LeBron James made history on Tuesday night as he became the NBA’s new all-time scoring leader, but there were plenty of negative headlines following the monumental moment.
The Lakers lost a key game in the race to make the playoffs, and it was reported by Adrian Wojnarowski on Wednesday that Lakers coach Darvin Ham and guard Russell Westbrook were involved in a “heated verbal exchange” during halftime.
The celebration inside the arena when James surpassed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s mark even spawned drama. Footage from behind the Lakers’ bench showed star big man Anthony Davis was the only person sitting down while James broke the record. The rest of his teammates stood to watch the possession.
Had this DM'ed to me. Can't help but wonder what was up with AD tonight. pic.twitter.com/zTruSPcqSk
— Anthony F. Irwin (@AnthonyIrwinLA) February 8, 2023
According to Jalen Rose, Davis’ on-court reaction is a serious issue for the Lakers, and implies that a LeBron-Davis pairing may not have much of a future in Los Angeles.
“It’s one thing that they lost the game. Anthony Davis – it was big stage game, he didn’t play well. I think he had 13 points, eight rebounds, maybe six in the second half, two in the fourth quarter. So he didn’t play a great game. He’s a professional, of course he wanted to win. They ended up losing.
But there’s no way on God’s green earth you can be sitting down when the greatest record in the history of basketball is being broken.
…. It comes off as petty, it comes off as you’re hating, it comes off as you’re being jealous of the moment. And when things like that happen overarching, you feel like ‘can they continue to play together?’
And so for me, I don’t think they’re going to knee-jerk and probably try to trade AD before Thursday, but that ain’t no long-term relationship when your second-best player, Anthony Davis, is purposely not celebrating LeBron James in the moment the entire world is watching.”
Rose went on to say that this moment will linger over Davis’ career.
“You talked about the guy that LeBron made the shot on, how that video’s going to live for him as a defender? He’s going to be cheered by his family and friends because he was on the court. This is a moment that Anthony Davis ain’t gonna live down. This is not going to be a good look long-term.”
