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Is LeBron James Actually Gonna Sign with the Sixers?
By Matt Schultz
Published:
A few days ago I wrote that the Sixers should sign LeBron James. At the time I was half goofing around. While I did (and do) genuinely think he’d be an excellent addition to the Sixers’ roster, the idea of him actually deciding to come to Philadelphia seemed pretty unrealistic, so that blog was a lot of riffing around. I said Philadelphia is a good city to have a midlife crisis in. I wrote a pretty lengthy paragraph about the Iron Hill in Wilmington, DE. I shoehorned in something about Ben Simmons’ fishing interview in Men’s Health, which feels so very long ago now… All in all, two days ago, LeBron to Philly was a pipe dream. It wasn’t going to happen. It was something to joke about.
But things have changed…
Jaylen Brown is a Sixer now. Philadelphia suddenly, miraculously, looks poised to make a real run in the Eastern Conference. Tyrese Maxey is a Klutch client. The road to the Finals is easier in the East than in the West. And now the idea is getting some actual buzz from insiders: Tony Jones at The Athletic reported that the Sixers are expressing interest in signing LeBron –
“On the heels of Wednesday night’s blockbuster trade for Jaylen Brown — which sent Paul George and multiple draft picks to the Boston Celtics — the Sixers have thrown their hat into the proverbial ring for the star forward, who became an unrestricted free agent after eight seasons with the Los Angeles Lakers. Philadelphia makes sense from a basketball perspective. The 76ers have enough scoring, depth and ballhandling at the top of the roster to allow James to ease into a role. And with James — or even without him — Philadelphia projects as a championship contender.”
This all sounds pretty good… but you may be thinking to yourself:“Wait… this can’t work. Don’t LeBron and Jaylen Brown have some kind of beef going? Didn’t Jaylen make a comment a couple years ago about how Bronny wasn’t good enough to play in the NBA?”
To that I would say: Yes. That did happen. Good memory:
Then I’d point you to this Jason Dumas tweet from Thursday afternoon reporting the beef has been settled and LeBron doesn’t care about it anymore:
I don’t want to get ahead of myself… but this is starting to feel real… Someone tell the Blue Coats to get Bronny a locker…
Matt Schultz is a comedy and sports writer from Philadelphia. He’s written extensively for ClickHole, The Onion, and Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco. His work has been featured in Vulture, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, Paste Magazine, and other publications. Much of his sports journalism can be found on college basketball websites that don’t exist anymore (PhilaHoops Heads rise up…) email: M.Schultz@sportradar.com