SI:AM | LeBron’s Family Business

Plus, two must-see milestone home runs.

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. My favorite part of this LeBron cover has to be his choice of shirt.

In today’s SI:AM:

👑 LeBron on playing with Bronny (and Bryce?!)

🎾 Serena’s opening act

⚾ The push to unionize the minor leagues

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LeBron’s grand plan

At this point in his career, would you be shocked at anything LeBron James managed to accomplish? Even playing in the NBA well into his 40s, alongside one (or both?) of his sons?

That’s the possibility that James floats in Chris Ballard’s cover story from the October 2022 issue of Sports Illustrated.

James’s oldest son, 17-year-old Bronny, is entering his senior year at Sierra Canyon School in Los Angeles and is a highly ranked basketball recruit. He’s an athletic 6'2" guard with sound shooting form and unselfish instincts as a playmaker. (The biggest knock on him is that he might be too unselfish.) He isn’t an obvious NBA superstar at this age like his dad was, but it’s tough to rule out the possibility that he could be good enough one day to earn a spot in the league. At 15, James’s middle child, Bryce, is also developing into a solid basketball player.

In February, James told The Athletic’s Jason Lloyd that he wanted to play his final year in the NBA with Bronny. It was a plan that his son was unaware of before the interview. Ballard got LeBron to shed some more light on his vision for the future:

​​When I ask about details, he waves away the query. “I like to throw things out in the airwaves, but I’m not one to [say] what’s going to happen in the next two to three years. I am a visionary, but I’m also a guy that lives in the moment.”

Still, the wheels are already turning. The free-agency deals and trades swirling around us? “I’d definitely be looking at who got first-round picks in 2024, 2025, things of that nature; 2026, ’27. I pay attention to that type of stuff.”

I do the math—2027?—and nod at Bryce. “Is there a chance you’d stick around for this guy, too?”

LeBron smiles. “I feel like I could play for quite a while. So it’s all up to my body, but more importantly, my mind. If my mind can stay sharp and fresh and motivated, then the sky’s not even a limit for me. I can go beyond that. But we shall see.”

It’s a lot to imagine: LeBron at 43, playing in an NBA game with both of his sons. But then, Tom Brady is still rolling at 45. Why can’t it happen?

It’s an audacious goal, but if anyone can make it happen it’s LeBron. If Vince Carter could play until he was 43, why not LeBron? And even if Bronny and Bryce aren’t true NBA-level talents right now, at least one team would be willing to sign them to get LeBron to come along with them, right? Hey, the Knicks once signed J.R. Smith’s brother Chris because he was represented by the right agency.

You might interpret LeBron’s goal as being an overbearing basketball dad, placing lofty and perhaps unrealistic expectations on his teenage sons, but the main theme of Ballard’s story is how LeBron and his wife, Savannah, try to make life as normal as possible for their three kids (Bronny, Bryce and 7-year-old Zhuri). “Normal” for LeBron is being the best basketball player in the world. Time will tell if his kids join him in the family business.

The best of Sports Illustrated

Jon Wertheim and Chris Almeida broke down Serena Williams’s first-round U.S. Open win. … Tom Verducci explains how the Orioles became the most unlikely playoff contender in MLB history. … Albert Breer explains why Jimmy Garoppolo is staying with the 49ers this season. … Emma Baccellieri has an explainer about the MLBPA’s push to unionize the minors.

Around the sports world

The Knicks reached an agreement on a contract extension with RJ Barrett that reportedly takes them out of the running for Donovan Mitchell. … San Diego State’s athletic director and football coach abruptly walked out of a press conference when questioned about the investigation into a rape allegation involving three football players. … Commanders rookie Brian Robinson Jr. shared a promising update after he was shot. … Cam Heyward is the latest NFL player to speak out about the dangers of low blocks. … Barcelona striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was robbed in his house by a group of armed men. … A New Jersey man was sentenced to jail time for posing as a Patriots player to buy and sell Super Bowl rings.

The top five...

… things I saw yesterday:

5. Bill Belichick’s reaction to seeing Chris Berman at Patriots camp.

4. Oneil Cruz’s 117.5-mph home run and this fun fact about all the balls he crushed off Corbin Burnes.

3. Twins reliever Jhoan Duran’s 100-mph splitter (the first 100-mph “offspeed” pitch of the Statcast era).

2. Aaron Judge’s 50th homer of the season.

1. Albert Pujols’s 694th career homer off his 450th different pitcher. (Plus, this fun fact about Pujols, Serena Williams and two former MLB players.)

SIQ

On this day in 1984, which future Hall of Famer grounded into his record-breaking 33rd double play of the season?

• Cal Ripken Jr.
• Gary Carter
• Eddie Murray
• Jim Rice

Yesterday’s SIQ: On Aug. 29, 1925, Yankees manager Miller Huggins suspended Babe Ruth indefinitely and fined him how much?

