LeBron James publicly said he'd want to play with Anthony Davis. And he defended those comments about the New Orleans Pelicans center Friday night by saying he'd actually want to play with lots of good players.
The first name the Los Angeles Lakers star mentioned as an example won't make Warriors fans happy, though.
LeBron James takes on the hullabaloo about his Anthony Davis quote. This was good. pic.twitter.com/ErJadhnOJ7— Tania Ganguli (@taniaganguli) December 22, 2018
It's interesting that of all the players in the NBA, LeBron had to mention Kevin Durant to open his statement. Where KD goes (or stays, Warriors fans hope) might be the top storyline of the next offseason, and he's already being linked to teams across the NBA. If Durant heads to L.A. as part of the next LeBron-led super team, it could take the Warriors-Lakers rivalry to a whole other level.
The NBA told ESPN that James' comments about Davis weren't considered tampering. ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reported that some small-market general managers aren't happy with the league's apparent unwillingness to enforce its own tampering rules, which, in simple terms, state that you can't talk about players under contract to other teams. Davis is under contract with the Pelicans until 2020, and LeBron definitely talked about him.
Those small-market GMs also won't like this news nugget. Yahoo Sports cited league sources in reporting that James and Davis, who share the same agent, had a postgame dinner together. So, yeah, the recruiting pitch is on, and the Pelicans can't do anything about it.
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It's obvious that LeBron wants more talent around him on the Lakers, and Davis definitely would help on that front. Warriors fans just hope LeBron keeps his focus on AD and stays away from KD.
