Knicks, Lakers Have Miami Heat to Thank for Their Soon-to-Be Superteams

Ok, hear me out.

I know that many of you decided to peruse this article in the same fashion that people flip their channels to watch garbage, voyeuristic television like Keeping Up With The Kardashians or Jersey Shore. Sure, why not hear the delusional ranting of another jaded Miami Heat fan, you may think. On some level, you may even be right.

But the reality remains that the Miami Heat broke through a barrier of NBA basketball that will shortly revolutionize the sport as we know it.

By the way, as I have stated in the past, the Miami Heat did not in fact start this trend of basketball that we haven't seen since the days of Magic Johnson and Larry Bird.

Rather, it came into place when, in the same season, Kevin Garnett joined forces with Ray Allen and Paul Pierce and Pau Gasol was traded to the Lakers.

Only then did pending free agent superstars start to clue in on the wake up call that it was not about being the next MJ, but about keeping up with the Joneses.

Think about it. We beg and plead for these superstars to get out of their own shadow and embrace the concept of teamwork. There may be no better example of this than Kobe Bryant. On a number of levels.

For starters, no one will argue that Kobe is one of the top ten best players of all time, and he has consistently been compared to MJ throughout his career, despite playing with a superstar for the majority of his championship years.

Then, when Shaq did finally get sent away from the Lakers, critics bashed Kobe for being the me-first player that everyone had secretly yearned for him to be.

At some point, Kobe's legacy did change and he won two rings as the lone superstar on his team. A team, mind you, that had Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, Andrew Bynum (one of the few legit centers in the league), and Ron Artest (before he became the basketball version of Charlie Sheen). Not to mention that he had arguably the greatest coach ever on the sidelines at his disposal.

Meanwhile, when you look across the country, the Celtics had a stacked lineup of all-stars. Now, people may have wrote them off as being at the tail end of their primes, but nevertheless, they are in year 4 of their faction and have been an eastern conference powerhouse ever since.

So, please, spare me the sermon on how LeBron and D-Wade broke some unwritten rule of basketball when they teamed up last year.

The fact is that when all of us were digesting the aftermath of The Decision telecast and simaltaneously relieving/wetting ourselves (some from joy, some from fear, and some from another orifice), we thought that the unification of Wade and LeBron would screw the league over, and make them an insurmountable force.

Ironically, it may have done the exact opposite.

Look, I'm not saying that the NBA lockout ended because of the Miami Heat. What I am saying is that the owner's association and David Stern were both fully aware that NBA interest was at a rare peak, which gave them all the more resolve to make a deal. And if you don't think that the Miami Heat played a sizable role in that peak, well, maybe you might want to start calling yourself Metta-World Peace.

Now, stop and take a second to look into that Mirror Ball that has the words Spalding encrypted on it, and tell me how you think the Chris Paul and Dwight Howard sagas are going to play out.

Once again, I'm not saying that Chris Paul and Dwight Howard decided to join forces with other superstars because of the Miami Heat.

What I'm saying is that it played a factor. Or, perhaps, you could try to convince me that when they were thinking about their pending free agency, it didn't weigh on them that the NWO suddenly showed up to South Beach.

Look, we all know that the Miami Heat is the new arch-villain of the NBA.

Everyone hates us.

They want to see us lose.

And it's almost poetic that the return of the NBA from it's momentary apocalypse comes on Christmas day because, for many, watching a certain nameless party Spreewell the team's chances at a championship was like saying goodbye to the NBA on that very holiday.

But, that doesn't matter.

Because in only a matter of years, the manifestation of what the Heat publicly started is going to catch on like wildfire, and before you know it, the NBA will have at least three or four powerhouses.

Right now, it's LeBron, Wade, and Bosh.

Soon enough, Chris Paul will join Carmelo and Amar'e in New York.

Then, Dwight Howard will come to LaLa land and try to help Kobe win his MJ-tying 6th championship.

After that, who knows.

See, NBA players are like women.

They know when they have all the leverage (which is almost always), they know  that the other side is practically brainless, and, ultimately, they know what they want.

So, pardon me if I choose to recognize the impetus of a revisionist makeover to The Decision in the same way the many of you will eventually recognize the Miami Heat's formation as the impetus that will revolutionize this league.

Eventually, a select few fan bases will begin to experience the unparalleled highs (picture how you feel when you're about to go out on the town with your buddies after the end of a season one episode of Entourage....and then inject steroids to it) and the bottomless lows (shall we say, two long islands deep at a bachelor party in a Vegas hotel room, when suddenly someone wheels in a cardboard cake and, before you know it, Chris Hansen jumps out).

Because, us Miami Heat fans have already been there.

And whether you like it or not, what we can take full and unabashed credit for is the rejuvenated shot of unpredictability that practically makes the new changes from the labor agreement seem diminutive in comparison.

Still a critic, Metta?