James won MVP award last two seasons with the Cavaliers. In a survey of league GM's, he gets just one vote for this season. Lakers are favored to win their third straight championship.
LeBron James leaving the court after the Cavaliers were eliminated by Orlando in the 2009 playoffs - and after he didn't shake hands with the Magic players.Cleveland, Ohio -- LeBron James has taken his talents from the Cleveland Cavaliers to South Beach and the Miami Heat, but the MVP trophy will go to Kevin Durant, and the NBA championship trophy will stay with the Los Angeles Lakers.
That's according to an NBA.com survey of the league's general managers.
James has won the last two Most Valuable Player awards, but just one of the GM's in the survey predict he'll win another this season. They give it to Oklahoma City Thunder forward Durant, who led the league in scoring last season.
Akron native James did not deliver on his promise to bring an NBA title to Cleveland in his seven seasons as a Cavalier, and just nine GM's say he'll help bring one to the Heat this season. The bosses say the Lakers will win their third straight championship.
Henry Abbott writes about the survey on ESPN.com's TrueHoop blog:
This year the survey sends a strong message: GMs are not enamored with LeBron James and the Miami Heat.
They tell this story most starkly by almost completely ignoring two-time reigning MVP LeBron James in predicting this season's MVP.
How about this for insight as to how the general managers regard James? By more than a two-to-one margin, they say James tops Durant as the league's best small forward, but by a similar margin, the GM's say they'd rather start a franchise with Durant than with James.
Apparently, some of the same execs who would love having James as a player would rather not have to tolerate his demands and selfishness.