami Heat: A Microcosm of what is wrong with this Country

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A word about LeBron: It’s over now. The noise needs to stop. The guy has really had three subpar playoff series, by his high standards, in his career: the 2007 Finals, when he was a kid; the 2010 conference semifinals, his last series with the Cavs, when he put up very good numbers but looked weirdly disengaged while battling an elbow injury; and the 2011 Finals, when he clearly melted down under pressure.

That Finals resulted in a Men in Black–style (or maybe Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, a much better movie?) memory-wiping of everything that had come before it — the 25 straight points against Detroit in 2007; the Game 7 masterpiece against the heavily favored Celtics in 2008; the unthinkable 38.5-8-8 line he put up against Orlando in the 2009 conference finals, a series in which LeBron hit an unusually high number of clutch shots and free throws in multiple games. It was as if this stuff had never happened, even though everyone knew it had.

James has done nothing but eviscerate the league since those 2011 Finals. He might be the game’s best elimination-game player since Bill Russell, and maybe the best ever. The next time he has a so-so Finals performance, please spare me the dreck about how he’s shrinking from the moment. He’s faced more big-stage moments than any player on earth over the last two seasons, and he’s risen to all of them.

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