Did Dan Gilbert Make a Special Fathead to Send a Message to Lebron James?

Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about basketball and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the basketball urban legends featured so far.

BASKETBALL URBAN LEGEND: Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert specially priced a Lebron James Fathead to make a statement against his former player.

Last year, Lebron James made history by returning to the Cleveland Cavaliers after spurning them to join the Miami Heat in 2010. So all is forgiven between Lebron and the fans of the Cavaliers and the owner of the Cavs, Dan Gilbert. Back in 2010, however, things were a bit different.

Gilbert spoke out against Lebron and famously celebrated the Heat losing to the Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 NBA Finals. Gilbert also found another avenue to express his displeasure with James – his Fathead!

You see, after making his fortune in the mortgage business as the founder of Quicken Loans, Gilbert began to spread his wealth around to a number of different companies. Among them are ePrize (an interaction promotions company), Xenith (a company that develops advanced helmets), Veritix (a company that specializes in paperless tickets), Stylecaster (an online fashion and beauty company), Quizzle (an online personal finance site) and, of course, Fathead.

Fathead sells large vinyl cut-outs of athletes for people (presumably mostly kids) to hang on their wall. If you name a league, Fathead sells vinyl cut-outs of players/participants from that league.

So when Lebron James left Cleveland, Gilbert was left in the odd position of having all of James’ old Cavaliers Fatheads. Now, you would think that these things would have to be discounted no matter what (because they are now out of date), but Gilbert took an interesting tact with James’ Fathead.

The largest James cut-out sold for $99.99. Gilbert reduced the price to $17.41.

Why such a specific price?

1741 was the year that Benedict Arnold, famed traitor of the American Revolution, was born.

All three of the Lebron James Fatheads quikly sold out. They held off on making a Fathead for James as a member of the Miami Heat, but eventually did so.

Luckily, all things are forgiven now!

The legend is…

STATUS: True

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future installments! My e-mail address is bcronin@legendsrevealed.com

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