The elusive goal to arguably one of basketball’s greatest superstars was finally reached on Thursday night, June 21st when LeBron James and the Miami Heat won the NBA Championship over the Oklahoma City Thunder. James expects to win, just has he has done since high school, and he’s won many accolades along the journey. He was named Rookie of the Year in 2003-2004, holds numerous NBA MVP awards, and carried his team to consecutive playoff appearances from 2006 to the present.
LeBron James is now a mentally tough athlete who has recognized the need to used sports psychology for basketball to continually raise his goals towards improvement. The truly elite athlete must strengthen their mental game of basketball as much as their physical game as they progress to higher level of play. James’s ultimate goal is to be remembered as one the NBA’s greatest athletes, and although he won numerous other individual awards, and won a bronze and gold medal from the Olympics, the quest for a championship remained his highest dream.
Lebron stated – Well, I mean, to me, I think my ultimate – my ultimate goal is winning championships and – and I understand that me going down as one of the greats will not happen until I, you know, win a championship.
Although LeBron James is obviously a gifted athlete, he now exhibits the attitude and basketball mental toughness that any athlete from any sport can imitate to reach their full potential. Even when James was markedly the best high school student in his state of Ohio, and later the entire nation as the NBA’s top draft pick of 2003, he still continually struggled to found methods to improve his focus, concentration and basketball mental game. The process of maturing into a great professional basketball player required that he improve his ability to maintain focus throughout the game, and also uphold a positive mindset by not continually concentrating on past mistakes. Mental Game Coaches stress the need to analyze your play with a constructive attitude, formulate a plan for improvement, and then spend your focus positively working to achieve that plan.
James reiterated this idea of his basketball mental game when he stated, “Sometimes in the past when I played something might make me lose focus, or I would go home after a game where I thought I could have played better and I would let it hang over my head for a long time when it shouldn’t.
James suffered from heavy criticism when he left the Cavaliers for the Miami Heat through a free agency deal in 2010. Even with all his superlative achievements, naysayers often chimed that he couldn’t close the game; that he choked in the Finals. There will always be negative outsiders and statements surrounding a successful athlete, usually growing in number with the more success the athlete earns. The truly mentally tough athlete learns to listen to constructive supporters who desire for their success, as well as a positive inner voice, ignoring the external influences that do not provide encouragement. The athlete with a strong basketball mental game analyzes based on their play, and not necessarily the points on the scoreboard, or the articles in the sports page the following day.
James goes on to elaborate, “Every night on the court I give my all, and if I’m not giving 100 percent, I criticize myself. You can’t be afraid to fail. It’s the only way you succeed – you’re not gonna succeed all the time, and I know that. You have to be able to accept failure to get better.
The hard work and effort made by LeBron James to improve his mental focus and mental toughness resulted in a scenario he had visualized many times before. He finally raised the NBA Championship trophy high above his head.
Lebron said once upon of time “I won at every level – all the way since I started playing the game of basketball at nine. I’ve won at every level, won championships at every level. And, you know, it won’t be fulfilled until I win at the highest level.”
When asked what was going through his head after the game was over he said “It’s about damn time. It’s about dame time”.
