Quite a few popular athletes have been involved in scandals over the past few years. He isn’t married so he isn’t likely to have a Tiger Woods scandal develop, although he has fathered two children out of wedlock. I doubt he is running a dogfighting ring, although anything is possilble. I’m not aware of too many NBA steroid problems.
So, if there was to be any sort of a scandal, I’d say it is likely to be a Ben Roethlisberger type incident.
I would say the chances are low. If he made it from 18-25 scandal free, it can only be easier after that.
I see this as a non-issue. He’s in a committed relationship and his kids are his and his wife’s, AFAIK. Just because they didn’t get married in the traditional sense has nothing to do with it.
He has already had two things that might qualify as scandals:
-His mother (who was living in public housing at the time and was certainly not wealthy) gave him a $100,000 custom Hummer H2 while he was in high school. The car was purchased with a loan she took out against his future earnings. Since this was not technically illegal it may not qualify as a scandal.
-Just this past season, it was rumored that Cavaliers teammate Delonte West was sleeping with LeBron’s mother.
I don’t know if the second one is even true, but if so, do either of these reach “scandal” status?
Heard the Delonte West one, and seeing as how batshit crazy that guy is, I wouldn’t be surprised. I’d say they both qualify as scandals but neither were his fault.
He seems to have a good group of guys around him so I’d be surprised if he was involved in anything too serious.
It seems that the bar for what passes for scandal gets lower and lower. I wouldn’t be surprised if Lebron said he didn’t like artichokes it would end up as a huge scandal, these days.
OJ Simpson might disagree about that.
I did hear about the Hummer thing, but since he was about to go the NBA and become a multimillionaire from contracts and endorsements, I didn’t see it as surprising or shady. I never heard about the thing with Delonte West. Even if it were true, there’s nothing wrong with it and LeBron isn’t responsible. To this point, LeBron has gotten a little flack for some things he’s said here and there but he’s pretty careful about what he says and does in public. What he does with his friends, who knows. But he seems to be very aware of his image.
Didn’t this “scandal” disapppear the second ESPN realized LeBron’s mother did nothing illegal? I know I haven’t heard about it since it happened.
This was a big scandal in Ohio high school sports during James’ senior season and was fully addressed and resolved then.
Dwayne Wade just finished getting a messy divorce, in which he cheated on his wife with a movie/TV star. Given the NBA lifestyle, a similar thing could easily occur with LeBron. While Wade’s divorce didn’t exactly rock Sportscenter, however, LeBron is under a tighter microscope so if a similar thing happened involving him ESPN and/or Entertainment Tonight would cover it with a lot more intensity.
People who come from a poor background often make bad financial decisions. That will be his Achilles Heel. It won’t be a scandal as much as a tragedy if it happens.
It will be interesting to see how reacts going forward. Is he going to start living a 24 hour party South Beach lifestyle? How will he react to being a truly hated player by many fans?
The only thing that I could imagine happening was if it came out that he threw the Boston series on purpose. I don’t think he did, but it was pretty obvious that he didn’t care too much either.
I have no idea what the rules are, but could there be accusations of collusion between him and Wade and Bosh?
By definition, players can’t collude.
Am I the only one who is curious about how the OP is assessing the likelihood of LeBron running a dogfighting ring or sexually assaulting a woman?
Anything is possible but he’s been in the league for seven years already, and he hasn’t been caught up in anything like this so far. He’s been pretty careful about his image up to this point, although he threw a lot of that image into the trash can last night. That may be as close to a real scandal as he ever comes.
The reason why I asked the question is because Lebron James is a person who hasn’t ever lived in the real world. I’d say he is very similar to Tiger Woods except probably even more removed from reality. He’s been on magazine covers, had his games on tv, drove a Hummer, and had rappers hanging out with him as a high schooler. I can easily see a person like having his life go seriously wrong.
There was also the controversy where he received free throwback jerseys (back when throwbacks were popular and cost 250 dollars) from some sporting goods store.
The point is, all of his scandals to date were entirely manufactured. The Hummer and the jerseys only jeopardized his eligibility, which is a big deal in amateur sports but a complete non-issue in pro sports (see Reggie Bush, Derrick Rose, O.J. Mayo and many more).
While Lebron came off wooden and insincere at his press conference, he seems like he has a good head on his shoulders. I would be shocked if he was involved in any scandals for his career. The easiest one to fall in to is extra-marital sex, which doesn’t really apply to the non-married Lebron. TONS of pro athletes have children out of wedlock, so even if some cocktail waitresses popped up it would pass within the week. I can’t really think of any other scandal he would be involved in, but I guess that’s what makes it so scandalous.
While I’m thinking about it, is cheating on his wife really the only thing Tiger did wrong?
Yes. I think the only reason it got to be as big a deal as it did was because of Tiger’s squeaky clean image and the fact that the number of mistresses kept growing (I think the last count is 14). The fact that one is a porn star and nearly all of them are pretty skanky looking (compared to Tiger’s very classy wife) didn’t help matters either.
Before becoming a high school phenom though he most certainly did live in the real world. His mom was broke, his dad MIA, and he and his mom had to move a number of times because of it. Life was pretty tough for him, I think, before the charm hit and he became a great hoopster.