Cavs Media Day: Mo Williams Clears the Air on Retirement Comments

“Retiring?” asked Cavaliers guard Mo Williams.  “Yes, at some point I’m going to retire. I’m going into my eighth season, so I consider myself to be more than 50 percent done with my career.  At some point, you have to think about what you’re going to do after you play the game. [But] It was all blown out of proportion.”

And that was the extent of any retirement talks as Williams was speaking publicly for the first time since his recent interview where Yahoo! Sports’ Marc Spears quoted Williams as saying LeBron James almost made him consider hanging up his hightop Nikes.  In what has been quite an offseason for Williams, the veteran guard admitted that he wears his heart on his sleeve and felt the exact same emotions as Cavalier fans when The Decision went down.  But in the same, he was also quick to point out that he has three years and quite a bit of money left on his contract – money he feels he has earned and is in no hurry to give up.

Being close friends with James, Williams took the two-time NBA MVP’s exodus from Cleveland harder than most fans would have even expected.  In response to a message he received claiming he “made too much money” to worry about James, Williams states that this summer was beyond the game for him.

“You can’t control where your heart is,” said Williams.  “It’s not about how much I get paid.  Just like the average fan that goes to work every day, I felt the same pain they felt.  I feel the same love for this organization as they do.”

Naturally, the Media Day would have a LeBron-centric focus, even going as far as one media member having a bit of a freudian slip and calling Williams “LeBron” before asking a question.  But if anything was the theme of the day, it was that the entire Cavaliers organization is putting the past behind them and is playing only with the future in mind.

Williams stated that he is a leader.  And while he may not be able to replicate 30 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists per night, he is willing to take the leadership role that will come with the territory of being a veteran.  Williams feels that the whole Cavaliers unit is the definition of synergy – the cohesive unit being greater than the sum of the parts – in it’s no longer a team that has to rely on one player carrying them night in and night out.

Though he did not forecast when Cavalier fans will see his next breakaway dunk, Williams did state multiple times that he feels the 2010-11 season will be fun.  It is not as much of replacing James as it is building a whole new team, complete with head coach Byron Scott’s leadership and winning ways.

If one thing is for certain, Williams – at least on this very Monday afternoon – did not speak as a man that is considering retirement.  He is behind the city of Cleveland more now than ever and will let the ESPN power rankings tell him how good his team is.  Williams will let the games do the talking.

“There are a lot of naysayers that have put a circle around our city and everything that we have created, but everyone else, they do not care about us,” said Williams.  “They feel no sorrow.  With that being said, we have to take that and come together as one – not just the 15 players, the coaches and the organization – I mean every fan that has supported us when we were selling out every night.”

“Stay with us,” Williams said.  “We will get the job done.”

Other Cavs Media Day news and notes:

– Anderson Varejao claims that his ankle still is not 100 percent after his injury with the Brazilian national team.  Undergoing an MRI, he hopes to be ready to go come the start of the regular season.

– The recently-added Joey Graham is very excited to get an opportunity to show why he was drafted in the lottery back in 2005.  He hinted that he has always been playing behind a superstar of some sort, most recently Carmelo Anthony in Denver.

– Christian Eyenga mentioned in passing that he recently had a surgery of some sort.  While the area of repair was not disclosed, he did say that he is back to full-contact as recent as a week ago.

– Daniel Gibson has officially swapped the I-E for a Y and is going by “Booby” Gibson.  The change was mentioned by several of his Cavalier teammates and (as told to WFNY) stems from a Twitter imposter.  To differ himself on the microblogging platform, Gibson opted for the Y.

– Jamario Moon tells WFNY that he fully plans on winning back-to-back Good Guy awards for the Cavaliers this season.  “Don’t let AP (Anthony Parker) fool you,” he said.

– And finally, power forward Leon Powe said that he feels this Cavaliers team as presently constructed can make the playoffs.  Point guard Ramon Sessions answered any questions about the post season by stating that he “isn’t even thinking that far ahead,” and would rather focus on the task at hand by getting training camp underway and taking it game by game.

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(AP Photo/Amy Sancetta)