First off, Lebron being the best player of the last 10 years playing exclusively in the East is the reason they have won 40% of the titles over the past 10 years.

No one doubts that Lebron is a great player. Last year his toughest series before the finals was...the Toronto Raptors. Toronto would not have been favored in a series against Western Conference foes: Warriors, Spurs, OKC, Clippers or Trailblazers. I actually question if they would have been favored over the #8 seeded Rockets, but we will assume that they would be for this argument.

Would Cleveland have gotten by either the Spurs or the Thunder last year? I don't think they would have. I can tell you they would not have been a favorite against the Spurs and I doubt they would have been a favorite against the Thunder. They were fortunate to get some breaks in the Finals by the league that clearly wanted the finals to continue (Draymond Green, foul count etc). They then won the critical game when they needed to. Congratulations to them.

Would Cleveland have even been the #1 seed in the West? Of course not? They would have been the #3 seed meaning they would have had to beat a team like the Spurs AND Thunder just to make the finals. Instead they played the Raptors and Hawks.

Let's put it even another way to help you understand. Cleveland is an overwhelming 1-4 favorite to win the East this year according to Vegas. The Warriors are a huge, but not quite as big as Cleveland huge, 2-7 favorite to win the West. The NBA finals? Well the Warriors are an amazing 2-3 favorite while Cleveland is 11-4. So Cleveland is a bigger favorite to win their conference, yet they are roughly 5 times less likely (according to Vegas) to win the NBA Championship? Why? Because Vegas knows that the West is brutal and the East is full of cupcakes.