LeBron James' Burden Too Much To Bear: Jordan's Shoes Still Unfilled

Try as hard as he might, LeBron James will never be able to fill the shoes of Michael Jordan.

While the extremely high-profile Miami Heat continue to underperform, LeBron feuds publicly and privately with coach Erik Spoelstra.

His recent actions are telling of how far the idea of an NBA icon has fallen and also remind us that there will never be another like Mike.

LeBron has been a mega-star surrounded by unprecedented hype since junior high school, but really this speaks volumes to the complete expansion of media coverage as we continue to search for the heir to the Air.

By now we should probably realize that the efforts have been futile.

Jordan was a once-in-a-millennium talent that transcended his peers in the NBA and revolutionized the sport towards the high-flying, above-the-rim show it is today.

When he entered the league, he raised his game to meet and eventually surpass the bar set high by players like Dr. J, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.

Entering the league during the twilight of Dr. J’s career and the peak of Bird’s and Magic’s, Jordan more than held his own in becoming the league’s most exciting player.

A supreme dunker and reliable crunch-time scorer, Jordan quickly carved his place among the all-time greats.

Since Jordan's (unofficial) retirement following the ’98 season, media have been eager to crown every young, gifted basketball player the next Jordan.

Kobe Bryant was the first to begin living up to the billing and I doubt we’ll ever see anyone come as close as him to matching the competitiveness, determination and scoring ability of Jordan.

Then along came LeBron. Billed in a Sports Illustrated cover story as ‘The Chosen One’ while he was in high school, the hype surrounding LeBron was force unto itself as he displayed the charisma and preternatural gifts to one day unseat Jordan as the greatest ever.

Something was missing, though. Something that helped make Jordan the legend he would become.

Jordan wanted nothing more than to win and prove a point to everybody else. If he was on his game, there was nobody in the world that could stand in his way.

It was this fire and drive, borne in being left off the high school team one year and riding the bench for Dean Smith at North Carolina his first season, that helped him propel the Bulls to six championships.

He also had a reputation as an extremely dedicated worker whose time on the court was surpassed only by his time in the gym. He worked hard because, despite having all the talent in the world, he felt like he had to.

LeBron doesn’t know this feeling. Despite having other-worldly talent, it wasn’t until being on the ’08 Olympic team and seeing the work ethic of Kobe, that he started to dedicate himself to being in the gym first thing in the morning while the rest of the world sleeps.

For players like Kobe and Jordan, they saw that all the hours spent working out and extra reps in the gym as a responsibility of maximizing their abilities.

Because he never had to work that hard and things came so easily to him, LeBron still hasn’t completely met the expectations bestowed on him in his youth.

His high-school teams were never pushed hard and forced to play a team with their talent level and when NBA teams were starting to challenge him in the playoffs, he wilted time after time.

He’s been accused of quitting on the Cavaliers during both of their last two playoff losses including an embarrassing display of egotism by LeBron in the final games of last year’s beat-down at the hands of the Celtics.

It should have been very obvious at that point that there was no way he was staying in Cleveland. Despite the now-obvious charade of LeBron as a down-to-earth local hero who loved his teammates and playing for the hometown crowd.

His hour-long self-indulgent ‘Decision’ delivered an image-damaging coup de grace to the long-suffering Cleveland fans.

Barely 20 years after getting their hearts broken by Jordan, the same fans' hearts were ripped out by LeBron in front of millions of television viewers.

Now that he jumped ship to Miami, it’s become painfully clear that LeBron is not the player/person he was thought to be and certainly no heir to Jordan.

Just a day away from his return to Cleveland, he’s a lightning rod for scrutiny and criticism as his team of superstars, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, are barely above .500 and looking nothing like a team ready to challenge for supremacy in the East.

While on paper, the Heat are superior in almost every way to the Cavs, Cleveland will certainly be fired up and have a rabid crowd behind them as they try to exact some revenge on their one-time basketball Jesus.

And the fans have every right to take out their frustrations. The 2003 overall No. 1 pick failed to back the promise he made to lead his team to the goal of bringing a championship home.

And when the going got tough, he skipped out on building on his success and climbing the mountain.

Even Jordan was turned back repeatedly by the Bad Boy Pistons of the late-80’s and came back each year until finally getting past them and winning his first title.

It’s why if LeBron ever does win a title, its value will be diminished by the fact that he took the easy route and couldn’t carry a team there himself.

Jordan did it with decidedly sub-par teams whose talent beyond himself and Scottie Pippen was the likes of John Paxson, Bill Cartwright, B.J. Armstrong and Bobby Hansen.

Jordan was a player willing to give everything he had and more towards winning a championship which was never more evident than his flu game in the ’97 Finals against the Jazz.

It’s that killer instinct and relentless drive that sets Jordan apart from all else, especially a player lacking in either like LeBron.

The place that houses the legend of Jordan was forged by Bill Russell during the Celtics dynasty during the 50’s and 60’s and is currently being renovated to make room for Kobe.

Until LeBron learns that all things in life and basketball are earned, he’ll be left to ponder what could have been.

Then came LeBron’s narcissistic Nike commercial where he asks what he should do and reiterates the criticism he’s faced since joining the Heat. It was similar to a recent Jordan commercial where Jordan reminds us of all the hard  work he put in. Though it was made before the LeBron commercial, it is a reminder of where others are failing in Jordan's footsteps.

Maybe it is Jordan’s fault that he set the bar so high and made it look so easy, but it’s more likely that he’s right in saying that people like LeBron are just making excuses.