as the most-hyped high-schooler-turned-pro of all time, when the first impression of James wasn't one of a scorer. He jumped so much higher then, almost too high that night in Sacramento when he unleashed his first feathery baseline jumper. James acknowledged the atmosphere then, admitting his steely expression only hid the unease.“I was super, duper nervous,” James said. “It was so many cameras on the floor, that shouldn’t have been allowed.
Because James has played in virtually every situation possible, it was hard to quantify an almost random night in February. The buzz followed James from his usual innocuous pregame routine, as camera operators nearly tripped over themselves to walk the same path he did from the locker room to the floor.
“I had to have the mindset and I dressed for the occasion,” said James, joking that many of his friends who flew into town were leaving on a red-eye Wednesday night and he wasn’t springing for the hotel stay extra nights for Thursday’s game against Milwaukee. Close friend Dwyane Wade was near and occasionally, Lakers owner Jeanie Buss stopped her usual laps around the arena to take in the spectacle. Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison and Lynn Merritt — who both worked at Nike and are close with James — sat close behind the broadcast table at midcourt.It felt big, like NBA Finals big — a stage that given their titanic struggle with the 11th-place Oklahoma City Thunder resulted in aseems highly unlikely from here.
It turns out, James was waiting on every big star to be seated before starting his own personal show., but the intensity felt as familiar as any historic evening. The chase wasn’t glorified the way James would’ve preferred, but he’s always commanded an inordinate amount of attention through his career, so it was impossible to measure how this registers among the ripples on his personal Richter scale.] comes out with a new roller coaster," James said."And we spent plenty of times just testing out the roller coaster. Many highs, many loops, how fast it goes and you get off feeling so much excitement, feeling like I wanna do it again.