Many believe LeBron James is taking a huge chance by putting the next chapter of his legacy in the hands of a rookie coach with no NBA experience. But in reality, it was a genius move by James.

The Euro-Princeton offense.

David Blatt's system can be traced back to his days as a player at Princeton and coach Pete Carril's "Princeton offense" which utilizes plenty of movement and backdoor cuts. Blatt then tweaked that style with 20 years coaching in Europe.

Now he is bringing his European system to the NBA at a time when the American game is more European than ever and he will be the only coach in the league with experience as a coach in Europe.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, one of Blatt's former players with Maccabi Tel Aviv,  Devin Smith, described their play as "kind of like a San Antonio type of feel," a style that LeBron loves.

In the NBA finals, the Spurs impressed LeBron with their motion offense and the way they spaced the floor and passed the ball.

Opening up the lane for LeBron.

While the European style is more team-oriented, Blatt's system will also play to the strengths of LeBron James.

With the more spacing and constant movement of the ball, the lane will be less clogged with players allowing James to attack the basket.

This will be in stark contrast to the Heat, who often stood around allowing the defense to collapse. The result was James often drove the lane only to find three or four defenders waiting for him.

The stretch-4.

But the Cavs need one more piece for Blatt's system to truly be lethal. They need what many around the NBA call "a stretch-4," a power forward who can shoot from the outside.

And as Ben Cohen and Andrew Beaton of the Wall Street Journal point out, the "stretchiest four" in the NBA is Kevin Love of the Minnesota Timberwolves. This is why it is so important for the Cavs to trade for Kevin Love and why they are willing to give up Andrew Wiggins, the top pick in this year's draft, to get the deal done.

This past season, Love took 6.6 three-point shots per game, tops among big men in the NBA. Those shots will not only fit Blatt's spacing, but it will further open up the lane for James to dominate.

"If I know David Blatt," Maccabi center Shawn James told the Wall Street Journal, "he probably wants Kevin Love very bad."

Blatt's system is flexible.

Blatt is also smart enough to know that even the perfect system is only as good as the players running it and he knows how to adapt.

"The real key to David's success," Maccabi forward David Blu told the Wall Street Journal, "is that he's able to adjust to his players."

Blatt was recently asked by Jeff Goodman of ESPN specifically about how James will fit into his system. Blatt smiled and had the perfect reply.

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron James has lost a bunch of weight this offseason after going on a low-carb diet.

ESPN's Brian Windhorst revealed some more details about LeBron's weight-loss program on a podcast with Grantland's Bill Simmons on Tuesday. 

Windhorst says LeBron is losing weight for two reasons: 1) he entered last season in the "the worst shape he's been in in a while," and 2) he has become a bit self-conscious about his weight in recent years.

After the Heat won their second straight NBA title, in 2013, LeBron enjoyed his summer (his first summer off since 2011 because of the London Olympics in 2012) and got married. 

Windhorst explained:

I've heard he's estimated about 10 or 12 pounds down now. I guess he has cut out carbs. Last year Ray Allen — as if Ray Allen needed anything to help with his body — he went paleo in the offseason. ... And Ray Allen came to training camp and he was the only Heat guy who was in better shape at the start of last training camp than at the end of the [2013] season because those guys enjoyed their second championship. Wade and LeBron especially. LeBron was probably, coming off his wedding and everything, he was probably in quote-unquote 'the worst shape he's been in a while.' He was obviously fine, but he got off to a slow start last season. His back was bothering him early on. He and Dwyane Wade both have gone to this sort of, I don't know if LeBron is terming it 'paleo,' but he's basically gone without carbs.

It's important to note LeBron in his "worst shape" is still one of the best athletes in the NBA. And even in November of last year he averaged 26 points, six assists, and six rebounds per game.

The slight dip in physical conditioning was enough to make him lose 10 pounds in six weeks, though.

The other thing that motivated LeBron's weight loss, according to Windhorst, is his self-consciousness at people thinking he weighs over 270 pounds. From Windhorst:

He has actually been in the mid-260s and sometimes over 270 in his career. He doesn't like talking about it. I don't even know what they list him at. I think they might list him at 250. He has been a little self-conscious about that in recent years, so I think there's a secondary reason as well.

The NBA lists him at 250 pounds. Considering LeBron is 6-foot-8 and completely ripped, that number seems low.

LeBron was just named the fittest athlete in the world by Sports Illustrated. He's a once-in-a-generation athletic freak. Now he's just going to be a slightly trimmer once-in-a-generation athletic freak.

Somebody get LeBron to Swenson's. Fast. pic.twitter.com/qgKChpYAlP

— Zac Jackson (@FSOhioZJackson) August 5, 2014

Join the conversation about this story »

The Minnesota Timberwolves and Cleveland Cavaliers have had a deal in place for "weeks" that will send Kevin Love to Cleveland to play with LeBron James, Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo reports.

