If money can't buy love

Have no illusion about whom LeBron James is playing for.\nHe certainly won't.\nLast year, his mother took out a sizable loan and bought him an H2 Hummer for his 18th birthday. For months afterward, she was all he talked about.\nLast month, a shoe company gave James $90 million to wear its sneakers until 2010. All of a sudden he turns up on HBO and says, "Nike is my family."\nTo be fair, James wasn't actually choosing between his shoe company and his mother, but between Nike and the Cleveland Cavaliers, the team that will make him the top pick in Thursday's NBA draft and pay him $12 million over the next three years.\nHe was asked who owned his allegiance first and this is James' complete answer:\n"That's kind of a tough question because right now my family is Nike," he said. "I don't have an NBA team right now. Once I get into the organization, I'm a team player. Once I get to know my teammates and coaches, I think it's going to be 50-50."\nMoney still won't buy you love, but the day when $12 million was enough to guarantee loyalty sure came and went in a hurry.\nThe late sports agent Bob Woolf, who counted Joe Montana and Larry Bird among his early clients and is credited with helping start the profession, used to tell cautionary tales about athletes frittering away money.\nSome clients sent him invoices from Brazilian opal mines that never seemed to open, some from big-city bars that never seemed to close. Still others would go into a new town for a weekend series, buy a couple or three Armani suits and a car, leave the suits on the hotel bed and the car running in the middle lane at the airport, and then head merrily on to the next town. Woolf lived in fear of the day their extravagant tastes turned into contract demands.\n"I always wonder what athletes will they be like," he would conclude, "when they come into some real money."\nWe got some indication 10 years ago, when a just-retired Michael Jordan topped Forbes magazine's annual list of moneymaking athletes and highlighted an unsettling trend: Jordan was paid $4 million in salary by the Chicago Bulls and several times that amount by Nike. Finishing close behind him was Shaquille O'Neal, who was paid $3.3 million by the Orlando Magic and four times that much pretending to play basketball at photo shoots.\nThat same year, O'Neal threatened to withhold his services from "Dream Team II" because USA Basketball organizers had a sponsorship deal with Coke instead of Pepsi, the soft drink he endorsed. And Alonzo Mourning toyed with the Charlotte Hornets during contract talks because the money he bankrolled from a shoe deal made his salary seem almost superfluous.\nJames has handled stardom well for most of his young life, and he's given every indication so far of being the "team player" he referred to above. He's already shown deference to Paul Silas, the old hand the Cavs hired to be their new coach, and downright humility when Jordan said he would rate James near the bottom of the league's small forwards and shooting guards.\n"He has unbelievable potential," Jordan said. "But he has played against high school kids who probably are under 6 feet and have the talent of sportswriters."\nJames had the uncommon smarts to say he'd work harder to get better. "That's like your father telling you something at home. If Michael Jordan says something to you ... all you can do is listen, because he's the greatest player to play the game of basketball."\nBy the same token, James wore a $500,000 watch to a photo shoot Tuesday in New York. A few hours later, he turned up in his own TV special saying how much he loved his ride -- outfitted with the obligatory custom stereo, DVD and video-game console -- and how he hated being alone. An entourage, as James is finding out already, costs money. What he'll learn soon enough is that it rarely delivers solid advice in return.\nExactly how much loyalty a contract should buy is a hot issue right now in Chicago, where the Bulls receive updates on the condition of Jay Williams. The former Duke star, injured in a recent motorcycle crash, was taken second in last year's draft and his face still peers out hopefully from billboards around town.\nUntil the accident, Williams and the word "reckless" would not have turned up often in the same sentence. Now, even before any realistic judgment on his playing future can be made, another round of surgery will be necessary. Wisely, the Bulls concern themselves only with questions about Williams' health these days and refuse to discuss whether he had permission to ride the motorcycle, something prohibited by the standard NBA contract.\nBut it's a safe bet the one thing management never counted on the day they signed off on Williams' deal was the kind of buyer's remorse staring them between the eyes at the moment.