Jun 21 2012; Miami, FL, USA; Miami Heat small forward LeBron James (6) dribbles into the near court against the Oklahoma City Thunder during the third quarter of game five in the 2012 NBA Finals at the American Airlines Arena. Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-US PRESSWIRE

“It’s about Damn Time” were the words that came out of LeBron’s mouth Thursday night after winning his first NBA championship. In the past two years, LeBron has gone under the most scrutiny by media and sports fans probably in the history of the NBA.

Since the infamous broadcast “The Decision” and the outrageous Big 3 Party where he displayed his cockiness of how many rings the Miami Heat would win (not 1,not 2, not 3…) all types of hate toward LeBron have been present.  Ranging from the burning of his Cavalier’s jersey to the thousands upon thousands of jokes of LeBron not having a title yet, Lebron was the face of “I hate…”

The pressure to excel under the great magnitude of criticism from the entire world without question affected his gameplay in the last year’s playoffs against the Dallas Mavericks.  In the 2-4 series loss, LeBron went for 17.8 points a game (including an 8 point game), 60% FT, 8.7 Points in paint, and 7.2 rebounds.  He often disappeared in the fourth quarter in the corner, not wanting to be part of the game at all.

When this year’s playoffs came around, nothing with the media changed – he was still the most hated figure in sports. Even when LeBron would put up huge numbers such as 30 + games with 8 rebounds and 7 assists, he would be blamed for the loss.  Not only did he have a ridiculous playoffs averaging 30.3 points 9.7 rebounds, and 5.6 assists, LeBron tried to improve his image off the court. He apologized for “The Decision” saying it was wrong to carry out his decision in this fashion.  Before game 5 of the finals, he even admitted that the way he acted last year was “very immature” as he tried to “prove people wrong.”  No more was the fake crying he did with Wade on the golf cart trying to imitate Dirk Nowitzki’s flu. No more was that chip on his shoulder that he needed to prove something. Instead of paying attention to all the media, he “just went back to the basics,” as he said after he winning the championship.  “I never had to prove anything to anyone.”  “I played with a lot of hate, and that’s not the way I play the game of basketball.  I play with love, and a lot of passion, and that’s what I got back to this year.”

And that’s exactly what LeBron did.  In the 4-1 series win he went for 28.6 points, 83% free throw, 17.5 points in paint and 10.2 rebounds and 7.4 assists.  The stat that stands out the most is the points in the paint compared to last year.  Instead of jacking up threes, he used his superhuman physique and smart play to drive to the basket and completely dominate, carving up every defender.

Jun 21, 2012; Miami, FL, USA; Miami Heat small forward LeBron James celebrates with the MVP trophy after winning the 2012 NBA championship at the American Airlines Arena. Miami won 121-106. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-US PRESSWIRE

His demeanor was completely different from last year finals in that he was never complaining with calls like he usually does where he takes out his mouth guard and furiously walks away to avoid the refs, and after scoring he kept his head up and went straight back to defense.  But most of all you saw his leadership.  You saw Thursday night when Mario Chalmers was about to complain about a call, and he just calmed him down, telling him it’s not worth it.  He did not disappear in the 4^th quarter like he did last year and stepped up and made huge shots such as in game 3 when he knocked that ridiculous bank shot from the left side, or in game 4 when he was suffering with a bad cramp and knocked down that 3 right in front of Thabo Sefolosha’s face.

Many people view his Championship as redemption to all the critics. But that’s not what he wants or what die-hard basketball fans want. They want this to be a step to move on from all the silly comics and stat comparisons, and that media jargon. They want the NBA media to return to the actual game of basketball and focus on his style of play, and just how damn good he is.  That what I get most out of when he said “it’s about damn time.” Not only is it time that he is a Champion but also it’s about time we can finally move on and appreciate LeBron James work ethic, energy, domination, and skills as a team player.  Sports Memes for a while has had some very amusing pictures of LeBron on Facebook and they finally come to a close with this one: Click Here. 