The past two No. 1 NBA Draft picks — Andrew Wiggins and Anthony Bennett — will go to Minnesota along with a protected first-round pick. Under NBA rookie contract rules, the trade can't be completed until Aug. 23.

Assuming the deal isn't derailed in the next 16 days, the Cavaliers are going to be close to unstoppable, at least on the offensive end.

Based on offensive win shares, an advanced stat that takes into account a player's total offensive impact, LeBron and Love are two of the three best players in the league. The top five:

• Kevin Durant (14.8)
• LeBron James (12.3)
• Kevin Love (10.6)
• James Harden (10.1)
• Steph Curry (9.3)

It's one thing to have a pair of exceptional offensive players on your team. It's another to have what the Cavs have now — two exceptional offensive players with complementary playing styles.

Love is a nominal power forward who can shoot threes and make enough mid-range shots to keep defenses honest. The LeBron-Love pick-and-roll will be a nightmare, with defenses stuck between keeping LeBron away from the rim and guarding the Love jumper. When LeBron goes down in the post — something that he has been effective at in the past two years — Love can space the floor. He also commands a double-team in the post.

Love is basically Chris Bosh if Chris Bosh had a better post game and was a great offensive rebounder.

This is a very scary proposition for the rest of the NBA, and that's even before you get to Kyrie Irving.

The 2013-14 season was supposed to be Irving's breakout year. Instead, playing on a bad team on which he was the entire offense, he regressed a bit. He averaged 17 points and six assists on just 43% shooting. Those efficiency numbers will improve next year when he's the third option and his role will be decidedly different. He's a 22-year-old who has already made two All-Star teams, and now he has LeBron James next to him. He's going to get better.

In addition to Irving, Dion Waiters stands to benefit greatly form LeBron and Love. As ESPN's Brian Windhorst mentioned on the B.S. Report earlier this week, Waiters makes sense with this team. He shot 41.6% on catch-and-shoot 3-pointers last year, which is the same as great 3-point shooters like Danny Green and Chandler Parsons. His poor overall numbers were a matter of poor shot selection, not ability. If his job is to stand on the wing and make wide-open 3's, he'll be fine.

There are real reasons to dislike this trade for the Cavs.

Cleveland's defense is going to be an adventure. Its only rim protector is the perpetually injured Anderson Varejao, and Love and Irving have shown only a passing interesting in guarding people in recent years.

Cleveland also killed its cap flexibility for the next half-decade. The team will not be able to sign anyone beyond the mid-level next summer, when players like Marc Gasol and LaMarcus Aldridge will be free agents. LeBron-Love-Irving is now their team for the foreseeable future.

But they're going to score like crazy.

Join the conversation about this story »

The NBA is already looking to maximize the exposure of LeBron James' decision to return to the Cleveland Cavaliers as details of the upcoming NBA season's schedule start to emerge.

The Cavs will open their season at home against the New York Knicks on October 30 according to Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports. This will actually be the Knicks' second game as they will open their season against the Bulls.

The Cavaliers will then travel to Chicago on October 31 to face the Bulls.

But the big moment will come on Christmas Day when LeBron will return to Miami for the first time to face the Heat according to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports.

The nationally televised Christmas Day matchups are often treated as the de facto start to the NBA season as casual sports fans begin to transition from football to basketball.

The other Christmas Day matchups will be the Washington Wizards at the Knicks, Oklahoma City at San Antonio, the Lakers at Chicago, and Golden State in Los Angeles against Steve Ballmer's Clippers.

The full schedule will be unveiled later on Wednesday.

Join the conversation about this story »

Rich Paul, LeBron James' 33-year-old agent and longtime friend, is one of the most influential people in sports.

He orchestrated LeBron's shock return to Cleveland this summer, holding talks with the Cavs while LeBron was on vacation and negotiating an incredibly smart contract that maximizes his client's earnings potential in the long term.

Joe Drape of The New York Times wrote a profile of Paul, and it sheds some new light on just how far the agent has come in the past decade.

When Paul was 21 years old he met LeBron, who was still in high school at the time, at the airport in their hometown of Akron. Paul hadn't gone to college and was trying to get his throwback jersey business off the ground when he ran into LeBron.

Here's how the NYT described their first meeting:

James, captivated by Paul’s Warren Moon throwback jersey, asked where he got it. It turned out that Paul was selling jerseys out of the trunk of his car and was going to Atlanta to buy more. He gave James his connection in Atlanta, and he told him to drop his name for a discount, and then went on his way.

'It was fate,' Paul said. 'I could have missed the plane. I could have taken an earlier flight. I could have not worn the jersey. I could have been having a bad day and not spoken to him.'

The two became friends. After LeBron got picked No. 1 overall in the now-legendary 2003 NBA Draft, he hired Paul on a $50,000 annual salary. Over the years Paul learned more and more about the sports business and went from LeBron's glorified personal assistant to his full-time agent.

He now represents a handful of NBA players and runs an agency called Klutch Sports Group.

