It’s been a busy summer for the Los Angeles Lakers, who recently extended Luka Doncic on a three-year, $165 million contract. For the first time in his illustrious career, LeBron James will be entering a season where he is clearly not the number one option on his team and won’t be tasked with doing most of the heavy lifting.
Despite this, players from previous generations have long criticized James for seemingly taking the easy way out by switching teams throughout his career, and recently, former Utah Jazz guard John Stockton continued this trend.
“I like where guys tighten their belt up and say…let’s go to work. We just got to get better; we got to play harder; we gotta play smarter, instead of just huh, where’s the grass greener?” said Stockton, per Jeremy Kruger of Yahoo Sports, via Apex Jones on X, formerly Twitter.
“I’m gonna go there and win a championship. I think it devalues that. You’re not climbing the mountain; you’re taking a helicopter to the top.”
Most people who criticize James in this regard seem to be taking aim at his teaming with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh with the Miami Heat in the early 2010s.
James also joined a star-studded team that featured Kyrie Irving and quickly traded for Kevin Love when he re-signed with the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2014.
However, when James arrived to the Lakers in 2018, Los Angeles was in one of its darkest periods in team history, and two years later, the Lakers were lifting the Larry O’Brien trophy with James winning NBA Finals MVP honors.
It’s true that James has switched teams more than most other legends of the game, including players like Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, and others.
However, LeBron James didn’t have the benefit of being drafted into a competent organization, as those players did, which may have forced his hand in bolting from Cleveland in the 2010 offseason.
The way he handled that decision and publicized it on national television may be fair game for criticism, but had he stayed, there’s no telling how differently his career may have ended up.
