While his agent, Rich Paul, assures that he did not put pressure on the leaders of the Lakers during the “trade deadline” and that he would not allow himself to interfere in the recruitment, it is LeBron James who spoke out on the rumours. He was given the intention of returning to Cleveland, or even leaving the Lakers before the end of his contract. The interested party deniesand he quotes the journalists concerned, and he even settles a few scores.
“I don’t understand how some of my comments from the weekend were taken out of context… I never said I saw myself playing in a Cavaliers jersey. I spoke to Jason Lloyd [de The Athletic] and he asked me the question. I said, ‘Well, I don’t know what the future holds, but actually, I don’t know if I see myself playing with the Cavaliers. I do not know. Could I see myself retiring in a Cleveland jersey?’ And he said to me, ‘How about you come back to Cleveland, for a one-day contract?’ I replied that it was possible”.
“It’s like when I complimented the GM of OKC. I really think he’s doing a phenomenal job, and you take that to mean that I’m saying Rob (Pelinka) isn’t doing a good job.”
Same firmness about his statements about his son Bronny.
“And then there are the things about my son, the fact that I want to play with my son wherever he goes, and it’s like you take my words, twist them and change them. It’s like when I complimented the GM of OKC. I really think he’s doing a phenomenal job, and you take it that I’m saying Rob (Pelinka) isn’t doing a good job. (…) I don’t care about Draft choices. I only care about winning titles. How is this directed at Rob and the Lakers franchise? Rob did the same. He went for Anthony Davis, he didn’t care about draft picks either, obviously. “
Finally, he ends by targeting a journalist in particular, Bill Oram, who has followed the Lakers since 2013, first for the Orange County Register and now for The Athletic.
“It’s really weird what you guys are doing… Not all of them, but whoever’s starting this, and Bill doesn’t like the Lakers anyway. Every time Bill says something about the Lakers, it’s negative. I hope no one at the Lakers takes their word for what Bill Oram says. I really hope not. He hasn’t said a nice thing about the Lakers in so long. “
Did the press therefore draw hasty conclusions about the intentions of the “King”, who was content to give an opinion on various unrelated subjects? It’s possible, but LeBron James has often used indirect comments to convey his messages in his career, and he knows very well that by commenting in a few days on a possible return to Cleveland, the arrival of his son in the NBA and the work of other GMs, it inevitably generates a lot of noise.
Not to mention that he also minimized his influence on the establishment of the Lakers roster…
“First of all, I don’t have the controls. They ask my opinion, and I express my opinion and what I believe. But I don’t press any buttons. That’s what the “front office” is for, that’s what management is for. I don’t press any buttons. So we can fix that right away. I wish we played better basketball, but between me, AD and Russ, I think we’ve played less than 15 games together this season. And that’s the biggest disappointment so far for the three of us, because we all wanted to see this work, and we just haven’t been on the pitch at the same time. “
| Shots | Bounces | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Players | GM | Minimum | Shots | 3 points | LF | Off | Def | Early | pd | bp | Int | CT | party | Points |
| lebron james | 41 | 36.8 | 52.2 | 35.3 | 74.8 | 1.1 | 6.8 | 7.9 | 6.5 | 3.2 | 1.6 | 1.0 | 2.2 | 29.1 |
| Anthony Davis | 37 | 35.1 | 53.7 | 18.2 | 70.9 | 2.8 | 6.9 | 9.7 | 2.9 | 2.1 | 1.2 | 2.3 | 2.5 | 23.1 |
| Russell Westbrook | 57 | 34.6 | 43.7 | 29.9 | 66.8 | 1.4 | 6.4 | 7.8 | 7.5 | 4.1 | 1.1 | 0.3 | 3.0 | 18.3 |
| Carmelo Anthony | 50 | 26.5 | 43.7 | 39.2 | 82.4 | 0.8 | 3.3 | 4.2 | 1.0 | 0.9 | 0.7 | 0.8 | 2.2 | 13.4 |
| Malik Monk | 52 | 27.1 | 47.1 | 39.9 | 77.2 | 0.4 | 2.9 | 3.3 | 2.4 | 1.4 | 0.8 | 0.4 | 1.7 | 13.0 |
| Talen Horton-tucker | 42 | 25.9 | 41.0 | 27.3 | 80.0 | 0.6 | 2.7 | 3.4 | 2.7 | 1.5 | 0.9 | 0.6 | 2.5 | 9.5 |
| isaiah thomas | 4 | 25.2 | 30.8 | 22.7 | 72.7 | 0.2 | 1.8 | 2.0 | 1.5 | 1.2 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 3.0 | 9.2 |
| Sekou Doumbouya | 2 | 8.2 | 62.5 | 50.0 | 75.0 | 1.0 | 2.0 | 3.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 1.5 | 1.0 | 0.5 | 7.0 |
| Avery Bradley | 49 | 23.8 | 41.1 | 38.1 | 85.7 | 0.6 | 1.8 | 2.3 | 0.8 | 0.7 | 0.9 | 0.2 | 1.9 | 6.6 |
| Stanley Johnson | 24 | 22.0 | 48.0 | 31.4 | 67.7 | 0.7 | 2.5 | 3.2 | 1.4 | 0.5 | 0.7 | 0.4 | 2.8 | 6.5 |
| Austin Reaves | 39 | 21.3 | 48.8 | 32.6 | 82.1 | 0.6 | 2.1 | 2.6 | 1.3 | 0.5 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 1.4 | 6.2 |
| Wayne Ellington | 35 | 18.9 | 39.2 | 38.5 | 80.0 | 0.3 | 1.5 | 1.7 | 0.7 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.1 | 1.0 | 6.1 |
| Dwight Howard | 42 | 14.4 | 61.4 | 66.7 | 62.1 | 1.9 | 3.5 | 5.4 | 0.5 | 0.8 | 0.7 | 0.6 | 2.0 | 5.1 |
| Deandre Jordan | 31 | 12.9 | 67.0 | 0.0 | 48.0 | 1.6 | 3.9 | 5.5 | 0.4 | 0.6 | 0.3 | 0.8 | 1.6 | 4.2 |
| Trevor Ariza | 20 | 19.3 | 35.1 | 32.8 | 50.0 | 0.3 | 3.0 | 3.4 | 1.1 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.2 | 0.9 | 4.0 |
| Kent Bazemore | 32 | 14.4 | 33.1 | 35.8 | 76.5 | 0.3 | 1.4 | 1.7 | 0.9 | 0.3 | 0.7 | 0.2 | 1.8 | 3.7 |
| Rajon Rondo | 18 | 16.1 | 32.4 | 26.7 | 50.0 | 0.6 | 2.2 | 2.7 | 3.7 | 1.9 | 0.7 | 0.3 | 1.4 | 3.1 |
| mason jones | 2 | 4.4 | 25.0 | 0.0 | 50.0 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 1.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 2.5 |
| jemerrio jones | 2 | 7.4 | 66.7 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 0.5 | 1.5 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 2.0 |
| Darren Collison | 3 | 12.4 | 28.6 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.3 | 1.3 | 0.7 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 1.7 | 1.3 |
| Chaundee Brown | 2 | 10.3 | 14.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 | 0.0 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.0 |
| Jay Huff | 4 | 5.1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.2 | 0.8 | 1.0 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.0 |