Paul told the NYT that he didn't just want to be a member of LeBron's entourage: "LeBron had no obligation to me. I was not entitled to anything. I wanted to be valuable."

Paul randomly meeting a teenage LeBron James at an airport is certainly a stroke of luck. But what came after — Paul turning himself into a legitimate force in the NBA world — is all Paul.

Join the conversation about this story »

NBA players losing weight has been one of the most interesting trends of the offseason.

LeBron James cut carbs and lost 10 to 12 pounds. Carmelo Anthony did the same thing. Dwyane Wade says he is lighter than he was a year ago.

These three guys were all drafted in 2003. They were among the five best players in the league for a decade. They were on the Olympic team that restored USA Basketball to dominance. They were at the forefront of every major and minor NBA trend you can think of — from the rise of the superteam in free agency, to the widespread use of the "stretch-4" on the court, to the explosion of the outrageous NBA fashion off the court.

Now, all at once, they're slimming down.

And to answer why they're slimming down, you just have to look at Kobe Bryant.

In summer 2007, Kobe was at the exact point in his career that LeBron is now. He was 29 years old and going into his 12th NBA season. He was also coming off the two best statistical seasons of his life.

That summer he lost 20 pounds. It worked. Over the next three years he won two titles, made the NBA Finals every year, averaged 27 points per game, and missed only nine of 246 regular-season games.

NBA players typically fall apart when they hit age 30. A study in the book "Stumbling on Wins" found that players decline 11% in year-over-year performance from age 29 to 30, 15% from 30 to 31, 22% from 31 to 32, and 35% from 32 to 33.

That wasn't the case with Kobe. While he never returned to the superhuman statistical heights he reached in 2005-2006, he maintained the statistical profile of an elite player from age 29 to 34 — a period in which most NBA players rapidly decline. 

He was slimmer at 34 than he was at 28:

The takeaway was simple: You can extend your prime if you change your body shape once you hit your 30s.

In 2013 Kobe talked about giving Pau Gasol advice on how to stay healthy:

I told him I thought the thing that really helped me out, I dropped some weight. I told him he should probably measure it himself, see if that's something he needs to do himself. As we get older, our metabolism slows, we quietly become a little heavy.

Kobe lost an additional 16 pounds in summer 2012, when he played in the Olympics alongside LeBron, Carmelo, and Wade, among others.

He isn't the only example of an older player finding success after losing weight. Tim Duncan lost 20 pounds in 2012, and he has enjoyed an unusually long third act to his career. Ray Allen, who was picked in the same draft as Kobe, went on a paleo diet last summer and was reportedly the most in-shape player at the Heat's training camp.

But the NBA has a long tradition of imitation, where the rest of the league follows the lead of the perceived Best Player In The World. Just as Kobe borrowed liberally from Michael Jordan's repetoire both on and off the court, the current generation is doing as Kobe does when it comes to late-career body maintenance.

It takes extreme dedication to lose significant weight at a point in your career in which you have already earned over $100 million and are on the top of the world. Kobe, with one of the most vigorous work ethics of any athlete ever, had that dedication, and it helped him play longer than most NBA players. 

Join the conversation about this story »

The biggest question mark surrounding LeBron James' decision to return to the Cleveland Cavaliers is the risk he has taken putting his basketball career in the hands of a rookie head coach who has never played or coached in the NBA.

That coach, David Blatt, had a very successful run as a coach in Europe for 21 seasons after playing for the legendary Pete Carril at Princeton and 13 years as a player in Europe. He is also bringing a European style of basketball to the NBA at a time when the style is becoming more popular and just helped the San Antonio Spurs win another championship.

That being said, there are still plenty of unknowns, there will undoubtedly be growing pains, and he will need to make adjustments.

Blatt recently did a Q&A with fans and was asked what he thought the biggest transition will be moving from European basketball to the NBA:

"Probably the schedule. Playing multiple games the same week with very few practices, and having a different recovery process, is unknown territory. The good thing is, in comparison to Israel, trips are shorter and much smoother in the U.S. The weather is another adjustment because Cleveland definitely doesn’t have the heat and humidity that Israel has. At the end of the day, though, it’s all about coaching basketball."

Blatt's last European club, Maccabi Tel Aviv, generally played games once a week, only occasionally playing twice a week.

With the Cavs, Blatt will open the 2014-15 season on October 30 against the Knicks at home and then have to play the Bulls in Chicago, the very next night. The Cavs will play five games in the first nine days.

With games so often and the need to rest in between, NBA teams rarely practice during the regular season.

Blatt says it is about coaching basketball. But he is going to have to change how and when that is accomplished.

That, and jeans. He won't be able to wear jeans during games anymore.

Join the conversation about this story »

Under NBA rules, the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Minnesota Timberwolves had to wait out a 30-day moratorium on trading rookie contracts before completing the Kevin Love trade.

