Can I Get A Little Help Here?

If the NBA playoffs end with no ring on the finger of one LeBron Raymone James, we should use Game 2 of the Celtics-Cavs series as Exhibit A for why LeBron should skip town at the end of the season. Whether you believe LeBron's elbow injury is genuine or just a ready-made excuse for when he has a bad game(much like how Laker fans have used Kobe's broken finger the last couple of years to excuse his occasional "I'm Kobe Bryant, I'm taking 32 shots tonight, win or lose" performances), LeBron clearly needed the backing of his supporting cast on Monday night. He didn't get it. Mo Williams, who is supposed to be LeBron's "Pippen", went 1-9 from the field(including 0-4 from behind the arc) and dropped a measly 4 points. Antawn Jamison, whom the Cavs Big Ben-ed from the Wizards at the deadline, had a respectable 16 points but he hardly took over the way you would want a sidekick to do if the franchise is having an off night. Shaq? 9 points and four boards for a guy who should use the Genie magic from his Kazaam days to instill a little life into the overweight corpse that has been dragging around Ohio the last six months.

In LeBron's walk year, all he wanted was what all young franchise guys wanted: He wanted the front office to put a championship calibur team around him. If Monday night was any indication, they didn't. The Cavs got curb-stomped at home by a Celtics team that has also been dragging rotting cadavers in the forms of Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and Rasheed Wallace. King James' Knights of the Roundball sat back and watched Rajon Rondo drop 13 points and 19 assists on them. They took ill-advised shots. They were sloppy on defense. When LeBron started to flounder, it was as if the air deflated out of the Cavs' tires. Monday night was an unacceptable performance for a team that desperately needs to keep its hometown legend. Do I think LeBron will stay? Yes.....but he shouldn't.

LeBron should take the entire summer to think about another 6 or 7 years in his hometown. He should wine and dine with Donnie Walsh in New York, go to the 40/40 Club with Jay-Z and the Nets' front office, even talk race relations with Donald Sterling in L.A. LeBron should make the people of Cleveland sweat....and then he should bounce.

Of the eight teams left in the playoffs, you can make the case that LeBron has the worst 2nd and 3rd options of the teams remaining. Don't believe me? Let's look.

*Orlando - Star: Dwight Howard. Sidekicks: Vince Carter and Jameer Nelson
*Boston - Star: Rajon Rondo. Sidekicks: Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett
*Atlanta - Star: Joe Johnson. Sidekicks: Al Horford and Josh Smith
*Phoenix - Star: Steve Nash. Sidekicks: Jason Richardson and Amare Stoudemire
*L.A. Lakers - Star: Kobe Bryant. Sidekicks: Pau Gasol, Ron Artest, Andrew Bynum, Lamar Odom
*San Antonio - Star: Tim Duncan. Sidekicks: Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili, Richard Jefferson
*Utah - Star: Deron Williams. Sidekicks: Carlos Boozer and Paul Millsap(and Kirilenko, when healthy)
*Cleveland - Star: LeBron James. Sidekicks: Shaq, Antawn Jamison, Mo Williams

Who would you say has the shortest end of the stick on this list? For all the knocks on Vince Carter's tight throat in the postseason and in crunch time, Jameer Nelson makes up for that by draining shots in key moments(a point proven in the Bobcats series when Jameer pretty much carried the Magic to the sweep). The Big Three in Boston may be washed up and 'Sheed may be mailing it in, but the Celtics proved on Monday they can still rachet it up in big games if they decide to just let their young point guard run the show. Phoenix continues to bring in sidekicks for Nash, even while other sidekicks are being sent away. After losing Joe Johnson, Boris Diaw, Shawn Marion, and Raja Bell over the years, Nash still has Amare and J-Rich and a Somalian-hungry Grant Hill to run with. San Antonio brought in Jefferson, who flunked in his first year, but still has Parker and Manu(who is especially nasty around this time) as well as one of the draft's biggest steals in rookie DaJuan Blair(not to mention other steals like George Hill and Roger Mason). Utah, eventhough they are about to rolled over by the Lakers, managed to slug it out with a uber-talented Nuggets team to make it this far AND that's without Kirilenko and Mehmet Okur. The Hawks are young and hungry, even with them getting taken behind the shed last night in their 43-point drubbing by Orlando. They made the Bibby deal work. They made Josh Smith happy. They made the Jamal Crawford deal work and they are poised to make a run with one or two more solid picks.

