LeBron James officially signed his four-year, $153.3 million deal with the Los Angeles Lakers yesterday, confirming as well that he would be leaving the Cleveland Cavaliers for the second time in his career.
NBA fans had known for months, almost a year, that being that LeBron would likely be joining the Lakers this summer if things didn't improve with the Cavaliers. On Monday, he did exactly that.
One person who wasn't surprised by the King's decision to move to Los Angeles is new Toronto Raptors head coach Nick Nurse.
Not Surprised
According to John Chick of The Score, Nurse wasn’t surprised by James’ decision to go to the Lakers because he had a lot of friends who were in Los Angeles at the center of the gossip regarding the former Cavs star.
The Raptors head coach said: “You know, everybody talked about it a lot. And I dunno, I have a lot of good friends in L.A. that kept telling me it’s a done deal for the last couple months, so I really wasn’t that surprised.”
Conference Dynamics
The King's move from the Cavaliers to the Lakers not only affects those two franchises, but it also changes the shape of both the Western Conference and the Eastern Conference.
After playing in the past eight NBA Finals with the Miami Heat and the Cavaliers, winning three titles, LeBron move to the Lakers makes them one of the favourites to win the NBA Championship.
With his departure from the Cavaliers, the Eastern Conference has opened up from Cavs rule for the first time in years, and Nurse knows that.
However, he's also realised that just because his Raptors are one of the favourites to be the East's representative in the Finals, it's not going to be a shoo-in for them either.
Nurse said: “How does that affect us? You can’t automatically say ‘jeez, we lost to LeBron every year, put us in the Finals.'
"I think the competitive nature will spread across the East now. Now we gotta go out and do it.”
Just like most seasons, the Raptors will be one of the favourites to win the Eastern Conference, but they'll still need to do the work on the court in order to make that happen.
CLICK HERE to listen to Episode Two of the new GiveMeSport NBA podcast, featuring New York Times senior writer Marc Stein. Subscribe for all future episodes.