That moratorium expires on Saturday, and the trade that became the worst-kept secret in sports is widely expected to be made official.

According to both Timberwolves beat writer Jerry Zgoba of the Star Tribune and national NBA reporter Sam Amick of USA Today, the details of the trade are as follows:

• Cleveland gets: Kevin Love
• Minnesota gets: Andrew Wiggins, Anthony Bennett, Thaddeus Young, a trade exception
• Philadelphia gets: Luc Mbah a Moute, Alexey Shved, Miami's 2015 first-round pick

There was some talk that Bennett would go to Philly for Young, but that doesn't appear to be the case.

The Sixers are employing an unprecedented tanking strategy for the second straight year. This trade gives them a first-round pick and clears cap space for 2015-2016. Both Mbah a Moute and Shved are on expiring contracts, while Young is on the books for ~$10 million in 2015-16 if he doesn't opt out of his contract.

The trade allows Minnesota to stay competitive in the short term while also hanging on to the last two No. 1 draft picks. Bennett had an awful rookie year, but he has lost a bunch of weight in the offseason, and it is far too early to write him off as an out-and-out bust. That trade exception could also help them offload one of their bad contracts.

LeBron James got his man, in the end. He had to give up a ton of young talent, and he killed his cap flexibility going forward in the process, but he got his man.

Join the conversation about this story »

Last December, Kobe Bryant went down with a season-ending injury shortly after signing a $48-million contract extension that will make him the highest-paid NBA player until 2016.

Some criticized Kobe for not taking a larger pay cut at a point in his career when his skills are diminishing.

In an SI cover story by Chris Ballard, one anonymous GM said Kobe had "zero" trade value because of his salary.

According to Ballard, Kobe had ideological reasons for taking his extension. He believes star players are underpaid because of the league's strict maximum contract rules, and he signed his deal as a show of defiance.

From SI:

"Bryant believes that players like himself and LeBron James are underpaid, compared to what they would be worth on the free market (he told friends he thinks James would be worth roughly $75 million on an open market). With his last contract, he felt it was important to demonstrate to younger players that you should never take less than you’re worth. When I asked if he was taking a stand of sorts, this was his response:

"'If you’re talking just from a business perspective, yeah.'"

Kobe added:

"As athletes, especially as public figures, you get the pressure of playing for the love of the game, they always throw that around all the time. Of course you play for the love of the game! But do owners buy teams for the love of the game?"

The NBA is a star-driven league. In no other sport can a single player swing the fate of a franchise so easily. Yet the NBA has rules in place to suppress their salaries.

Under the new CBA, the NBA caps maximum salaries at around 30% of the salary cap with 7.5% annual raises. That means LeBron James is only allowed to make around $20 million in 2014-15. 

Estimates for what LeBron should and would get paid on the open market are all over the place. Kobe says $75 million. One stat says $44.8 million. Another stat says $31 million. But ultimately they're all more than $20 million.

Ultimately LeBron would be worth however much an NBA owner is willing to pay him, and considering some of the free-spending owners coming into the league, that number might be higher than we think.

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron James is losing a bunch of weight this summer. He lost a reported 10 pounds in the first few weeks of the summer, and shocked the NBA world when he posted of photo on Instagram looking downright skinny.

A key part of LeBron's weight-loss plan is cutting carbohydrates. Miami Heat teammate Ray Allen came into camp in the best shape of anyone on the team last fall, Windhorst reports, and that influenced LeBron this summer.

Some are referring to it as a Paleo diet, although it's unclear if LeBron is calling it that.

Ken Berger of CBS Sports did a long article on the rising popularity of Paleo diets among NBA players in December. Here's his definition of Paleo:

"The Paleolithic diet -- Paleo, for short -- involves eating like our caveman ancestors did: lean meats, wild-caught fish, vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar or processed foods. Its proponents call it the 'anti-inflammatory diet' on the theory that avoiding processed carbs and sugars decreases inflammation in the body -- the kind that causes joint pain and the kind that a growing number of medical authorities believe contributes to heart disease, obesity and diabetes."

So what's LeBron eating?

His Instagram holds some clues.

For one lunch he had "arugula salad with chicken, strawberries, mango, cashews and olive oil/lemon vinaigrette dressing" with a bowl of squash and zucchini.

This meal is full of "powerhouse" foods. Arugula is the 18th most nutritious food in the world, strawberry is 30th, and winter squash is 32nd.

Another particularly delicious-looking dinner was lobster salad with asparagus and mango chutney:

As with any diet, the key here is sticking to it. While he was in Greece, a restaurant made LeBron a personalized cake, and he didn't eat it.

"To dang on bad I can't eat it! Grrrrrrrrrr!! Smh." he said on Instagram. 

As you can see above, all of LeBron's meals feature lean meats and vegetables.

LeBron's wife, Savannah Brinson, is also into eating healthy. She opened a shop called The Juice Spot in Miami last year that calls itself "Miami's first Wifi bar fully equipped with organic cold pressed juices, superfood smoothies, Acai and Oatmeal bowls."

