LeBron James made history after sparking a brawl between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Detroit Pistons. James’ strike on Isaiah Stewart’s face caused a full-scale brawl between the Lakers and Pistons during the game. And his strike also caused a little bit of history for him, but not anything that he would be too proud of.
The NBA suspended LeBron James for one game after the incident. This marks the first suspension of James’ career after 1583 games and 39,276 minutes played across his career. James’ first suspension comes at the age of 36, which just goes to show how disciplined LeBron has been in his career.
It gives further prudence to Anthony Davis’ argument that LeBron James is not a dirty player. And James will probably actually benefit from the suspension, as he gets an additional game to rest after only playing a few minutes against the Pistons.
James even tried to reach out to Stewart after the game and tried to apologize and explain to him that his hit on him was unintentional. There isn’t any word on if the apology was expected. But the footage of the incident does show that regardless of intent, James was responsible for the situation in the first place.
Going forward, the Lakers will need James back, especially because they cannot continue with Russell Westbrook being the primary decision-maker and ball-handler for them if they want a chance to win the NBA championship. In a way, them getting these losses early in the season is actually a good thing for them.
It’s better for them to identify their problem areas right now, rather than struggle with them during the tail-end of the season, or even during the playoffs. This will give LeBron and the Lakers plenty of time to come up with an innovative solution for their early-season struggles and try to fix the situation.