Then, there's the Lakers. Kobe's Lakers, to me, are the blueprint that Cavs GM Danny Ferry should have followed. When Kobe wanted a new supporting cast or a ticket out of town, the Lakers gave him the former....and then some. The Lakers stole Gasol, managed to keep Odom happy as a sixth man, brought along Bynum slowly and then rolled the dice on Artest this offseason. The jury is still out on the Artest deal but Ron-Ron showed proved his defensive rep in the opening round against Kevin Durant and the Thunder. That's one of the big things Cleveland's missing: a stopper. If LeBron can't run end to end and swat shots, the Cavs are screwed. Every team in the final 8(with the exception of maybe Phoenix) has a stopper on the roster. The Cavs, much like they do on offense, have LeBron and that's it.

When the Cavs got Jamison, everyone declared the East over and that LeBron could just crab-dribble into the Finals. The problem was, with all the hype from the Jamison deal and the Shaq deal before it, things weren't examined in the process. Jamison is a solid NBA power forward, but there's a reason he doesn't have much playoff success. He puts up great numbers on bad teams because he's normally the best or 2nd best guy on his squad. He may suit well in a role player situation, but he's not a go-to guy on a contender. Mo Williams is Monta Ellis on a better team. If Mo Williams played for the T'Wolves, you wouldn't recognize him with a 3D television. He's a good scorer and a dangerous shooter when he's hot, but he's not a second wheel. The same goes for Shaq. The man is so washed up, his skin should wrinkle. Besides being old and out of shape, The Diesel just looks disinterested. What exactly does HE gain by getting LeBron a ring? Why should a man who has always been the focal point bust his ass so someone else can get the glory when that's never been his M.O.? The reason the Shaq-Kobe Lakers failed was at least partially(and perhaps more so than that) based on Shaq's unwillingness to defer franchise player status to The Black Mamba. Now, you're expecting Shaq to give a damn when he's in the midst of a divorce, overweight, aching and old? Epic fail, Mr. Ferry.

There's also the issue of the Cavs' lack of draft success. Once again, you have to look at the 8 remaining teams. The Magic drafted Howard. The Lakers got Bynum. Hawks got Horford and Smith. Utah got Williams. Suns got Amare. Spurs got Duncan, Parker, Hill, Ginobli AND Blair. Celtics got Rondo and Pierce. The Cavs, sure, they got LeBron, but what about after that? In 2004, they passed on Al Jefferson and both of the Smiths(Josh and J.R.) to take Luke Jackson(who lasted about 12 seconds in the NBA). In 2005, they dealt away their first rounder in a previous trade that could have netted them Danny Granger or Nate Robinson. 2006, they passed on Paul Millsap for current Laker Shannon Brown. In 2007, another previous trade botched their chances at Aaron Brooks, Rudy Fernandez and Carl Landry. In 2008, they took J.J. Hickson at 19 over George Hill and Mario Chalmers. Then, of course, there was last year, when they(much like many other teams) passed on DaJuan Blair and Hornets sleeper Marcus Thornton to take a kid out the Congo who probably won't be playing with LeBron when he makes it to the States.

I know it's easy to take potshots at missed draft opportunities in retrospect, but some of these are glaring whiffs(especially the Blair pick). If you want to build a team around a young star, give him young talent. Where do you get young talent? The Draft! You look at LeBron's supporting cast since 2003 and you won't find too many names that jump out at you and make you say "Wow, how did he not win a ring with THAT guy!". Kobe opened his career with Shaq, then got Gasol and Odom. Howard got Vince Carter and Jameer Nelson. Duncan teamed with David Robinson as a rookie and then proceeded to watch his front office nail draft pick after draft pick throughout his career. If you're going to try to sell LeBron on staying put on a track record that includes poor drafting and suspect trades, I don't think that's enough. New York can offer LeBron to chance to team with an Amare Stoudemire or the "Avatar" himself, Chris Bosh as well as the chance to be a global icon playing in a Gabourey Sidibe-sized market. Those guys are infinitely better than ANYONE King James has laced them up with. All Cleveland can offer LeBron over the next six year is what they've given him and the rest of the King James Witness Program over the seven years: false hope.

The Cavs may bounce back and this loss Monday night might have fired them up into going into destroyer mode and that may render everything said here moot. However, we've been watching this movie for seven years now. LeBron, this isn't "The Departed". There's no Matt Damon or Mark Wahlberg or Jack Nicholson to complement your Leo DiCaprio. This is "Troy". A one-man wrecking crew alongside a bunch of names that people have heard of, but can't carry a masterpiece. Top of the line stars like you, LeBron, don't make a career doing Tyler Perry movies. Go to New York. Go to L.A. Start your own "Departed", because, if Monday night is any indication, that film will never be set in Cleveland.