The Father-Son Drama of LeBron and Bronny James

Two years ago, during All-Star weekend, LeBron James told a reporter that he would spend the final year of his career, whenever it arrived, playing on the same team as his son. “Wherever Bronny is at, that’s where I’ll be,” he said. At the time, Bronny, LeBron’s oldest son, was a junior in high school. LeBron was not outlining a detailed plan—he later told Sports Illustrated that he had not discussed the idea with his wife before he spoke, nor had he talked about it with Bronny. He was just putting “it in the air,” he said, “because I like to talk to the basketball gods out there and see if things can come to fruition.” He added that the basketball gods had always listened to him before.

Other men have dreams, but other men are not LeBron James. His comments that weekend—whether they amounted to a passing thought, a simple wish, or a profound ambition—immediately tilted the way people talked about the 2024 N.B.A. draft, which will take place this week, and which is the first that Bronny is eligible for. Would a team select Bronny in the first round if that meant a chance to get LeBron? Should they? Bronny is a good player, perhaps even a great one, depending on your frame of reference. It’s generally agreed that he has N.B.A.-level talent. But he is not his dad, who was hailed as the Chosen One before he had finished high school. LeBron has said that he regrets naming his eldest LeBron James, Jr., because it is a heavy burden to carry, and he wanted Bronny to be his own person. Then came those All-Star-weekend comments. Perhaps he forgot.

He has raised his son in his own image, as many parents do. And why not? It is quite the image: LeBron is a champion, a billionaire, a philanthropist, a podcaster. Wealthy, powerful men have always used their wealth and power to smooth the path for their children, and particularly to elevate their firstborn sons into prestigious positions. The endless legacy of chattel slavery has meant that few Black Americans have been able to do this for their children. But LeBron can.

No one has suggested that he pressured Bronny to play basketball. Still, he passed along more than his genes. He hired the best trainers, modelled the necessary discipline, and presumably offered his sons access to his peerless basketball mind. He helped coach his sons’ teams, just like any other dad. Sometimes he’d throw in a few dunks during layup lines.

By the time Bronny finished high school, scouts had compiled detailed reports on his game. He was a terrific on-ball defender, with quick hands and deft footwork; he had good instincts; teammates seem to enjoy playing with him. He did the little things to help his team win—making the extra pass, setting hard screens, sprinting to the corner in transition. He had nice shooting mechanics and an array of ultra-athletic dunks. What he lacked—understandably, perhaps, when you think about it—was a killer instinct. He was a selfless player, who seemed happy to pass instead of score. He didn’t try to take over games. He didn’t act like that was his birthright.

But attention has been. Many of his high-school games were aired on national television. Like a lot of kids, he got an Instagram account in his mid-teens; unlike most kids, he had a million followers within forty-eight hours. (He has 7.7 million now.) Some celebrity parents try to shield their children from all publicity; the Jameses have worked to control the exposure that they knew was coming. Cameras followed Bronny everywhere, but they did so on behalf of LeBron’s production company. Bronny rarely gave interviews; his dad did most of the talking, praising his son and tweeting about his skills.

And it wasn’t smoke—there was something to hype. After high school, Bronny went to play for the University of Southern California, not far from the Jameses’ home. Then, while training for his first season, Bronny suffered cardiac arrest. He spent time in intensive care. For a time, his N.B.A. potential seemed beside the point. For all LeBron’s power, he couldn’t protect his son completely. No parent can.

Bronny had surgery for a congenital heart defect and had his début with the U.S.C. Trojans four months later. On his first defensive possession, he forced a deflection and nearly came away with a steal. It was the kind of vivid impression that sports can create more powerfully than almost anything else. Still, it was just a moment, and one that proved difficult to sustain. Bronny averaged less than five points for the Trojans, who won few games and failed to make the N.C.A.A. tournament that season. Scouts and basketball executives knew there were mitigating factors to consider: the months that Bronny spent off the court during his recovery and the minutes restriction he was placed under after he returned; the competition for playing time and the challenges that come with playing for a struggling team. Bronny was not in a great situation for developing his game, which always takes time.

