{"id":131410,"date":"2025-08-09T09:46:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T09:46:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/131410\/"},"modified":"2025-08-09T09:46:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-09T09:46:11","slug":"stephen-a-smith-suggests-lebron-james-return-to-cleveland-cavaliers-to-win-another-nba-championship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/131410\/","title":{"rendered":"Stephen A. Smith suggests LeBron James return to Cleveland Cavaliers to win another NBA Championship"},"content":{"rendered":"

LeBron James<\/a> and Stephen A. Smith<\/a> have not been the best of friends over the course of this year<\/a>. Still, as far as the end of James\u2019 career, Smith had an opinion this morning of how he thought he could end it perfectly.<\/p>\n

\u2018First Take\u2019 aired on Friday from the NABJ Convention in Cleveland. It was there today that Smith suggested, considering the point of his career he\u2019s at and where each franchise stands, James should leave the Los Angeles Lakers and return to the Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a>, for the second time, before he retires<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, you know, I\u2019m here in Cleveland, you know. It\u2019s been a while since I\u2019ve been here\u2026And, you know, it gets cold here, you know, but it\u2019s a nice town, great sports town and what have you,\u201d Smith said. \u201cI saw the Cleveland Cavaliers this past season, and I\u2019m a huge, huge, huge Donovan Mitchell<\/a> fan, okay. That brother is something special, right? But the absence of help during the postseason was very glaring. They got bounced up out of there.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then I thought about Los Angeles. We know, it has become crystal clear that that pretty much, the weather and Hollywood is the only reasons why LeBron is there, because he damn sure ain\u2019t winning no damn championship there. It ain\u2019t gonna happen, okay \u2013 not with Oklahoma City, be mindful of Dallas<\/a>, don\u2019t dismiss Houston, Minnesota and (Anthony Edwards)<\/a> already sent them home\u2026I think (the Lakers) are going in the right direction, keeping Luka<\/a>. Of course, that\u2019s a given<\/a>. But, getting specifically to LeBron, it has gotten to a point where I think it warrants \u2013 bro, why don\u2019t you just come back to Cleveland to end your career?\u201d<\/p>\n

James obviously has spent half of the 22 seasons of his career in the NBA<\/a> with the Cleveland Cavaliers. He was the No. 1 pick in the 2003 NBA Draft by the Cavs, where he spent the next seven seasons of his career before deciding to leave for South Beach. Then, four seasons later, James would return for another four-year stint in Cleveland. <\/p>\n

With that, James is the best player in the franchise\u2019s history with averages of 27.2 points (49.2% FG, 33.7% 3PT), 7.3 assists, 7.3 rebounds, and 1.6 steals per game. James has led them all-time in several categories, been an All-Star, All-NBA, and MVP several times over, and has taken them to the most playoff success they\u2019ve ever had, most notably winning the NBA Finals in 2016 as part of all five of their berths in The Finals (\u201907, \u201915-\u201918).<\/p>\n

Since then, James has spent the past seven seasons in Los Angeles, winning another championship and posting 26.6 points (51.3% FG, 36% 3PT), 8.1 assists, 7.9 rebounds, and 1.1 steals as a Laker. He also opted into his player option<\/a> back at the end of June. However, over this offseason, his future there has been in question as he comes towards the end of his playing career.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s where Smith\u2019s suggestion comes into play. Rather than, even with Luka Don\u010di\u0107, trying to get Los Angeles back into the NBA Finals from out of the Western Conference, Smith knows how much easier it\u2019d be for James to move again and, specifically this season, try to take Cleveland back again from out of the Eastern Conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis cannot be disputed. He\u2019d have a better chance of winning the championship in Cleveland than he would in LA,\u201d Smith said. \u201cThe road through the Western Conference is arduous to say the least. In the Eastern Conference? New York has got a new coach, questions about their depth. Damian Lillard<\/a> is no longer in Milwaukee, back in Portland, so what help do you have with Giannis<\/a>? Jayson Tatum<\/a> is out for the year with an Achilles tear, okay?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe saw what happened with Cleveland last year. Indiana was in The Finals \u2013 Haliburton\u2019s<\/a> out for the year<\/a>, Turner<\/a> is a Milwaukee Buck now, alright. Orlando is on the come up with the Desmond Bane<\/a> acquisition, which we love, but they\u2019re on the come up, haven\u2019t arrived. If LeBron James came back to Cleveland? You\u2019re the favorites to come out of the East, and you need only four wins to win a championship.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou come back to Cleveland, you bring the \u2018chip back to Cleveland, and you say goodbye. Five-time champion\u2026That ain\u2019t happening if you stay in LA because you ain\u2019t coming out of the West. But you could come out of the East and all you\u2019d need is four games. If LeBron was back in Cleveland? Cleveland is the favorites, and then he would remind people he\u2019s here to win championships instead of going Hollywood. Because you ain\u2019t winning a championship in LA. He already won a \u2018chip, even though that was in the bubble but I don\u2019t hold that against him\u2026I\u2019m saying, you look at the West? It\u2019s loaded. The road to prosperity is hard. It\u2019s much easier in the Eastern Conference this upcoming season.\u201d<\/p>\n

Smith also just thinks it\u2019d be enticing for him to return to The Land. James, a native of Akron, Ohio, has done so much on and off the court in Cleveland that he\u2019s as big a star there as anyone may ever have been before in Los Angeles or elsewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the place where he\u2019s beloved,\u201d Smith added. \u201cLA? You know, that\u2019s Kobe<\/a>, Magic<\/a>, Kareem<\/a>. They\u2019ll never embrace him like that. Miami, because he left, even though he went to four-straight finals and delivered back-to-back \u2018chips? They\u2019ll never embrace him like that. But, this place? He is beloved, and should be because of what he did for this area, what he did for this city. I mean, he is a god-like figure in these parts, as well he should be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Few people have less of a say in what James does at this point than Smith. That said, Stephen A. says, if he\u2019s serious about winning another NBA Championship, James <\/p>\n

\u201cTo me, if you\u2019re about winning the \u2018chip? This is the decision\u2026If you are about closing the door on your career by crowning yourself as a champion? Winning one for the thumb, having five?\u2026This is a prime opportunity right there for him, if you want the \u2018chip. If it ain\u2019t about the \u2018chip then it\u2019s not about the \u2018chip.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LeBron James and Stephen A. Smith have not been the best of friends over the course of this…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":131411,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[79845,1260,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-131410","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-lebron-james-03-st-vincent-st-mary","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114998174340798131","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}