Yeah I get that lots of fans are jealous and like to attack the guy, because he's arguably the best player ever. There's always been a jealous instinct to tear him down.
I wouldn't bet my own money on LeBron being fully clean of enhancement drugs, but if he's been using them it probably started all the way back in high school. Dude was always pretty ripped even for a teenager.
In his defense, it was widely reported that he went on an exteme 67 day diet in the offseason:
James told reporters at his Nike sneaker event in Oregon that he cut out everything except meat, fish, fruit, and vegetables for 67 days. He did it to "test his mental fortitude," The Oregonian reports.
He told SI:
"I had no sugars, no dairy, I had no carbs. All I ate was meat, fish, veggies and fruit. That's it. For 67 straight days."
He told the Oregonian that he had "lost a ton of weight" ? so much weight that he's now trying to put back on a few pounds.
It doesn't take much time to put back on the weight if you add carbs back into the mix... And carbs should absolutey be in the mix if you are an athlete. You need them for energy.
Fwiw, I don't care if Lebron has taken enhancement drugs. I imagine most of the old timers like KG and Kobe probably had drugs helping them recover from injuries. And it's not like Brandon bass can start juicing and put up 38 points, 18 rebounds and 13 assists in ECF game. Lebron is incredible. Try to appreciate it while it lasts. We are watching one of the greatest players to ever live.
WHAT!?
No way. Absolutely no way. The only reason why you'd ever put the word 'arguably' next to lebron is if you were saying that he's 'arguably' the most protected player of all time, imo. I honestly don't know who got more preferential treatment - Kareem, Magic, Jordan, Lebron, Duncan, Shaq, or Dirk, and those are the first guys who come to mind, because you could probably add Dr. J to that list, as well, iirc.
To me, lebron is the biggest fraud in NBA history. Sure, he gets all the awards and accolades, but do you realize that if Pop hadn't inexplicably choked by taking Duncan out at the end of game 6 in the 2013 finals, Lebron would not only have had a career 1-3 record in the finals to that point, but that he also would have lost all 3 of those series on his home court? Ouch.
Sure, maybe he did the Gwyneth Paltrow-type cleanse over the summer, lol
, but his 'miraculous' bulking up during a two week hiatus is more than a little suspicious to me, to say the least, and for the record, it does matter if he's been using steroids for even any part of his career. It's one thing to do what Andy Pettite did and use hgh in an attempt to recover more quickly from an injury (I still don't like it, but it's not the same thing as juicing to gain a competitive edge, imo), but it's quite another to act like Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, or Sosa.
What I cannot wait to see is what happens to Lebron's game when his athleticism leaves him, because then he won't have the ability to dunk over people all the time. I want to see him be able to score via skill. I don't know if you've noticed, but the dude's been the league for over a decade now, and he still has no post game, a reliable jumper, either from 3 or midrange (and he's been atrocious from the perimeter so far in the postseason), or the inclination to rebound, which he clearly just doesn't have, in addition to footwork like Pierce's. The last time he rebounded like he did in game 3 was in game 6 against us, iirc. IN 2012
. Were his 8 offensive rebounds a career high, lol
, and how did he ever get them, since he's never shown that he has the skill of positioning, etc., which allows you to get all of those rebounds in the first place.
He's also never changed his style of play. Have you ever seen him be able to play off the ball in any way, because I haven't, lol
. To me, the great ones add something to their games every year, no matter how long they've been in the league, and Lebron just has never done that. Okay, I guess you could say that his jumper has somewhat improved, but his free throw shooting hasn't, and he only tried posting up during what seemed like a two-week fad in Miami a couple of years ago, lol
. At 20 years old, Giannis has a substantially better post game than Lebron has. I know that I recently used this clip, but check out his post move against Tony Snell starting at the 1:13 mark, after he grabbed an offensive rebound (what a concept
) -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ-AJ6YDlvoThere's more skill in that one post move than I've EVER seen from Lebron whenever he's actually decided to play inside over the past 11 years, ahaha
.
If he ever came here, I'd throw up, to say the least, and wouldn't watch another game until he left, for all of the reasons which csfansince60s listed, and TP to him for that. In fact, watching these pathetic attempts by Chicago and Atlanta against him makes me appreciate our Pierce, KG, and Rondo teams even more, quite honestly.