Last December, LeBron was eating Acai bowls and drinking beet juice from the juice bar, so he has a history with these sorts of food:

Kobe Bryant was the first NBA superstar to recognize the importance of dieting and losing weight once you enter the back half of your career. Now Carmelo Anthony, Dwyane Wade, LeBron and others are following suit.

The result is a leaner, more energetic LeBron James, which is terrifying for the rest of the league.

Join the conversation about this story »

When LeBron James signed his 2-year, $42.2 million contract with the Cleveland Cavaliers it was clear that James was banking on the new television deals for the NBA being huge which in turn would bring the salary cap way up along with his earning potential.

With the NBA nearing deals worth in excess of $2 billion with ESPN and Turner (TNT) it looks like that is exactly what is happening and once again James was once step ahead of everybody else.

With the increased television revenue, Dan Feldman of Pro Basketball Talk estimates that the new salary cap will rise to $16 million with that bump likely spread out over two seasons (2015-16 and 2016-17) to eliminate a massive 1-year spike. However, even if spread out over two years, the jump will still be huge.

What this means for LeBron is he will be able to cash in with a new max contract when his 2-year deal expires following the 2015-16 season or sooner if he chooses to opt-out after just one year.

As a 10-year veteran, James' salary is directly linked to the size of the salary cap as he is eligible to earn up to 35% of the team's cap space. Instead of an average salary of $22 million over the next four years, James can start earning an average salary of ~$24.9 million if he opts out after one year or ~$27.7 million if he waits until after the 2015-16 season.

So instead of signing a 4-year, $88 million deal now, James can potentially earn up to $153 million over the next six years, an extra $65 million over two years as long as he stays healthy.

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron James shared new details of the diet that saw him lose more than 10 pounds this summer, and it sounds even more extreme than we realized.

James told reporters at his Nike sneaker event in Oregon that he cut out everything except meat, fish, fruit, and vegetables for 67 days. He did it to "test his mental fortitude,"The Oregonian reports.

He told SI:

"I had no sugars, no dairy, I had no carbs. All I ate was meat, fish, veggies and fruit. That's it. For 67 straight days."

He told the Oregonian that he had "lost a ton of weight"— so much weight that he's now trying to put back on a few pounds.

LeBron's weight loss has been one of the big stories of the NBA off-season. After he posted an Instagram photo looking downright skinny in August, speculation began that he was on a Paleo diet. Brian Windhorst of ESPN reported that he dropped more than 10 pounds after going on a low-carb diet.

So what exactly was he eating all summer?

He posted photos of a few meals on Instagram this summer, and they seem to follow the 67-day diet he described.

For one lunch he had "arugula salad with chicken, strawberries, mango, cashews and olive oil/lemon vinaigrette dressing."

For another he had lobster salad with mango chutney:

When he was on vacation in Greece the hotel made him a personalized cake, which he didn't eat, apparently because he was off added sugars.

There are multiple theories why LeBron decided to lose weight this summer. Windhorst told ESPN's Bill Simmons that LeBron was in relatively poor shape at the beginning of the 2013-14 season after winning the title in 2013 and getting married that summer. He added that LeBron has always been a bit self-conscious about his weight, listing himself at 250 pounds when he's clearly in the 260s.

There's also a Kobe Effect at work. After Kobe successfully extended his career by losing weight as he entered his mid-30s, a bunch of NBA stars are following his lead. LeBron, Carmelo Anthony, and Dwyane Wade all dropped weight this summer.

A little more than a month before the NBA season, it looks as if the best player in the world is leaner than we've seen him in a long, long time.

NOW WATCH: Scientists Have Debunked These 5 Common Myths About Meat

SEE ALSO: The Fabulous Life Of LeBron James

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron James said in an interview with CNN's Rachel Nichols that he was down to about 250 pounds and would be quicker than last year after going on an extreme diet for 67 straight days this summer.

The diet appears to be a modified paleo diet. He didn't eat sugar, carbs, or dairy and consumed only meat, fish, vegetables, and fruit for more than two months.

In the interview, which will air on CNN on Friday night, the new Cavaliers player said he dreamed of cookies and pancakes while on the diet. When asked if he was faster now, he said: "I am. I am. And that's not such a good thing for the competition."

LeBron was listed at 250 pounds last year, but that's widely considered a fabrication. ESPN's Brian Windhorst guessed that LeBron has been into the 260's in recent years.

Here's the full transcript from the Nichols interview:

RACHEL NICHOLS: You've already been putting in a lotta work to try to make this season successful, been on a pretty strict diet, you look lighter. I mean, how much weight did you lose?

LEBRON JAMES: I lost a few pounds. I lost — I haven't been in this weight class.

RN: Gimme a ballpark?

LJ: I'm in the 250ish range, you know, a lot lighter than I've been playing at in the last few years. But I feel good. 

