Tyler's Take: LeBron James to Miami

Last week LeBron James announced that he was going to leave the city where he was born and raise and leave to sunny Miami. Now I firmly believe that it is within LeBron's rights to leave and play basketball wherever he sees fit, but there is a right way to so these things and a wrong way. LeBron James has just forever given us an example on how not to do something.

There really is no way that I can put everyone into the shoes of the people of Cleveland and the heartbreak they just experienced. In short they had a young man who grew up in the city, or at least close to it, and rose to the level of savior when he was drafted 7 years ago. He took them to their first NBA Finals ever and it doesn't really matter then that he lost because the fans knew there was plenty of time for the titles to come. Cleveland went from the worst attendance in the NBA to selling out almost every game, heck the value of the team almost doubled in the seven years LeBron was there. Then this happened.

Imagine if you will that it's 1993 and Michael Jordan has just won his 3rd NBA title and a year removed from leading America to Gold in the Summer Olympics. Everybody loves Michael, there is nothing he can do wrong. He is on the Wheaties box and everyone is wearing his shoes. But something is different, instead of announcing his would be retirement Michael Jordan announces that he is moving to Spain and gaining citizenship there so he could play against the USA in the upcoming Olympics. It doesn't matter from here on out if this fictional Jordan would go on to Spain and have success, what matters is he left us for someone else and the day would come where we would have to face the man we idolized in another country's colors.

"People leave teams all of the time," you may say. And you'd be right. It's not the leaving that hurts, it's the goodbye. I had the opportunity to listen to "The Decision" as I was, like millions of others who watched it on ESPN, enthralled by what would happen. Mere minutes before the announcement experts were being asked what they thought would happen and many came out and said they thought he would stay because he wouldn't have gone on national television to rip out the heart of his home town. I even agreed with them, I thought that he would surprise everyone and say he was staying.

We all know that didn't happen. He was on that stage surrounded by kids and said he was leaving. He was calm, cool and collected and said all the right things. The only problem was he was saying all the right things to everyone. LeBron had just broken up with the city of Cleveland on national TV. Now we have a little over 3 months to listen to every NBA analyst talk about whether or not this will work. Personally I think it may work out and they may win some championships. I also know that I will no longer "witness" LeBron's ascension to greatness like I once did. I think that Cleveland feels the same.