Will LeBron Ever Be Liked Like Mike?

Michael Jordan has 11,679,860 fans on Facebook, LeBron James has 7,394,487 -- the difference is 4,285,373. Going into the Finals I predicted that the better team would be lead by the NBA's biggest star. I was wrong. The Heat may have had the stars, but the Mavericks clearly had the better team.

I guess I was spoiled by growing up in the Jordan generation. I have been spoiled into believing that the leagues best players are the leagues best teammates. The biggest star in the NBA is supposed to be the best leader. Because for so long, that's how it was. Michael Jordan was the NBA's best player, best teammate and best leader. And his Bulls won six championships.

Prior to the start of the NBA Finals, we witnessed LeBron dominate the Celtics and dismantle the Bulls. The Heat entered the Finals 9-0 at home with home court advantage. The Heat easily took the first game and Scottie Pippen declared that LeBron could end up being the best to ever play.

Oh, how things changed in five games.

Now that the Finals are over and the Mavericks are the champs, the general public couldn't disagree more with Pippen. Nobody is dumb enough to compare James to Jordan now. Not only did LeBron's on-court legacy take a hit, but his off-court antics and stupid press conference quotes continued to hurt his chances of ever being liked as much as Mike.

LeBron is only 26 years old, he has plenty of time left in his career to get people to "like" him.

Jordan wasn't perfect, he had gambling and marital problems during his career. Everyone knows about how Jordan was up gambling until the early hours of the morning before a Knicks playoff game. Jordan's wife filed for divorce in 2002 and settled for $168 million -- the largest divorce settlement in history at the time on public record. In 2006, Jordan paid a women $250,000 to keep their relationship a secret. James hasn't had any gambling, marital, drug or alcohol problems so far in his career.

Jordan loves himself just as much as LeBron. As cool as I think it is, there is his 'Jumpman' logo. He retired from basketball only to return by sending a press release that stated "I'm Back". And then retired again before coming back, again. James may have "The LeBron's", but Jordan had "Space Jam" first.

A big difference is that Jordan's attention seeking never came across as narcissistic because Jordan was by far the best player in the NBA. Jordan, in a sense, was the NBA.

LeBron may think he's the NBA, or wishes he was the NBA, but he's not. Not until he starts acting more mature. Not until James develops a stronger mental stability. It took Jordan losing to Detroit's "Jordan Rules" three consecutive times before he learned what it took to win it all. But even in his failings, Jordan never collapsed when the lights were the brightest.

Then again the lights that shine on James may be a lot brighter than the lights that shined on Jordan. His Airness didn't have to play in a YouTube/Twitter-driven media world like The King. Maybe Jordan's career would have been different if the media in Chicago would have been more willing to print dirt on Jordan. If @HisAirness played in a social media thriving time, bloggers in Detroit, Indiana, Los Angeles and Utah might have been harsh on his stint playing baseball or would have pushed him in post-game interviews on his relationships, on and off the court. Or maybe not.

Jordan might have avoided scrutiny from the media because he was a winner. His winning legacy started when his Tar Heels took home the 1982 NCAA championship. The legacy continued when he won his first NBA title in 1991.

Before Jordan could tell people to 'Be Like Mike', he had to win first.

James needs to take a look at how Jordan's game did his talking, the Bulls winning did his talking. And with wins came popularity, acceptance and respect. It's only a matter of time before LeBron gets his Finals win, and recaptures his fans.