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Tuesday, April 12, 2011

LeBron's Entourage Too Much?

Lebron James has had a healthy deal with Nike since before that debut night in Sacramento. Since that time her had of of Nike's top flight shoe designers on his team, up until sometime up in 2008. Well this designer, Tinker Hatfield, had had enough and while making an appearance in Miami he spoke about it.



According to the Heat Index via Brian Windhorst...




Well how should we take this? Most times players and their entourage's are in the news for bad press that hurt the athlete. With this coming on the heels of Lebron's crew not being allowed in the "Q" on their latest trip to Cleveland could this be another sign albeit a subtle sign that the "boys" are "in the way". To be fair we can't say that LeBron's crew has caused much bad press compared to those we've come to know throughout the history of sports.

Here's the video: the LeBron comments are at 6:10ish


“I don’t like working with LeBron’s entourage,” Hatfield said. “It’s too many people, too many ideas, too many opinions.”

It is the second time in the last six months Hatfield has publicly taken a shot at James various friends and managers. During a similar event last October in Santa Monica, Calif., Hatfield told a group of listeners at a shoe store that “I used to work on LeBron’s, until his entourage kind of pissed me off.”

Hatfield was the main designer on the first generations of James’ shoes, starting in 2003. But according to sources, in 2008 he stopped working with him to focus working on Kobe Bryant’s shoes and the Jordan Brand. In the meantime, Hatfield said last week that James’ products have “suffered a little bit” and “hasn’t done as well as the Kobe stuff.”

“[Working with Bryant] one guy comes into the room with him and he has ideas and is very forward thinking and is smart about what he needs to do, what he thinks he needs to do to be a better player,” Hatfield said last week.

“LeBron is a great guy, I really like him, but when he comes into the room and he’s got like eight other guys saying things. That is one reason why the LeBron stuff, even though it does OK, it isn’t quite as exciting to me as the Kobe stuff or what we’ve done with the Jordan Brand.”

Here's the video:

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