RN: The diet was strict, right?

LJ: Very strict. Sixty-seven days.

RN: And what did you eat or not eat? 

LJ: I'll tell you what I couldn't have. No carbs, no sugar, no dairy, no refined sugar — no nothing. Meat.  Fish. Veggies. Fruit.

RN: What was the hardest thing to give up?

LJ: It was either pancakes or chocolate chip cookies and ice cream. 

RN: I mean, did you go to bed dreaming about pancakes — 

LJ: Once —

RN:— that you couldn't have?

LJ: All the time. I had the cookie monster chasing me a few times in my dreams.  

RN: Are you quicker on the court now?

LJ: I am. I am. And that's not such a good thing for the competition.

In August, LeBron posted this picture to Instagram, prompting a wave of interest in his dieting habits that is set to ramp up with the NBA season a month away:

NOW WATCH: Scientists Have Debunked These 5 Common Myths About Meat

Join the conversation about this story »

For 67-straight days this summer, LeBron James didn't eat sugar, carbs, or dairy. 

He only ate meat, fish, fruits, and vegetables as a "mental challenge," he says. He even turned down a custom-made cake from a restaurant in Mykonos at one point.

The results were profound. He says he lost "a ton of weight," and a jarring Instagram photo of "Skinny LeBron" looking thin in the face became the biggest NBA story of the dog days of August.

While the diet might be responsible for a leaner, quicker, more terrifying LeBron James, experts from the health world are skeptical.

"This is not something as a dietitian I would advocate for," Joy Dubost, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, told Business Insider, "I don't believe, nor does the science support, that you have to eliminate certain food groups to be healthier or lose weight."

The diet appears to be a modified approach to a traditional paleo diet, according to Dubost. The paleo diet, which NBA players like Ray Allen have adopted in recent years, calls for the elimination of processed foods, grains, sugars, and even legumes. It's sometimes called the "caveman diet" since it advocates for people eating like humans did thousands of years ago.

You lose weight on the paleo diet because you inherently consume fewer calories. Cutting calories by eliminating entire food groups results in the type of weight loss we've seen from LeBron, but it also deprives your body of healthy sources of nutrients.

"When you start excluding dairy and whole grains, those are all very nutrient-rich sources that provide important vitamins and minerals into the diet. And when you start restricting that, particularly for a length of time, you can run the risk of nutrient deficiency," Dubost said.

It takes significant planning and resources to get the nutrients you need while refusing to eat grains, sugars, and dairy. LeBron has every resource in the world at his disposal. He has a team of people making sure he's getting the nutrients he needs. Normal people don't, which makes trying to mimic a diet like LeBron's difficult.

"LeBron James will walk into a restaurant and they're going to do whatever they can to accomodate him. He's going to have personal chefs and personal nutritionists," Dubost said.

"Your everyday person will not get that."

Alissa Rumsey, a clinical dietitian at New York-Presbyterian Hospital, agrees.

"I personally don't believe in completely cutting out all grains and dairy, that some in moderation is fine and can provide you with fiber, protein and a variety of vitamins/minerals," she told Business Insider, "I find that any 'diet' that cuts out complete food groups is not one that people can follow in the long term."

This was never a long-term diet plan for LeBron. He said he originally only planned to go on the diet for a month, but keep going for 67 days because he felt so good. Even Ray Allen, whose summer paleo diet last year reportedly influenced LeBron, immediately ramped up his consumption of carbs once the season rolled around.

LeBron can get away with this diet in the short-term because he's surrounded by experts, he has the resources to do it right, and he's one of the best athletes ever. For you and me ... not so much.

"For the normal, everyday person this is too extreme," Dubost says, "If you're going to follow this approach or want to follow it, I'd really encourage anybody to meet with a dietitian."

Join the conversation about this story »

This summer LeBron James slimmed down, losing some 15 pounds to ready himself for the upcoming season. His secret? Cutting carbs.

The approach is nothing new: Two years ago, Dr. Cate Shanahan helped the Los Angeles Lakers switch from high-carb to low-carb diets and become so-called fat-burners, meaning that their bodies burn fat as a primary fuel, instead of carbohydrates. It's a fast way to lose weight while keeping muscle, a move that can help prevent injuries and boost energy reserves for players — and everyone else.

"The best way to make the switch at home is in baby steps over the course of a month," says Shanahan, author of Food Rules, A Doctor's Guide to Healthy Eating, and Deep Nutrition: Why Your Genes Need Traditional Food. To get started, stick to Shanahan's three guiding principles for designing low-carb meals (or go to her website, drcate.com, and click on "What's To Eat?"), and follow her four-week plan.

The Guiding Principles
1. 50/30/20: Aim to get 50 percent of your calories from healthy fats, 30 percent from protein, and 20 percent from healthy carbohydrates, ideally whole fruits and vegetables. 

