Bronny James has declared for the 2024 NBA Draft, but many have doubts about whether he’d be any good at the professional level. Kendrick Perkins is not one of them, though, and he thinks Bronny, who has also entered the transfer portal, has all the tools to be a fine NBA player.
“It’s the right move,” Perkins said on First Take. “I mean when you look at Bronny, I always said that I don’t believe Bronny is built for college. I think he will be a hell of a pro. I’m not saying that he’s gonna be his dad. I’m not saying that he’s gonna have an All-Star-caliber career as far as a pro, but he will have a great pro career.”
Perkins thinks being around pros his entire career has benefitted Bronny and believes he is making the right decision to test out the waters by declaring.
“He’s ready right now,” Perkins continued. “I don’t want everybody to look at what he did as far as playing with USC. With his game and the way he’s able to stretch the floor, his IQ of the game of basketball, his athleticism, the way he defends on the perimeter, I just think it was the right move.”
(starts at 0:58 mark):
That’s quite an interesting take from Perkins that Bronny is more suited to playing in the NBA than in college. Time will tell if that is the case. Still, as Perkins said, you don’t see All-Star potential in Bronny but he might have what it takes to be a solid role player in the league for many years.
I also agree with Perkins that we can’t fully judge Bronny by what we saw from him on the court for USC in his freshman season. The 19-year-old averaged just 4.8 points, 2.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 0.8 steals, and 0.2 blocks per game, but this was on the back of him suffering a cardiac arrest in July 2023.
The fact that Bronny was back on the court just under five months later was admirable in itself. How well would he have played this season if not for that cardiac arrest is something we’ll never quite know for sure.
Charles Barkley Does Not Want Bronny James And LeBron James To Be On The Same Team
LeBron James has expressed in the past that he would want to play with Bronny in the NBA. Not everyone thinks that would be a good idea, though, and Charles Barkley explained why he doesn’t want LeBron to play with Bronny.
“I don’t want him (LeBron James) to play with his son. I want his son to develop his own name,” said Barkley. “If he goes to LeBron’s team, I think it would put too much of a spotlight on him because LeBron’s a brighter star of this generation…I think the kid needs to go away by himself so he can grow as a player, so he can grow as a person…You don’t want your kid on that type of pressure…I don’t want him to play with LeBron.”
Austin Rivers also does not want LeBron to play with Bronny, based on his own experience, as his father, Doc Rivers, was his head coach at one point. Rivers thinks a lot of negativity would come Bronny’s way and he doesn’t want that to happen. At the end of the day, though, all that matters is what the two of them think and it will be interesting to see if they team up.
Thank you for being a valued reader of Fadeaway World. If you liked this article, please consider following us on Google News. We really appreciate your support.
