U.S. basketballer LeBron James announced that he was leaving his old team, the Cleveland Cavaliers to go and play for the Miami Heat. The announcement was made on a one hour television show that was specifically broadcast so that James could make his decision public.
The owner of Cleveland publicly released an extraordinary condemnation of his former star player.
The reaction to the move, the nature of its announcement, and the examination of the wider issue of sport and celebrity in western culture has been extraordinary.
Such has been the backlash to the situation that it has been given the evocative title ‘The Lebacle’. Having a word coined for you is pretty rare, but James is not going to be dropping this into conversation with any frequency, even in third person references.
ESPN writer Bill Simmons hosts a ‘Welcome to the All-LeBron sound-off’ where he makes a few choice comments, but largely gets out of the way so that his commenters can say it all.
On one level, James is welcome to use his skills wherever he thinks they can get him the return he thinks they are worth. He is also welcome to secure a place on a team that he thinks can win the competition in which he is playing.
If society in general want to attach such importance to an individual who bounce a ball as they run down a wooden floor and then throw it through a hoop is James at fault?
mgpcpastor's blog 
This was so classless from all the parties involved. I’ll be posting my thoughts on the saga in the next day or two. The verbal spray from the team owner was written in comic sans.
There’s an interesting contrast to be observed between the more socialist leanings of Australian culture when it comes to limiting sports stars from playing where they’d like to play and being able to earn as much as they can and the free-enterprise leanings of the USA where it was only the perceived disrespect that James showed to Cleveland that grated.