NBA OFF-SEASON EDITION

Time to tie a bow on the NBA and move forward - the NFL season is just around the corner you know. One of the craziest off-seasons in sports history flew by these past few weeks with the "Summer of LeBron" taking center stage. It actually should have been titled the "Week of LeBron", but between the draft and the first week to 10 days of free agency, the majority of the NBA off-season activity has now taken place. Here are my winners, losers, and incompletes of this whirlwind off-season.

WINNERS

Miami Heat - I will start with the obvious - Miami landing the three top free agents will if nothing create a ton of interest, potential for some drama and a lot of pressure in South Beach. I don't think anyone saw this scenario playing out until the very end. Now it will be interesting to see how one ball gets spread around.

Eastern Conference - Maybe the biggest winner in all of the moves was the NBA Eastern Conference, who for the first part of the century has been the ugly stepsister. The top 3 picks in the draft went to the East and then Stoudemire and Boozer migrated over in free agency. While Cleveland and Toronto are sure to take a step back, the East should be very competitive with Miami, Orlando, Boston, Chicago, Atlanta and Milwaukee leading the way, and improved teams in New Jersey, Washington, and New York. No one in the West has made dramatic improvements, thus another winner in this off-season is the..

Los Angeles Lakers - Barring an injury to Bryant or Gasol, book L.A. for a 4th consecutive finals. They still have Kobe. They still have all that size and length. They re-signed Fisher who is a "glue" guy. And nobody in the West took any big steps, with Utah and Phoenix likely going backwards.

Joe Johnson - Above Average Joe got a max deal as Atlanta panicked. He ended up with the best deal out of all the big name free agents. Johnson is a nice player, but not a max guy. The Milwaukee Bucks did this with Michael Redd and it hurts in the long run. Johnson will be rich and the Hawks will be good, but this contract will likely prevent them from being championship material for its duration.

Milwaukee Bucks - This is a local entry, but the Bucks quietly had a very good off-season. The big name free agents are not going to knock down Milwaukee's door, so the Bucks secured some key components in Salmons and Delfino, added some flavor in Maggette, Larry Sanders, and Chris Douglas-Roberts, will get Andrew Bogut back and Brandon Jennings will be a year older. If nothing else, they have created excitement for a franchise that was bordering on extinction.


LOSERS

LeBron James - It started in the summer of 2009 as I once pointed out - not talking to reporters after the Orlando loss that year and then the way he handled the whole Jordan Crawford dunking incident - there were signs that LeBron still lacked the direction and maturity we had come to expect from this manchild. Well, the people in his circle botched 2010 even worse. LeBron lost some respect and credibility with how things were handled. He has also put enormous pressure on himself now - he has to win multiple championships in Miami or his legacy will not be what we all once thought it could be.

Cleveland Cavaliers - Were they ever really in the running? We will never know. What we do know is that they lost their hometown legend and then acted like a baby when he chose to leave. Cleveland needed LeBron way more than LeBron needed Cleveland. We know Cleveland tried to surround James with players to win a title, but the window closed. Now the Cavs will need to rebuild and try for relevancy about the time to be in the running for LeBron's next contract.

New Jersey Nets - First, the lottery was unkind and they dropped low enough to miss out on both John Wall and Evan Turner. They flirted with LeBron, but playing in Newark for two years before moving to New York was not really an ideal recruiting pitch. So they settled for Travis Outlaw. The Nets can't be as bad as they were last year, but with the Cap space they had cleared, the giant improvement is just not going to happen.

Chicago Bulls - Every move they made for weeks was to secure LeBron or D-Wade. They got Carlos Boozer. The Bulls have a lot of young talent and will be a very good team, but the big fishies got away and the road to an Eastern Conference title got much tougher.


Incompletes

New York Knickerbockers - The Knicks, like several other teams, made all their moves the past few years with the sole purpose of landing LeBron James. Obviously, that did not happen. It might be for the best. A trio of Chris Paul, Carmelo Anthony, and Amare Stoudemire may be tearing up MSG within the next two years. And this trio actually makes more basketball sense then the Miami triumvirate. This is no sure thing, but the longer Anthony goes without re-upping in Denver, the better the chance he ends up in New York. This one will be worth watching.