Deadspin
Anbody who's ever been a waiter in their life realizes that it can be a dreadfully demeaning job. Regardless of how much tip money you collect for five hours of work (most of which usually go back into the restaurant during the post-shift decompression time at the bar) there's always a moment when you say to yourself, "This is why I should've never been an English major."
The poor server who had the unfortunate experience of waiting on LeBron at Cleveland's XO Prime Steaks during a recent late night pop-in probably had this thought. According to the Cleveland Scene, this is how it all went down:
LeBron pulls up in his Mercedes outside XO. People stop and try not to stare, but c'mon, it's LeBron James. He enters the restaurant with a group of friends. On this special occasion, the King decides to dine late. He keeps his group there until around 3:45 a.m. During this time the waiter obsequiously pours drinks and fetches anything else His Greatness needs.The final bill comes to $800. By the feudal laws of decorum, which stipulate that the affluent should administer a 20 percent gratuity, staffers figured they'd be pocketing an extra $160. But when they fetched the autographed bill after His Heinousness bolted back to Akron, their expectation turned to disbelief, then anger.
LeBron stiffed them with a meager $10 tip. This is what French nobles like to call your requisite Bourgeois Bitch-Slap. The waiter wouldn't even take it, tired of being shat on by guys like LeBron.
It'd probably be in James' best interest to now hire an official food taster if he plans on dining at anymore Cleveland restaurants in the near future.
When it comes to tipping, LeBron goes Scrooge McDuck [Cleveland Scene]
Comments
This is what French nobles like to call your requisite Bourgeois Bitch-Slap.
Usually you pay double for that, Cotton!
I"m sick of waiters expecting tips for doing their jobs.
Roy Williams is proud.
Lebron is the biggest tool in sports. I can't stand the bitch. The Kanye West of basketball.
Well, in his defense, he had to get gas that day.
@nico002: Aw, bitter Kobe fanboy.
You mean to tell me Lebron's posse isnt big enough to meet the requisite 'parties of 8 or more' mandatory 18% tip?
He tips the refs better.
Look, now he's flipping us off!
Nope, just a disgruntled knicks fan.
It's odd that he hasn't learned from Big Z's tipping skills.
/bad joke
I'm not that surprised. Ilgauskas and Varejao are the ones who handle all the tips on the Cavs roster.
@Afino: De-Mo-NAY! De-Mo-NAY!
A personal chef may be in order.
@DavidTheMan: Yeah, it's so ludicrous to expect to get, ya know, paid for your job.
/Former waiter.
As someone who worked as a cook, I say fuck the front of the house.
UGH. What a dick. One more reason I hope the Celtics shut him down again tonight. WE ARE ALL WITNESSES
I waited on Bill Cowher once, and he's a good tipper.
/motion's with fingers
Here's the world's smallest violin playing for all the waiters.
So I guess that photo is LeBron playing the world's tiniest violin for all the world's waitresses?
/Mr. Pink'd
Sorry, but you're still not getting anyone to root for Boston.
"'Listen, there won't be any tip. But in the afterlife, you'll achieve total consciousness.' So I got that going for me, which is nice."
I love black people. I would be friends with a black person if the opportunity ever came up. Go Obama!, etc.
But black people are just horrendous tippers. I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'.
this guy keeps putting too much garlic in the sauce.
Witness [a cheap douchebag]
@Natrone Means Business: Damn...
Hate stories like this. For chrissakes, dude, throw a G on the table and be done with it.
It's almost like he's a 23-year-old multimillionaire athlete and international celebrity who's been told he's God's gift to basketball since he was a teenager, and thus has no way of having any real empathy for anyone who hasn't been raised in that matter.
@TheHogBlogger: Doh!
@nico002: I don't think King James cracks the top 1,000 in the "Tools In Sports" list.
this happens way more than you think
@nico002: LeBron's closeted?
@nico002: Oh, a Marbury fanboy, even better. Because he's not a tool.
@ Brazil
You're wrong.
Marbury is mentally retarded. Lebron is just a toolshed.
XO will now establish automatic gratuity on 17% for cheap superstars.