• $500
• $1,000
• $2,500
• $5,000

Answer: $5,000. That was a ton of money at the time, equivalent to more than $84,000 today.

Officially, Ruth’s suspension was due to “general misconduct,” but Huggins wasn’t shy about the specific reasons.

“Of course it means drinking,” the manager told reporters. “And it means a lot of other things besides. There are various kinds of misconduct. Patience has ceased to be a virtue. I have tried to overlook Ruth’s behavior for a while, but I have decided to take summary action to bring the big fellow to his senses.”

Ruth was having a rather pedestrian season in 1925. After leading the majors with 46 home runs the year before, Ruth managed only 25. His batting average plunged from .378 to .290. With their best player struggling, the Yankees won only 69 games and finished seventh in the American League.

There was a good reason for Ruth’s down year, though. As I wrote about in an earlier SIQ, Ruth collapsed at a train station in Asheville, N.C., as the Yankees made their way back north from spring training in Florida. Many newspapers erroneously reported that he had died. Back in New York, he was diagnosed with an “intestinal abscess” and underwent surgery. He missed 41 games while he recovered.

But it wasn’t the poor play that irked Huggins, it was Ruth’s attitude. So when Ruth stayed out until 2:30 a.m. during a road trip to St. Louis, Huggins was fed up. He fined him nearly 10% of his annual salary. American League president Ban Johnson thought Huggins was right to try to send a message to Ruth.

“Ruth has the mind of a 15-year-old boy and must be made to understand where he belongs,” Johnson told reporters, according to the Hall of Fame. “For a player receiving $52,500 a year, Ruth ought to have made himself a hero instead of reflecting discredit on himself, his team and the game. He has been on probation to observe training rules, and this he hasn’t done. Misconduct, drinking and staying out all night are things that will not be tolerated.”

From the Vault: Aug. 30, 1993

John Biever/Sports Illustrated

SI pretty much nailed it with its 1993 college football preview issue. The magazine ranked Florida State the top team in the country and while the Seminoles wouldn’t go 12–0 as predicted in the issue’s ranking of every Division I-A team, they did win the national championship.

There are two stories about FSU inside the issue, both by Austin Murphy. The first is about how Bobby Bowden built one of the best programs in the nation:

From the moribund loser he took over in 1976, Bowden has built one of the nation’s top two or three programs. He has done it with sound defenses, terrific kick-return teams, wide-open offenses and the odd “rooskie,” which is Bowdenese for trick play. Last season, for the sixth straight year, the Seminoles won 10 or more games and finished among the top four teams in the country. Bowden’s 227 victories make him the second-winningest active coach in Division I-A, behind Penn State’s Joe Paterno. Even more remarkable, his teams are undefeated in 11 consecutive bowl games, including a 27-14 humbling of Nebraska last New Year’s Day in the Orange Bowl.

The second focuses on a single player, freshman kicker Scott Bentley, who had been one of the most sought-after recruits in the nation. Bentley received some 90 scholarship offers but eventually whittled the list down to FSU and Notre Dame. It seemed like a sure thing that Bentley, who made a 52-yard field goal as a high school sophomore, would go to South Bend, where his father played baseball and basketball.

Indeed, he had verbally committed to the Irish as a sophomore. But after a disappointing visit to South Bend and a much better one to Tallahassee, Bentley picked the Seminoles. And Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz didn’t take it well:

The day of Bentley’s press conference, Holtz got on the horn with Brian Ford, a punter-placekicker from Cathedral High in Indianapolis, and talked Ford into breaking a verbal commitment to Vanderbilt. The Commodore coaches were furious.

Then Holtz phoned the Bentleys. Scott was asleep, and Holtz left his number. “What do you think he wants?” Scott asked his father when he awoke. “He probably wants to congratulate you and wish you luck,” Bob guessed. “He’s class.”

The classy coach chewed the boy’s head off. Bentley says Holtz accused him of lying. “Did you tell Coach Yelovich you were coming here?” Holtz reportedly demanded. Says Bentley, “I said that there had been times Coach Yelovich put so much pressure on me that I told him what he wanted to hear.”

Holtz’s pontificating about the sanctity of a recruit’s promise to a coach would have been more convincing had he not just finished persuading Ford to screw Vanderbilt. And Holtz wasn’t finished with Bentley. “Son, you didn’t just make a four-year mistake,” he reportedly said, “you made a 40-year mistake. You let me down, and you let your father down.”

The call might have been Holtz's last stab at changing Bentley’s mind. Or it might have been purely spiteful—Holtz has never pretended to be a gracious loser. The coach isn’t saying: He refused to discuss Bentley with SI.

Bowden was sure glad that Bentley picked the Seminoles. In the Orange Bowl against Nebraska, he made four field goals, including one from 22 yards with 21 seconds left that gave FSU the national championship.

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