I bleed green. Celtics since birth. A certified Celtics fan through the years but lately can’t control the urge to join the fray and write something about our favorite rivals, the Lakers. About the latest in the NBA extravaganza. The hottest topic since NBA Draft day 2024.
There was once a movie made for TV in 1976, starring John Travolta entitled The Boy in a Plastic bubble. The story is about a boy with immunity problem since birth and have to be protected from the outer world, and spend his life living in a germ-free bubble. An after many years he was set free to live in an unfamiliar world.
Fast forward 2024, here comes another boy soon to be released from a bubble of protection from his father and family into a more complicated and unforgiving world of professional basketball. A boy whose life has been subjected to microscope the moment he has shown interest in basketball.
The boy’s name is LeBron Raymone James Jr or Bonny James.
It’s normal for young boys to get hooked to basketball. It’s normal if you are a young American boy exposed to TV environment and social media which devote much time to basketball. It is normal if you are the son of a basketball icon named Lebron James.
What is not normal is when you need to live a near perfect basketball life . When you think too much of the pressure anytime you play, always aware and cautious about the name at the back of your jersey. It’s not normal anymore when you are expected to equal or surpass the standards set for you by the critics, the price you pay for having namesake, a living legend in basketball.
NBA had many known cases of father and son who were fortunate to have reached the peak of their basketball careers reaching that level. Tito Horford who played for the Bucks and son Al who played with the Celtics. Bill and Luke Walton, Dell and Steph Curry to name a few but none have been on the same team on the same year and on the same season.
It would be a first time in the NBA come 2024-2025 season if both Lebron James and his son Bronny, drafted 55th pick will don the same jersey come game time. It will be history.
It will be the perfect venue for Bronny to prove his worth and silence his critics. It will be an opportunity for him to carve his name in the sport and veer away from the shadows of his more illustrious father.
No need for Lebron Sr to prove his skills and capability since his name is already etched in the annals of basketball history.
But something will always bother the father and son tandem, It is the constant pressure to deliver day in and day out. Not only inside the court but off the court as well. The sword of Damocles is always there, threatening.
The pressure will be enormous and can cloud your judgment. There’s always the need to perform 110 percent on a nightly basis to erase all doubts. Basketball is a team sport and any situation involving Lebron and Bronny will always be scrutinized; the more it will be blown out of proportion if one committed a mistake that causes a turnover.
Being together in a team is one thing. It attracted already too much pressure and attention. I wonder how it will be when playing together, side by side in the court in an actual situation.
The pressure that rest on the shoulders of the father and son now becomes more daunting. It’s not just any more about winning.
It is more of proving something.