2. Embrace healthy fats: Going low carb means going high fat, and that means knowing the bad fats from the good. On the bad side, the only true villain is trans-fat, which sometimes appears on ingredient labels as "hydrogenated" or "partially-hydrogenated" oil, and which hides in a lot more processed food than you'd think, including most commercial salad dressings containing Canola and other vegetable oils (for a list of offending oils, check out Dr. Shanahan's website). On the good side, walnuts, almonds, avocados, olive oil, and fatty fish like salmon and sardines are the superstars. But don't be afraid of saturated fats from whole food sources like poultry, butter, and meat, especially grass-pastured. Numerous major studies have failed to find any link between saturated fat consumption and heart disease. Plus, says Shanahan, "Our bodies need these fats to help with nutrient absorption." 

3. Don't snack: "A lot of people have been told you've got to suppress appetite by having frequent small meals throughout the day. But this keeps your insulin levels elevated, interfering with your switch to fat-burning." Don't starve yourself, but skip those hourly handfuls of almonds.

Four Weeks to LeBron Lean
Week One: Zero Carb Breakfast. For the first week, don't worry about changing your lunch and dinner habits. Just make breakfast a zero-carb meal — as in, two eggs scrambled in extra-virgin olive oil, topped with avocado. Or cold leftover chicken. You'll feel the difference immediately, in steady energy throughout the morning.

Week Two: Pack Lunch. When Dr. Shanahan says baby steps, she means baby steps. Before you worry about what goes into lunch, just get into the habit of packing lunch at home and bringing it with you to work. Mid-day restaurant and cafeteria meals are too often jumbo-sized and loaded with carbs and trans-fats.

Week Three: Low-Carb Your Lunch. Salad with chicken, tuna, steak, or even a hardboiled egg, plus copious walnuts, avocado, extra-virgin olive oil.

Week Four: Low-Carb Your Dinner. You've always wanted to eat this way: roasted, pan-seared, or grilled lamb/chicken/steak/fish, with copious sauce; heaping helping of vegetables or salad, maybe some cheese; fresh fruit dessert; but skip the rice/bread/pasta/chips.

More from Men's Journal:

• How to Eat to Improve Your Performance
• The Top 10 Protein Power Foods
• 7 Ways to Lose Your Belly Fat
• How to Stick to Your Diet and See Results
• 10 Bad Foods That Get a Healthy Rap

NOW WATCH: Scientists Have Debunked These 5 Common Myths About Meat

Join the conversation about this story »

The health world thinks the LeBron James diet is crazy.

LeBron didn't eat sugar, carbs, or dairy for 67 straight days this summer. He subsisted on meat, fish, fruits, and vegetables — and lost a startling amount of weight in the process. It's a modified version of a paleo diet, the fad diet in which people eat as humans did thousands of years ago.

LeBron was able to pull off this diet because he has the resources to do it right, he's one of the most athletic people ever, and he has a team of experts making sure he's getting all the nutrients he needs.

But registered dietitians say the diet is too extreme, arguing that eliminating entire food groups to lose weight is both unnecessary and dangerous.

"I would discourage any client, professional athlete or not, from following this low-carb diet," Torey Jones Armul, a registered dietitian, nutritionist, and spokeswoman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, told Business Insider. "To lose weight, increase energy levels, and improve performance, your best bet is loading up on fruits and vegetables, choosing whole grains and lean protein and making exercise a habit throughout the week." 

"Cutting out entire food groups is extreme and puts people at risk for nutritional deficiencies, not to mention nearly impossible to sustain in the long-term," she said.

Other dietitians we spoke to agreed: there's no reason to voluntarily stop eating entire food groups.

While health professionals advise against doing what LeBron did, there are ways you can take elements of LeBron's low-carb approach and make a healthy diet out of it.

Armul gave us some sample "LeBron diet" meals that also incorporate the type of healthy grains and dairy that dietitians say you should never cut out entirely.

They sound pretty delicious.

Breakfast:

• Option 1: Veggie omelet with a side of turkey bacon, fresh fruit, and sweet potato hash browns.
• Option 2: 100% whole-grain or sprouted wheat toast topped with peanut butter or almond butter, banana, and side of Greek yogurt with blueberries or other sliced fruit.
• Option 3: Egg sandwich with 100% whole-grain muffin, avocado and salsa, and a smoothie made with fresh or frozen fruit and low-fat Greek yogurt.

Lunch:

• Option 1: Spinach salad with veggies, grilled chicken, and a light balsamic, vinaigrette, or olive oil dressing. Pair with a side of fresh fruit, or add sliced berries, apples, or mandarin oranges as a salad topper.
• Option 2: Turkey sandwich on 100% whole-grain or sprouted wheat bread. Add healthy toppings like spinach, avocado, tomato, cucumber, sprouts, and yellow mustard. Pair with a side salad or fresh fruit salad.

