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Bronny James missed summer league game with knee swelling as LeBron James defends him: 'He doesn't give a f**k'

Bronny James is expected to play in their final California Classic game on Wednesday

ryan young
Staff writer
·4 min read

Bronny James did not play in the Los Angeles Lakers’ California Classic summer league game on Sunday due to trace swelling in his left knee, according to ESPN’s Kendra Andrews.

The rookie, who made his debut with the team on Saturday in their loss to the Sacramento Kings at the Chase Center in San Francisco, was held out as a precaution on Sunday. He is expected to play on Wednesday in their final game of the tournament against the Miami Heat.

James played 21 minutes on Saturday in the Lakers’ 108-94 loss to the Kings. He had four points and two rebounds in the contest, and shot just 2-of-9 from the field and 0-of-3 from behind the arc.

"He's just got to keep learning, keep getting reps and learning how much he's capable of," Lakers summer league coach Dane Johnson said after Saturday's game, via ESPN. "Like, his body, he can get downhill if he uses his shoulder if he has a little bit of an advantage on somebody. And just building that confidence into him."

The Warriors rolled past the Lakers on Sunday afternoon without any issue. They cruised to a dominant 92-68 win behind 22 points and 11 rebounds from Ethan Thompson. Dalton Knecht led the Lakers with 12 points despite shooting 3-of-13 from the field.

After they wrap up in San Francisco, James and the Lakers will head to Las Vegas for more summer league games. They'll open that tournament against the Houston Rockets on July 12 at the Thomas & Mack Center.

Though he wasn't courtside to watch his son, LeBron spoke about Bronny from training camp in Las Vegas on Sunday afternoon.

His son, he said, isn't bothered by any criticism he's receiving whatsoever.

"I don't know if people really understand Bronny," James told ESPN on Sunday. "He doesn't care. I actually care a little bit. When I came in [as a rookie], I wanted people to like me and some of the things that people were saying about me kind of bothered me early on in my career. ... He doesn't give a f**k.

"He does not care about nobody. He doesn't even listen to that stuff. He's like the coolest. He's like the complete opposite of his dad. His dad will say something [to address the critics]. Bro does not care. ... Everything that's being said about him, he really does not care."

James was selected by the Lakers with the No. 55 overall pick in the NBA Draft last month after a single season at USC, where he averaged 4.8 points and 2.8 rebounds largely off the bench with the Trojans. James, the eldest son of LeBron James, then signed a four-year, $7.9 million deal with the club. When they take the court together in a game this fall, they’ll be the first father-son duo to do so in the history of the league.

Bronny's path to the league was far different than the one he took, and LeBron is well aware of that. The way that Bronny has handled himself so far compared to how he thinks he would have had he been in that situation, he said, is remarkable.

"Just imagine if you were a kid, you were born into a situation where your dad was super famous, super wealthy and you the kid still had the drive to want to be able to accomplish things for yourself," LeBron said, via ESPN. "I personally don't know if I would've been able to do that if the roles were reversed. ...

"When I was coming up, I had no choice. I literally had no choice ... I had to make it out for me. My mom, my family, my hometown, my city. Bronny has all the choices in the world. If Bronny wants to stop right now or never played basketball or just wanted to be a gamer or wanted to be a chef or wanted to be nothing to whatever, he could have done that. ... People don't understand how hard that is and the commitment for him to be coming out of heart surgery less than a year ago, for him to be able to be in the NBA, the kid, he's special.

"But he doesn't care. He doesn't. It doesn't bother him."