IT’S obvious that LeBron James easily gets annoyed.
It showed in the just-ended best-of-seven National Basketball Association (NBA) Finals, especially in Game Six on Monday.
He literally blew his top and wrought havoc of massive magnitude on his foe.
He unleashed a fury like no other to cause lasting embarrassment on the one man that stood his way, embarrassed him somewhat two nights before.
He became Incredible Bulk with his 11th triple double in the playoffs in spearheading Monday’s 106-93 murderous rampage of the Miami Heat—sealing a 4-2 series victory only a fool would have doubted from happening.
“Thinking I have something to prove fuels me,” said James after the Lakers’ 17th title that tied them with the Boston Celtics in the all-time winner plateau.
To do that, James fired 28 points, grabbed 14 rebounds and issued 10 assists to capture all honors again in every department, ahead of everybody, including Jimmy Butler, the Heat’s great pretender that got James’s goat in Game Five.
James was so infuriated at seeing his team lose a series clincher after unloading 40 points and snaring 13 boards—all the more angered that Butler bottled up the winning points in Miami’s 111-108 Game Five victory that cut the Lakers’ lead to 3-2.
Butler’s charities for the Heat’s 109-108 lead had clinched it after Danny Green, receiving a pass from James, missed a wide open three with 16.8 seconds left.
The 2010 champion Lakers still had a chance to seal it in Game Five as Markieff Morris, after nabbing the rebound, flung a pass to Anthony Davis underneath the basket. But it was much too high for Davis to catch it that he didn’t bother to jump for it.
Stung by the Game Five defeat that robbed them of a much anticipated 4-1 victory at the NBA bubble in Orlando, Florida, revenge was written in the faces of the pair known as the “Deadly Duo” going to Game Six.
So, right from tip-off, Davis, redirected to center from power forward by Coach Frank Vogel, scored the game’s first basket point blank.
After Bam Adebayo countered, James barreled back-to-back freight-train drives for the Lakers’ early 6-2 lead.
Heat’s Duncan Robinson’s two triples sandwiched charities by Kentavious Caldwell-Pope before Green’s three preceded James’s coast-to-coast blur to pad the Lakers’ lead to 13-8.
With the battle plan all laid out—no quarters given, take no prisoners—the Lakers starved the Heat to only 20 points in taking a 28-20 first quarter lead—the frame sealed with a three-point play by James.
With James, holder of too many NBA records that I have lost count, always orchestrating play, it was all Laker show from there. They built leads of 20 points or more numerous times as Miami was ridiculously reduced to a virtual clinic of precision and perfection.
With 3:17 left in the third quarter, the Lakers were up 36 points 82-46, easing up a bit on the gas for a 29-point, 87-58 margin going to the fourth quarter.
The journey back to the podium secured after a 10-year title drought, time to slow things down.
The final quarter was but a formality.
James, 35, on his way to a fourth Finals MVP in as many tries, directed his troops to just go through the motions.
It was over but the coronation.
And how did Butler, whose triple double of 35 points, 12 rebounds and 11 assists made Heat the Game Five winner and James angry, fare?
Unmasked. Just 12 points in a meaningless Game Six outing.
King James reigns.
THAT’S IT Cheers to Commissioner Willy Marcial for the early plaudits deserving of the Philippine Basketball Association restart this week at Clark Freeport in Pampanga. Indeed, if there’s a will(y), there’s a way.