Tour de LeBron: The New Jersey Nets

Now that the Lakers and the Celtics have gone to the last seconds in the last minute of the last game and finally scratched and clawed and wheezed and battled to decide a champion, it's time for the really intense competition to begin.

Who gets LeBron James?

The LeBron Sweepstakes begin when the doors to free agency swing open on July 1. The two-time MVP will have a conga line of suitors winding from coast-to-coast.

The footlights of NewYork or the movie lights of L.A.? The salsa beat of Miami or the thundering Bulls hoofbeats of Chicago? The comfort of home in Cleveland or the mean streets of New Jersey? Fuhgeddaboutit.

Here's a tour of the prime spots where The King may end up.

This stop: the New Jersey Nets.

Brook Lopez has quickly established himself as a young center with All-Star potential and he's got a more than capable running mate in point guard Devin Harris. Toss in the No. 3 pick in the Draft and the enthusiasm of new coach Avery Johnson and the Nets are a team with a reason to feel good about the future.

Great views of the Manhattan skyline and easy access to the New Jersey Turnpike.

Injecting real excitement into a franchise that's been languishing in the backwaters ever since the ABA championship days of Dr. J will be a chore. Yes, there were those two trips to the NBA Finals in 2002 and 2003. But those were the anomalies.

Frank Sinatra, Bruce Springsteen, Tony Soprano. None of them basketball players. Oh, you noticed?

There was that shining two-year window (2002-03) when Jason Kidd, Kenyon Martin and Richard Jefferson had the Nets flying high at the top of the Eastern Conference standings. But before that, the glory days were in a different league (ABA) in a different state (N.Y.).

He would be joining the team with the worst record in the league to play off-off-Broadway in a temporary home for two years until relocation to Brooklyn. That hardly sounds like a step closer to a championship. And as Fred Armisen says in his Saturday Night Live impersonation of Gov. David Paterson: It's New Jer-seeee!

New owner Mikhail Prokhorov, the Russian billionaire, definitely needs a star attraction to give him reason to raise his glass of vodka in a toast rather than drink it to drown his sorrows because he just bought the worst team in the league.

20:1

Fran Blinebury has covered the NBA since 1977. You can e-mail him here and follow him on twitter.

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