Cavaliers Offense Looking For A Spark
January 6, 2010Is Eric Wright “Pay da man 2?”
January 6, 2010
The basketball world was abuzz last week when photos of LeBron James’ Air Max VIIs were allegedly “leaked.” The images were of a blue and orange colorway that could have been passed off as Cavaliers throwbacks – at least until the image of the sole had the infamous I Heart NY graphic with the James logo of a lion replacing the heart.
Unfortunately for Knicks fans as well as those who cannot get enough scandal or controversy, The NY Post reports that the shoes are in fact a hoax and stemmed from an eBay auction.
[James being a member of the Knicks is] so surreal that a hoax was perpetrated on the Web in the past days — reporting Nike had released pictures of a soon-to-be released new Knicks LeBron shoe in blue and orange — with “I love New York” pictured on the orange sole along with “L23” shaped in a question mark. A Nike spokesman told The Post yesterday it was a fake. It looks as though it’s being sold on e-Bay, so buyer, beware.
The Post rarely passes up a chance to stir the LeBron James-to-New York pot. Certain blogs took credit for “leaking” the photos when in fact they were featured on NikeLeBron.net days before the shoes went mainstream. Once ESPN caught wind of said images, it did not take long for the whirlwind of “how could LeBron allow this” talk to take flight.
Cavaliers fans who were offended by these shoes can now sleep soundly. At least until James does something else New York-related.
17 Comments
Pulling off a good hoax used to take a lot of imagination and effort. The Internet has made it way too easy now.
Related/Not Related: On NPR this morning they were talking about the Tiger/Nike issue and how now Lebron is the face of Nike. Of course this lead to the discussion of Nike leaning on Lebron to play in NY, which of course, he’s going to do. At least that’s what everyone outside of Cleveland thinks. Take it FWIW.
(* Jay’s note: Me listening to NPR is an oddity, I know. But I was in the enginneering lab and they were listening to it. )
Nice work, Scotty.
Sorry, I don’t buy it.
why wait until it’s been forgotten before saying it’s fake. I think they floated this test balloon on purpose. Testing NYC opinion and the mood in general for his move. Hopefully they found what we already know. Moving to NYC or LA will NOT move more product.
With the world becoming smaller a star doesn’t need to be IN the city to be exposed. Sell all the shoes you want in NYC, but win here. Win now.
Win here! Win now!
Here’s a link to the article on NPR. The ending is a nice change of pace us Cleveland fans will enjoy.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122253668
Hope that works.
“Win here! Win now!”
Win Forever?
/Pete Carroll’d
Jay: thanks for the link to the NPR piece. Frank Deford is often pompous and wacky, and I like ‘im like that.
In reference to Deford’s final comments, I don’t think anyone here would forgive the Chosen One’s bearing false witness, especially not toward his many witnesses. (There’s a nest of word play that the usually indefatigable Deford left untouched this time.)
Denny, this is now my Cavs slogan for the rest of this season.
Win Here! Win Now! Win Forever! Sounds like a good WFNY shirt. I mean . . . shirt that I will be making and selling 🙂
@#4: Nike didn’t really wait to call it a hoax. That article was written last week and the “yesterday” in question is 12/31. I’m actually a bit surprised it took WFNY this long to pick up on this. Figured I’d just missed it in a While We’re Waiting… post.
As the guy that used to post as “I’m Ron Burgundy?”, I just want to say that your internet name is ballin’, sir. Top notch, aside from the mizpelling of Burgundy.
“I’m actually a bit surprised it took WFNY this long to pick up on this.”
[points at Denny]
I’ve had enough of this internet-pointing business. Also, I missed that one; oops. CAN’T CATCH ‘EM ALL, FOLKS. That’s what our tipline is for.
No relation. Formerly commented with my single initial “M.” The name just popped into my head the other day, and as the misspell indicates was clearly not well-enough researched.
Apologies for accidentally calling you out, Denny. Really just wanted to make sure the conspiracy theorists didn’t read too much into historycat’s take.
No no worries – no calling out, or anything like that. It’s cool. I remember seeing something on Twitter about it, but never thought to link to it.
Great hoax even better was the coverage the supposed story received to bad nobody thinks to actually check the legitimacy of stories before hopping on their Tweeters or blogs and giving personal opinions. I love technology and all but much like the use of the English language I think reporting, sports and news, will suffer greatly. It seems these days people aren’t educated enough to understand the difference between NEWS and OPINION. For proof just watch cable news programming – if you can stomach it! 🙁
Lebron James is the best player in the NBA. He has mnay amazing skills. I hope to see him win a championship ring. He deseves to win a ring.
[…] those leaked-turned-photoshoppedNew York colorways of LeBron James Nike Air Max VII? Well, it turns out that they may not have […]