Don't diss Lebron 
by Jacob Oberdorf, Staff Writer
Recently, an e-polling firm surveyed fan to determine the most hated athletes of 2010. The list follows: Michael Vick won the crown as the most hated athlete followed by Tiger Woods, Terrell Owens, Chad Ochocinco and Kobe Bryant.
As with most sports fans, these names really didn’t surprise me. That is, until I found No. 6 on the list – Lebron James.
This summer Lebron’s decision shook up the sports world when he abandoned his hometown team and said he would “take my talents to South Beach and play for the Miami Heat.”
My first reaction when those words rushed from his mouth was I’d hate to live in Cleveland right now. A few minutes after Lebron shared his decision, cameras showed people from Cleveland burning Lebron James jerseys and rioting in the street. Is it me or were their reactions taking the news way too far?
(A note here: I am not being “familiar” with Lebron by calling him by his first name since I don’t know him personally. But I just can’t use the newspaper style of calling someone by the last name because people simply don’t call him James – he is Lebron.)
I completely understand Lebron’s move upset Cleveland fans. How hard it must be to accept that the best player in the NBA doesn’t want to play for his hometown team anymore. Honestly, I probably would’ve been crying my eyes out. But watching this spectacle in Cleveland left me in disbelief at how fast an athlete can fall from the penthouse to the dog house.
Lebron accomplished much for Cleveland even before he played for the Cavaliers. He grew up in Akron about 30 miles from Cleveland, attended Saint Vincent High School and played on arguably the best high school basketball team in history. He became a hometown hero to many of the people of Cleveland.
Before the Cavs drafted Lebron, sports fans considered them the laughing stock of the NBA (almost as the Pirates are in the MLB). But after LeBron arrived, they became contenders.
The Cavs advanced to the playoffs every year and also reached the NBA Finals once, a lot for Cleveland considering its last professional sports championship was in 1964 when the Browns won the NFL Championship.
The people of Cleveland thought Lebron would never leave them. What they don’t understand is all professional sports are all business. Athletes must do what is best for themselves and their families – exactly what Lebron did.
He gave Cleveland the best seven sports years that the city has enjoyed. With the upcoming NBA season, talk of the “big three” in Miami is heating up. Lebron and the Heat will be taunted and threatened wherever they travel.
This Lebron situation proves that athletes earn and deserve every dollar they’re paid. No matter what sport, the pressure and stress that they endure every season must be unbearable. Cameras always focus on them, and sports writers and fans always examine them under a performance and personal microscope.
At one moment, professional athletes can be the most loved people in the city in which they play, but in a blink of an eye they can become the most hated enemies of or traitors to the city.
Ordinary people don’t just wake up and decide to play in the NBA, the NFL, the NHL or MLB. A career as a professional athlete requires talent and dedication. Most career athletes sacrifice the best years of their youth to achieve their spots on professional teams.
Frankly, people should lay off knocking athletes for the money they earn. If the professional athletic shoes were on the critics’ feet, I doubt we’d hear any more complaining.
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