@DavidTheMan: While I'm very inclined to agree with you, I must say that I'm guessing the treatment for a VIP such as King James was probably better than a schmoe like myself would get if I strolled into a place like that late at night and wanted to be waited on until almost 4 in the morning. For that extra bit of service and ass kissing you would think he'd leave a little more than $10 on an $800 tab. Forget the "standard" 10%, or 20% or whatever rules people have... but $10 on 8 hun just ain't right.
@King of Pants:
Yeah, but he's still a douche. You have to be a complete asshole to leave ten fucking dollars on an $800 tab. I'm not asking him to calculate the 20%, but he had to know that $10 was an insult.
@Phil Mickelson's Man Tits: This kind of stuff always starts arguments but correct me if I'm wrong doesn't the Restaurant pay you a wage?
@Arriaga_II: I hate it when restaurants do that.
I'm a 20-25 per center, especially if a server has to put up with/clean up after my kids. But if they stick me with a forced 15 or 18 per cent gratuity, well, that's all they're getting.
Course it's douches like LeBron here who force them to resort to demanding tips up front.
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon:
egg-fucking-xactly
Wait a sec, $10 is a bad tip on an $800 tab? My grandfather is rolling around in his grave.
Hey, that's about a dollar for each point scored in Game One against the Celtics.
By the way, shouldn't tips be a form of compensation for stellar service received, instead of an expectation even mediocre waiters have? Shouldn't waiters be paid more, so that they don't live or die by the amount of tips they get?
LBJ will never hold a candle to Kosar. Never.
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon:
most of the time, restaurants pay at or below minimum wage with the expectation of the front of the house splitting all tips as a supplement
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon: As a waiter or waitress, you make a nominal wage of about $2.something an hour. Your wages are supposed to be made in tips. They're not just gravy.
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon: @BigTenObsession:
Yeah, but servers get paid below minimum wage because most of their income is from tips.
@DavidTheMan:
Anyone who doesn't sympathize with waiters is an asshole. They make $2.50 an hour. They depend on tips.
Fuck LeBron.
@nico002: The biggest tool in sports? Really? He would certainly fall behind the entire Knicks roster, and probably everyone who played for New York from the mid-90's on.
just fukn tip people! if u can't afford to tip than don't eat out so damn much!
Madden, Kruk and Mangino do not apply to this rule
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon: I could go on hour long rants on this. Waiters act as if they are sweatshop workers being forced to work. If you don't like the wages/hours/working conditions, fucking quit.
Still, LeBron was a d-bag before we knew he was a bad tipper, now just more so.
In LeBron's defense, he was using a Willard to determine the proper gratuity.
@DavidTheMan:
Yes god forbid there be a service industry job where a person's pay is directly proportional to how good they are at the job (or the size of their breasts).
See how much better service a flat-rate pay institution, like say the DMV, treats it's customers than waiters.
/former waiter
for what it's worth...Cleveland Scene is one of those free weekly news/tabloid rags.
You know...the kind that have the transvestite ads in the back..err um...yeah.
The problem is BronBron's tip calculator was a "Wilard".
How is it a steakhouse in Cleveland can stay open til quarter to 4am, and every place in LA shuts down at 1:45am?
Maybe the service was just slow and horrendous? I mea, Christ, he was there until 3:45.
Scottie "No Tippin'" Pippen sat outside XO, grinning like Miyagi at the end of the Karate Kid.
It's not Lebron's fault. Tebow just got there before the waiter.
@SlantedAndDisenchanted: I'm not.
To be fair, when the end of the night came, everyone else at the table just stood around waiting for Lebron to do something.
@HockeyMountain: I only wish that the DMV, doctors and many other prefossions got paid this way.
what an absolute dick.
GO CELTICS!
And LeBron then fulfilled his promise of shooting whatever percentage he tipped against the Celtics.
@Dany Heatley Speedwagon: In Boston, their hourly wage is $2.31/hr. So yea, they get a wage, only its roughly 66% less than minimum wage.
@Send It In, Jerome!: @Dany Heatley Speedwagon: "Mine doesn't have a 7!"
I always thought it was funny that dudes are in the back, sweating their asses off and cleaning nasty shit and only make like minimum wage to 15/hr max...meanwhile some bubbly young lass waits tables (not easy, but not backbreaking by any stretch) and nets 200-300 for 6 hours of work?
Servers should only complain if they work at anything in the Ponderosa-Denny's-local diner class. You are the T.O.'s of the restaurant world.
/Republican
//kidding