The Great Pat Riley

The last time I wrote about The Great Pat Riley was when the Los Angeles Lakers overcame the charging Boston Celtics in the Game 7 of their Final Series. Back then, I was driving the point of hiring Phil Jackson as the new Head Coach of Miami Heat since the guy really knows the road to the championship like the back of his hands. He has been there and he has done that over and over again dating back from the Michael Jordan era to the Kobe Bryant phenomena.


Well, the guy has other things in mind. As if short to saying he doesn’t need a coach with the caliber of Phil Jackson to win a championship for Miami, he invested on time and sacrificed couple of years of their NBA season to be able to free up their salary cap and be in a better position to acquire the biggest talent in this year’s pool of free agents. The biggest that is LeBron James!


The weeks of speculations and surprises have finally brought to an end with his confirmation live from ESPN that he is picking Miami Heat over other NBA teams interested in luring his service. His entry will formally form the deadly triumvirate of Dwayne Wade, Chris Bosh and King James for the Heat. This is a force that is surely to reckon with in the upcoming NBA season.


Pat Riley knows how to play basketball from the sidelines. As the Team President, he endured years of scrutiny and criticism from the sporting world over the dismal performance of the Miami Heat since they won the Championship four years ago. His move to let go of Shaquille O’Neal and passed-on several notable free-agents last year kept everyone wondering if he is indeed capable of handling the basketball operations of the franchise.


Nobody really knew what’s on the mind of The Great Pat Riley until today when he finally got the service of LeBron James. At the start of the season, Dwayne Wade made his intentions very clear, he will only re-sign from the ballclub if and when he sees a serious intent from the management that the team is poise on competing in the Finals. Doing so will mean acquiring players who can best compliment the game style of Wade. The management, under the Pat Riley made the intentions more than clear, with the acquisition of Chris Bosh and King James, Miami is not just poised to compete in the Finals, the Heat will take home the crown in one way or the other.