LeBron James: Time for a Little Humility

by Megan Cotton

Last November in my blog I asked “Can LeBron Take The Heat?,” a response to the Nike “What Should I Do?” video meant to repair LeBron James’ broken image after his move to Miami and the much hated ESPN special, “The Decision.” In my opinion the commercial did its job, using pop culture and witty scenarios to ask basketball fans (excluding Cleveland fans, of course) to forgive him for his move and just let him play the game.

Who didn’t do his job, however, was James. After more than disappointing play in almost every 4th quarter of the NBA Finals, James couldn’t conjure up humility for a post-game interview when he said, “All the people that were rooting on me to fail, at the end of the day, they have to wake up tomorrow and have the same life that they had before they woke up today. They have the same personal problems they had today. I’m going to continue to live the way I want to live and continue to do the things that I want to do with me and my family and be happy with that. They can get a few days or a few months or whatever the case may be on being happy about not only myself, but the Miami Heat not accomplishing their goal. But they have to get back to the real world at some point.”

Yes, you can say he was disappointed and caught up in the heat of the moment but suggesting that everyone who doesn’t cheer for you has “personal problems” is a step too far. For a player this highly scrutinized, with a history of showing bad sportsmanship, it was all the critics needed to attack him.

So what should James’ next PR move be exactly? His sponsors, like Nike, have been quiet so far, but this season’s disappointment seems to be a bit more than a well-made, witty commercial can fix.

In a blog posted on CNBC, “LeBron James’ Marketing Might Never Recover,” writer Darren Rovell, suggested that even if James wins one (or several) NBA Championships his image may be too far gone to save.

“The only repair can come through championships—LeBron finally getting it done, Tiger beating Jack. But that doesn’t mean that Tiger or LeBron will get back to where they once were,” said Rovell. “Winning a title is important for LeBron James. But the right person getting through to him as to why he’s in this position to begin with, and for him to accept what they have to say, might be even more important.”

That’s really what it comes down to: people don’t want to see “the bad guy” win. They want humility and a heartwarming story wrapped up with that championship. Right now James is too far gone for people to want a moving story about him featured on ESPN but as a PR professional you have to believe that very few images are actually beyond repair.

In a previous Platform blog about Michael Vick’s rehabilitated image, Libby Page laid out a process professionals can use to transform public perspective. Vick showed genuine remorse, got involved in community service and let his work at practice and during games speak for his new ethics.

James should follow a similar path. He should show the public he’s sorry for his post-game comments and that he is disappointed in his 4th quarter play. He should get involved in his new community and show that he cares about Miami. After that, he should focus on basketball and work hard to achieve what he left Cleveland for, to win a championship.

By not feeding the media with negative comments and lackluster play, he won’t give critics anything to talk about. So, maybe forgiveness can come with time and with James learning humility and keeping his over-confident attitude reserved for games … including the 4th quarter.

Can LeBron Take the Heat?

With the NBA season starting, the much publicized team re-alliances are back in the headlines. The leader of these shifts is LeBron James’ abandonment of the Cleveland Cavaliers for the more championship-favored Miami Heat. The announcement, made by James in a one-hour ESPN special July 8, left Cleveland fans heartbroken and betrayed by their once hometown hero. The fallout led to a stream of anti-LeBron YouTube videos, Facebook pages and accusatory statements by Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert.

Nike, which endorsed James since he was 18, saw this November as its time to speak up. The company released a commercial asking “What should I do?”. In it, James asks what the public wants from him, to disappear, to admit he’s a championship chaser or to just sell shoes? He asks the hard question of what exactly fans expect from athletes.

This is a challenge for any PR professional responsible for handling an athlete’s image. In all logical sense, James made a business decision. He switched from one company to another; people do it all the time without sparking Facebook hate groups. But Nike, a company that makes its money off understanding the personal connection people form with athletes, knew this was not the case.

So, what do you do when an athlete’s image could be in jeopardy? No, he didn’t get caught in a series of infidelities or sending inappropriate text messages to a reporter. What he did was much worse in the eyes of the fans: he let down the people who wear his jersey and buy his shoes.

That is what’s so great about James’ new commercial. It puts this heavy question in the hands of the fans. Nike does not condone his decision as right or wrong. It simply addresses the issue and allows fans to draw their own conclusions, while reminding us that at the end of the day James is a basketball player making a career choice.

This isn’t the first time the Nike PR team responded to an image problem with a commercial. In fact, they seem to follow the same plan they did with Tiger Woods. After Woods’ infidelities came to light, Nike waited a few months, then ran a simple but heavy-hitting commercial with a recording of Woods’ late father speaking to him. The commercial seemed to be Nike’s way of reprimanding him for his actions while also showing it would continue to support him and not drop its sponsorship.

It worked. Sure, there are still Tiger jokes and no one supports him the way they used to, but no one questions Nike’s business decision to stick by him. So the question is, “will this work for James?”. Of course, no Cleveland fans are about to jump back on the James bandwagon, but the almost 4 million views on YouTube suggest that those of us stuck in the middle can certainly forgive and forget.

By Megan Cotton