Lakers Are Defending Champs, But Heat Deserve Respect Too

Ever since the signing of the "Big Three" in Miami, there has been an overwhelming amount of articles on the Heat, for them or against them.  There are a fair amount of haters, as well as those who view the Heat as favorites to win it all.

Something I have come to notice is that a lot of those haters tend to reside on the West Coast.  The city of Los Angeles, to be exact.

Before I take my dive into the meat of this piece, let me start off with the fact that of course the Los Angeles Lakers deserve the proper respect for winning the 2010 NBA title.  Don't forget they repeated and will be going for a "three-peat" this year.  Kobe and his boys deserve all the respect and more at this point and time as any defending champion in any sport does.

But, and that's a huge but, there's a difference between the Lakers and their fans demanding respect and being straight up arrogant and quite frankly ignorant.  

Many Lakers fans are upset at the amount of attention the Heat are getting this summer. Can you blame the Heat?  Can you blame the media?  Can you blame Heat fans?

This is, without question, the biggest free agent summer in perhaps all of sports, and now you have a superstar pairing like none before.  And you expect people to not talk about it and instead only talk about the Lakers and how great they are?  No, so get over it, Lakers fans.  And you know you would be talking just as much and be just as proud if you were in the Heat's situation right now.  Don't even bother attempting to deny that.

Secondly, yes, many NBA fans and analysts have gone a little bit overboard with the predictions for this coming season.  Some refuse to give the Heat the credit they deserve for acquiring James, Bosh, and Wade and filling out the rest of their roster.  Some continue to give the unproven (yes, I am a Heat fan and yes, fellow Heat fans, we are unproven at this point) Heat too much credit, predicting an easy Heat win in the 2011 championship.  

Are some Heat fans selling short the Lakers' greatness?  Sure, but this is a two way street.

I have read many overconfident articles and comments on here and different sites regarding Kobe and the Lakers.  Lakers fans give off the sense that they believe they are dominant and unbeatable.  No one can beat the Lakers in their minds, because after all, they have won back to back championships.  The back to back titles is without a doubt where this false sense of being invincible is coming from.

Many Lakers fans have stated the Heat still have no chance, that LeBron is a choker and still unproven, that the Heat team doesn't match up with the Lakers at all.  There are even those who say the Heat will have a very difficult time getting out of the East. Let me put things in the right perspective here.

Lakers fans, by no means did you dominate this past season.  Didn't the Lakers barely escape a near first round upset against the young Kevin Durant and the Oklahoma City Thunder?  LA's best playoff series in 2010 was against the Jazz, but other than that, where was all that Laker dominance their fans speak of?  Taking a series in six games as you did with the Thunder and the Suns is by no means dominance.

Then we look at the finals.  Lakers fans, you do realize you barely beat an old, worn out Celtics team that conquered an extremely weak and pathetic Eastern Conference.  It took you seven games to beat them, and in that seventh game, you barely squeaked by.  Things might have gone differently if Perkins were healthy to play, there's no room to deny that.

To put this in perspective with how the Heat fared in their series against the Celtics, remember how the Heat were in every game but one.  Miami even had a nearly twenty point lead in the opening game over Boston, in Boston.  A very, very average Heat team hung with the Celtics last year, and despite only winning one game in the series, that average Heat team did put up a fight.

If an average team was good enough to just hang with the Celtics last year, what do you think this new and greatly improved Heat team is going to be able to do?

I'm not saying this to bash the Lakers, because as a Heat fan, I have an immeasurable amount of respect for the greatest franchise in the history of the league.  I'm saying this to put the Lakers' fanbase in their place. 

Lakers fans, realize this.  When you rush to your computers to bash the Heat and dig for reasons as to why they won't be able to beat your Lakers, understand that many will view that as ignorant, arrogant, and even scared.  If you are so confident in your team, there is no reason to come racing to the Internet to write long, opinion filled articles and comments as to why the Lakers are still the best and why the Heat will never come close.  Let your team do the talking.

So as I near my closing of this article, I must say this.  Lakers fans, if you don't want the to hear the Heat talk, stay away from the articles.  It's an exciting time for the Heat fanbase and organization, and it's only natural for us to be acting this way.  As Heat fans, we have three big reasons to be excited and talk.  

Proven teams don't need to talk, but unproven teams like Miami can't do anything but talk at this point before the season.  Understand?

I will close with this last statement.  The Lakers are currently defending champions and on their quest to another three-peat, they deserve respect.  The Heat have put together a phenomenal and competitive team, most likely the team with the best shot at taking the crown away from LA.  Miami deserves respect too, but just how much will be determined by this upcoming season.