NBA: What if the playoffs were only best-of-five series?

2012-2013: LeBron loses to old foes

Be glad you have these seven-game series, Miami Heat fans because the outlook of the LeBron James-era would have looked totally different.

Let’s start in 2012, where the Big Three in South Beach is fresh off losing to the Dallas Mavericks in the Finals and are yet again ready for a title run. They happen to face off in the Eastern Conference Finals with the biggest thorn in LeBron’s paw, the Boston Celtics. They are in large part the reason why James fled Cleveland to go to Miami and have yet again bested the Heat in a critical fifth game.

In reality, LeBron said a couple of weeks ago that had the Celtics won this series, the front office would have blown-up the team. Let’s assume that they all come back together and roll through the 2013 regular season.

At this point, the Heat are 0-2 in title chances so far since James came to town, but have made the NBA Finals and face the San Antonio Spurs. To refresh your memory, the iconic Ray Allen shot in Game 6 forced the decisive seventh game where Miami won. In this scenario, those moments do not happen as both teams split the first four games and the Spurs win to give Tim Duncan his fifth ring.

I write both scenarios because this would have marked the James-Wade-Bosh trio in Miami as an epic failure. If LeBron lost in 2012 to the Celtics, does he move to the Western Conference early to avoid them altogether? Where would these losses leave him in the conversation amongst the all-time greats?