The Thunder lost 91-85 Sunday night to put the Heat up 2 games to 1 in the series.  The 2 losses have been for completely different reasons.  In game 2, the loss was mostly attributed to the awful start as they went 1-12 in the opening minutes and fell behind 18-2 making it catch-up for the duration of the game.  In game 3, after playing a solid 40+ minutes of basketball, poor decisions in crunch time led to their downfall.

Lets first talk about game 2:

After having such a bad start, a comeback of this magnitude against the Miami Heat in the Finals even with a guy like Durant is hard to come by. Since game 1 was also similar in that the Thunder fell behind early (shot 1-6 from opening tip resulting in a 20-10 deficit in first quarter), people were wondering whether Harden should be in the starting lineup to add scoring to the slow-starting offense. Sefolosha was not posing any offensive threat at the shooting guard position or doing his job on defense (3 points in Game 2) and Perkins wasn’t playing much of a role either (combined 8 points 15 rebounds in Game I and 2), so it was a valid point.

But who in there right minds would want to tinker with the starting lineup in the finals when for the whole playoffs the starting lineup of Russell Westbrook, Thabo Sefolosha, Kevin Durant, Serge Ibaka, and Kendrick Perkins was working – they won 13 of 17 games and went 47-19 in the regular season.  Scott Brooks said in an interview before game 3 “it hasn’t even crossed my mind to change the starting lineup”.  Westbrook in an interview on slow starts said that its all about “coming out ready to play and they were more ready to play than we were…we have to come out and play harder.”  Later he was asked what adjustments they needed to make and Westbrook said he isn’t making any adjustments “regardless of what anybody says.”

The Thunder improved on their game 2 deficiencies in game 3.

1.  They came out with a strong start, never being down by more than 6 in the first quarter shooting 9-19.

2.  Sefolosha came back from a poor game 2 and played outstanding defense on Wade and Lebron coming up with 3 steals, one of which was one of the most important plays of the game when he stripped it from Wade dribbling up the court and finished for a layup to make it a 3 point game with around 2 minutes left.  He also hit the first basket of the game.

3.  Perkins proved all the doubters that he should stay in the starting lineup by going for 10 points on 12 rebounds, 6 of which were offensive.

4. The Thunder’s defense forced 8 turnovers in the 4th quarter, close to as many as all of game 2.

But with all of these improvements, plus Durant still scoring 25 points, the Thunder still lost.  Bottom line is that in a very tight game, the Thunder still did not make smart decisions.  Whether is was Westbrook’s offensive charge, or Harden’s rookie move fouling Lebron with 16 seconds left (they did not need to foul down 3) as he tried to draw a charge with his below par acting skills.  Then the miscommunication on the inbound pass from Sefolosha down 4 with 13 seconds left, which is truly unaccetable… lead to their demise.  This cannot happen if the Thunder want to win the finals.  In game 2, you could come back being down in the 1st quarter, but in game 3 when you make mistakes in the final minutes, there is no coming back.

So How Can The Thunder get to Game 6?

One thing for sure is they need to hit their free throws.  In game 3 they shot 15-24 from the line and with every game being decided by 6 points or less, where leads come and go as fast as a jaguar in the finals, this cannot happen.

Another thing that needs to happen is Westbrook needs to find a medium of aggressiveness.  He needs to pick his spots – when he needs to step up and drive to the basket and when he should just give the ball to Durant and that is a point guard job to do.

In game 3 the thunder improved on their game 2 weaknesses but weren’t smart down the stretch. And in game 4 they need to not only improve on game 2 weaknesses by getting off to a better start but also game 3 weaknesses by finishing the game wisely.

If they overcome all these weaknesses – slow starts, lack of production from supporting cast, Westbrook and Harden playing without intelligence late in the game, and poor free throw shooting, we will see the Finals return to Oklahoma.