Report: Wealthy Paul shut down Lakers-Warriors commerce talks about LeBron James final season

There was a professional push final season for LeBron James to be a Golden State Warrior, in line with a brand new report from unbiased NBA journalist Marc Stein.�

Stein reported that commerce discussions surrounding James bought to a degree the place there have been conversations between Warriors controlling proprietor Joe Lacob and his Los Angeles Lakers counterpart Jeanie Buss, together with a push from Warriors star and James’ buddy Draymond Inexperienced to have the 39-year-old NBA icon contemplate a transfer up north.

Nonetheless, these talks by no means progressed past that, largely as a result of affect of James’ longtime agent Wealthy Paul, who was “adamantly against the thought” with James’ picture in thoughts, in line with Stein’s report.

“Sources say Paul implored each groups to scrap the idea … largely as a result of he wished to insulate James from potential backlash over switching groups for the fourth time in his profession,” Stein wrote in an article revealed Sunday (by way of Bleacher Report).

ESPN reported after February’s NBA midseason commerce deadline that Golden State had made a push to amass James earlier than the deadline, however the talks gained little traction as soon as Buss informed Lacob that the Lakers had no need to commerce James and referred him to Paul, who “resoundingly” informed the Warriors that his famous person shopper had no curiosity both.�

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Inexperienced even texted Paul, who can also be his agent, about James’ potential curiosity within the Warriors and was shortly rebuffed, per the ESPN report. The same commerce inquiry from the Philadelphia 76ers was additionally reportedly flatly denied.

LeBron James and Warriors famous person Steph Curry nonetheless bought an opportunity to play aggressive video games on the identical crew this summer time after they led Group USA to a fifth straight Olympic gold medal in males’s basketball. James, the face of the crew and United States nationwide flag bearer on the Paris 2024 opening ceremonies, averaged 14.2 factors, 6.8 rebounds and eight.5 assists per recreation throughout the match.�

He led the crew within the latter two classes and would have led in scoring as nicely if not for Curry, whose heroic taking pictures performances within the semifinal towards Serbia and gold medal recreation towards host nation France have been instrumental in Group USA’s success. Curry averaged 14.6 factors per recreation within the match, ending a hair above James.

[Top 5 USA Basketball Olympic moments: Is Steph Curry’s ‘Night Night’ No. 1?]

James now appears poised to complete out his NBA profession with the Lakers, particularly after Los Angeles drafted his son LeBron “Bronny” James Jr. within the second spherical of the 2024 NBA Draft. LeBron and Bronny are set to develop into the primary father-son duo to play on the identical crew collectively in NBA historical past.

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