Dinner:

• Option 1: Grilled or baked salmon with crushed pistachio topping, steamed vegetables and quinoa, drizzled with freshly squeezed lime juice, olive oil, or balsamic vinaigrette. Season with dried herbs like rosemary, chipotle pepper, or paprika.
• Option 2: Chicken or shrimp soft tacos with whole-wheat tortilla, shredded spinach, black beans, avocados, diced tomatoes, or chile peppers and salsa. Top with plain Greek yogurt for a lower-calorie sour cream substitute.

SEE ALSO: The Fabulous Life Of LeBron James

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron's Cleveland Cavaliers are already making highlights.

Just a few days into training training camp, in an open scrimmage, Kyrie Irving and LeBron James hooked up for the first of many highlights.

On a fastbreak, Irving dropped a pass off through his legs, hitting LeBron James with a perfect lane as he soared in for the dunk. 

Here's video from the scrimmage:

SEE ALSO: LeBron James Says He's Faster, In A Different 'Weight Class' After Extreme 67-Day Diet

Join the conversation about this story »

Like most of the all-time greats, LeBron James has an incredible work ethic unrivaled by most of his peers.

But LeBron also has a secret weapon that separates him from many of the other greats: his amazing memory.

James may have an "eidetic memory"— the closest thing to the mythical photographic memory — according to ESPN's Brian Windhorst. He can remember specific plays from old games in exacting detail. One teammate told Windhorst that you can't use the same football team twice when you play LeBron in the "Madden" video game because he remembers which plays you ran.

He is already putting that work ethic and memory to use in his return to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Ken Berger has written a story for CBSSports.com about new Cavs coach David Blatt and the building of his relationship with James. The piece includes one telling nugget from the team's first week of full practices.

At the end of the second day of practices, during which the team was practicing twice a day, Blatt "blew his whistle and told the players to clear the court and get off their feet." He then held a meeting with this coaches for about 30 minutes.

When Blatt emerged from the offices, he found James still on the court coaching four teammates on the details of Blatt's offense from the point of view of each position.

There was James on the practice floor with four teammates, marching them through the intricacies of Blatt's offensive system from the perspective of each position, one through five. James had already mastered them all.

Many players struggle to master their own positions. Before the end of the first week of practice, LeBron has already mastered all five positions in an offense he has never played in before.

We can argue about the greatest players of all time. But when it is all said and done, we will have a hard time coming up with a player who was better at the mental side of the game.

Join the conversation about this story »

LeBron James is selling the Miami estate he called home when he played for the Heat, the South Florida Business Journal reports.

It's listed by Opulence International Reality, which calls the house"the most opulent estate in Miami."

It's on the market for $17 million.

It has an infinity pool that overlooks Biscayne Bay, a maze of terraces, a movie room, and a massive master suite. The photos make it look incredible.

The outdoor space is the best part.

The concrete dock has room for two 60-foot yachts.

The infinity pool overlooks Biscayne Bay.

LeBron James took a risk when he signed his short-term contract with the Cleveland Cavaliers in July.

He could have signed a four-year deal worth $94.5 million guaranteed. Instead, he signed a two-year, $42.1 million contract designed to make him a free agent when the league's new TV deal begins in 2016.

At the time, it looked as if the value of the TV deal would double— resulting in a salary cap bump that would significantly increase the value of LeBron's potential max contract starting in 2016.

On Monday, we got the details of the new TV deal, and it's even more massive than anyone expected.

ESPN and Turner will pay the NBA a reported $2.66 billion per year — a 186% increase from the previous deal. Because the salary cap is directly tied to "basketball related income" (of which TV money is a huge part), the deal will increase the salary cap by an estimated $25.8 million (45%) starting in 2016-2017. And, significantly for LeBron, it will increase the value of the league's maximum contract by $9 million per year.

That's a huge spike, and LeBron is positioned perfectly to take advantage of it because he took the unusual step of signing a two-year deal instead of a four-year deal.

In addition, waiting two years to sign a long-term deal with Cleveland bumps up the value of his annual raises. Under NBA rules, a free agent who leaves his team to sign elsewhere (like LeBron this summer) gets 4.5% annual raises. But a player who has been with his team for at least two years and re-signs there can get 7.5% annual raises. LeBron will qualify for that 7.5% annual raise in two years under what's called the Early Bird exception.

His max salary would have started at $22.1 million with $1 million annual raises if he signed a max contract this summer. His max salary will start at an estimated $31.1 million with $2.3 million annual raises if he signs a max deal in summer 2016, assuming the salary cap increases by 45% because of the new TV money.

When you add it all up, LeBron's estimated max contract starting in 2016-2017 will be four years, $138 million. His estimated max contract this summer was four years, $94.5 million.

As long as LeBron stays healthy, signing a two-year deal will have made him an extra $43 million in the long term.

NOW WATCH: How The Secrets Of The Samurai Can Help You Achieve Laser-Focus

SEE ALSO: LeBron Is Selling 'The Most Opulent Estate In Miami' For $17 Million

Join the conversation about this story »