The Los Angeles Lakers are a franchise whose fanbase expects the team to be competing for a championship every season. While those expectations may be unrealistic at times, that comes with being one of the most accomplished franchises in the league.
It seems as though every season, the Los Angeles Lakers are a team that has to deal with a lot of drama. In fact, former Lakers forward Kyle Kuzma has recently suggested that when playing for the Los Angeles Lakers next to LeBron James, drama is almost unavoidable.
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“I probably watched every Laker game [last year]. I haven’t really watched too much this year. Things are drastically different for sure… Obviously you’re playing in a big market, when you’re playing in LA, you’re always going to have a lot of drama. You’re playing with one of the all-time greats like LeBron, there’s going to be more drama. You have to fight through it.
Kyle Kuzma definitely has a point with this. Obviously, playing on a historic franchise like the Lakers next to all-time great leads to a lot of media scrutiny and consistent attention. That scrutiny obviously increases when the team is poor, which has been the case over the last two seasons.
Obviously, there are times when the drama can be extremely taxing and toxic. We saw Russell Westbrook deal with vitriol from fans and analysts alike during the 2020-21 season, with many negative reports coming out about him, and people piling on to criticize him. There were even death threats that happened to his family, which is clearly unacceptable.
Unfortunately, drama comes with playing on the Los Angeles Lakers. Hopefully, that changes in the future, as dealing with that consistently can definitely be difficult as a player.
Kevin Durant Previously Said Playing With LeBron James Can Be Toxic
In 2018, Kevin Durant notably claimed that playing next to LeBron James can be toxic. He also alluded to similar things as Kyle Kuzma, noting that there are a lot of media members who pay attention to LeBron James.
“So much hype comes from being around LeBron from other people,” Durant said. “He has so many fanboys in the media. Even the beat writers just fawn over him. I’m like, we’re playing basketball here, and it’s not even about basketball at certain points. So I get why anyone wouldn’t want to be in that environment because it’s toxic. Especially when the attention is bulls–t attention, fluff. It’s not LeBron’s fault at all; it’s just the fact you have so many groupies in the media that love to hang on every word. Just get out of the way and let us play basketball.”
Obviously, the situation is not LeBron James’ fault, as he can’t control his popularity and what comes with it. However, it is clear that it takes a very strong-willed player to play next to him on the Los Angeles Lakers and deal with everything that goes on.
As of right now, the Los Angeles Lakers are a poor team in the Western Conference, with a 3-10 record to start the season. Hopefully, that changes in the future, and perhaps we’ll see them get back to the playoffs this year.
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