If he were not the son of LeBron, he might have gone back to college for another year or two, or transferred to a school where he would have more opportunities to shoot and work on his ball handling. Instead, he entered the draft. At the combine, where players are interviewed, tested, and given thorough physical evaluations, he showed top-level athleticism. (He also, apparently, put to rest questions about the heart defect; the N.B.A. has cleared him to play.) Bronny has the skills to be a credible role player, particularly on the defensive end; his offensive game needs improvement. And his ceiling could be higher than that—every pick is part guess, part gamble. He is much shorter than his father—Bronny is six feet one and a half and LeBron is six feet nine—though his wingspan adds several inches. Experts have ranked Bronny somewhere in the mid-fifties among draft-eligible players, which would put him late in the second round. A patient team that’s good at developing players could probably benefit from drafting him; every team needs talented young players who do the little things and are eager to learn and to grow.

But he has only worked out for two teams, his father’s Los Angeles Lakers and the Phoenix Suns—despite reported attempts by “a half-dozen N.B.A. teams” to schedule time with him. His agent, Rich Paul, said that the limited contact is by design, part of an effort to steer his client to the right spot. He is not willing, he has said, to let Bronny sign what’s known as a two-way contract, which would allow a team to move Bronny between the N.B.A. and the developmental G League. Paul says that he is doing everything in Bronny’s best interest, as he would for any client.

Rich Paul is also LeBron’s agent, and one of his closest friends. LeBron is a free agent this summer; he could, in theory, go wherever Bronny goes. Paul has tried to squash that idea. “LeBron is off this idea of having to play with Bronny,” Paul told ESPN. “If he does, he does.” But it would be surprising if teams weren’t at least discussing the idea of drafting James fils in order to recruit James père. LeBron, at thirty-nine, is the oldest player in the league, but he is still an excellent one. And the N.B.A. is a business; the father-son tandem would be smart business. LeBron has always influenced the makeup of his teams, and the Lakers recently hired his podcasting partner, J. J. Redick, as his new head coach. (Redick and LeBron are the same age.) One commonly proposed scenario is that the Lakers will draft Bronny, in the second round, and then re-sign LeBron.

Is that what Bronny wants? This is a question that seems underdiscussed—although, in fairness, for a long time, the answer seemed impossible to know. During the combine, he said that he was trying to do his own thing. “My dream has always just been to put my name out, make a name for myself, and of course get to the N.B.A., which is everyone’s angle in here,” he said. “I never thought about just playing with my dad, but of course, he’s brought it up a couple times.”

Does he want to get ribbed as a rookie while his dad is watching? Does he want to get his ankles taped on a training table next to his dad? Does he want to sleep in the same team hotel as his dad? I suspect few nineteen-year-olds would. Then again, few nineteen-year-olds can plausibly envision making a slick pass to their dad on an N.B.A. court or being embraced by their proud fathers on the floor at the end of a close win while the whole world watches.

A peculiar aspect of Bronny’s situation is that it is, on one level, unimaginable and, on another, easy to see. Many N.B.A. prospects have complex family situations and face tricky psychological challenges. Each one is somebody’s son. But we don’t usually know their parents, and we often regard them simply as prospects, as stat lines and combine measurements. They are all, like Bronny, on the precipice of growing up, and their parents, too, surely wrestle with the high stakes of this moment, and all the ways it will change their sons’ lives. Many parents want to plan their childrens’ paths, and to participate in their successes. Many parents have a hard time letting their kids go.

And some parents have more reasons than others to keep their kids close. As it happens, Bronny is the same age that LeBron was when he became Bronny’s father. LeBron was not raised by his own father; he took his mother’s surname as his own. He has spent half his life being the father he wished he’d had. It is not always easy to cede control, or to admit that you never totally had it—even if the basketball gods are listening. ♦