Look, it’s a storyline.
Is it a concocted storyline? Oh, yeah — but you already knew that. You knew it when Rich Paul, the agent for both Bronny James and Bronny’s father LeBron, reportedly started telling certain NBA teams to not bother drafting Bronny.
You knew it when the agent further said that Bronny would not be signing a two-way contract, meaning he wouldn’t agree to any deal that could involve him playing in the NBA’s G League. That might have given a few teams pause, considering Bronny’s college averages of, let’s see here, 4.8 points, 2.8 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game.
You knew it when Bob Myers, the former top executive at Golden State, relayed during ESPN’s draft coverage that Paul was telling some teams, “If you take him, he’s going to Australia.”
And you knew it when the Lakers inevitably selected Bronny with the 55th overall pick in the second round, making this father-son thing official once LeBron re-signs. Woofed Magic Johnson on X, “Watching Bronny suit up for the Lakers during Summer League in Vegas will be must-see TV!”
So — yeah. Storyline.
The only questions now are who gets the rights (I’m going with SpringHill Company, but hey), how much access they’ll have (let’s assume total) and how soon we can expect a full series rollout. In the meantime, NBA TV and ESPN will reap the short-haul rewards.
Without a doubt, the NBA 2K25 Summer League gets a bump here, although I’ll be curious to see how fascinating people find it to watch Bronny play without his father. The bigger narrative arc, the one more people will warm to, is the idea of LeBron and his son on the court together — but that’s not what this time of year is about.
Also, Magic’s enthusiasms notwithstanding, Las Vegas won’t actually get the first crack at BronnyTV. That will almost certainly happen during the California Classic, an outgrowth of the Summer League that begins this weekend. ESPN goes first, then NBA TV:
Saturday: Lakers vs. Sacramento Kings, 4:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.
Sunday: Lakers vs. Warriors, 6:30 p.m. ET on NBA TV.
The Lakers’ first appearance in Las Vegas is set for Friday, July 12 against the Houston Rockets. That’s a 7:30 p.m. ET tip on ESPN, and the summer games then roll on for 10 days.
That is a lot of Bronny, assuming he plays and plays often. The Lakers will decide that. All that is known right now is that the younger James – whose lone season at USC was shortened by a serious health scare (a cardiac arrest during a summer workout), which was diagnosed as a congenital heart defect and required surgery to repair – is good to go.
Fair to say that Bronny never found his footing in college after that difficult turn of events. As the eldest son of LeBron, though, there’s a strong belief by some scouts in his upside, and Bronny reportedly helped his cause with a good showing at the pre-draft combine in Chicago. I mean, we’ll see.
Bronny can shoot the three and has court sense, and the Lakers’ Anthony Davis told ESPN before the draft that he supported L.A. taking LeBron’s kid.
“He’s very good defensively,” Davis said. “He can read the floor very well. I think he’s a really good playmaker. I saw him work out a couple times besides the pro day, and working with a big…His reads, reading the defense, making the right passes — that was really impressive to me.
“I think he’s going to be fine, man. Obviously, it’s a lot of pressure on him with his dad being who he is.”
You’d think so, but for Bronny and all the James gang, this is closer to situation normal. Their father has been famous for all of their lives; they’ve had cameras around them for all of their lives. Whatever Bronny has become as a basketball player, he’s achieved in the midst of that — or in spite of it, depending upon your view.
Microphones and stage lighting probably aren’t going to affect him much, considering that Bronny spent his high school years being featured in the LeBron-co-produced docuseries Top Class. This is a public player who has lived in the public eye.
Is he good enough to play in the NBA? Despite all the words spewed and images projected, it’s honestly anybody’s guess. But you won’t have to wonder for long — it’ll all be available to you, one way or another. In a different Lakers era, somebody would’ve called it Showtime.
Mark Kreidler is a national award-winning writer whose work has appeared at ESPN, the New York Times, Washington Post, Time, Newsweek and dozens of other publications. He’s also a sports-talk veteran with stops in San Francisco and Sacramento, and the author of three books, including the bestselling “Four Days to Glory.” More of his writing can be found at https://markkreidler.substack.com. He is also reachable on Twitter @MarkKreidler.
