Lakers News: Verified Fake LeBron James Twitter Account Requests Cavaliers Trade

Elon Musk's new blue-check payment plan creates chaos on first day.

After the world's richest man, Elon Musk, overpaid to own Twitter, he almost immediately tried to back out of the deal. When legally coerced into completing the sale, he began slashing and burning immediately, laying off plenty of staffers and phasing out a lot of regulatory bodies, seemingly without much sense of what made the bird app such a social media hit. 

Elon Musk's decision to create an $8 monthly subscription service for users to purchase blue check marks on Twitter, previously allocated only to verified public figures who were properly vetted, was a blatant scramble to cover his losses in ad revenue. It predictably stirred up chaos on the platform during its initial unveiling.

As TMZ Sports recounts, a newly verified user posed as LeBron James yesterday, imitating the 18-time Los Angeles Lakers All-Stars profile handle and images, and claimed he was demanding a trade.

"I am officially requesting a trade," not-LeBron wrote. "Thank you #LakersNation for all the support through the years. Onto big and better things. #ThekidfromAKRON #ImComingHome"

It's understandable. James is pushing himself through a sore left foot, resisting rest to the point of exacerbating the injury in games, seemingly because he knows he is probably the most important player capable of helping the team win some (any?) games in the foreseeable future. Even with James and Anthony Davis mostly available (each player has missed one of the team's first 11 games apiece), the Lakers have staggered to a brutal 2-9 start, good for the 14th seed in the West (mercifully, the 2-10 Houston Rockets are in full Tank-o-rama for Wembanyama mode already).

Even though this was a totally fake request and the real LeBron James seems to be happy with his non-basketball life in Los Angeles, I'm pretty sure he actually would rather be playing on the 8-3 Cleveland Cavaliers, looking like one of the beasts of the East thus far, right now. Unfortunately, after inking his two-year contract extension this season, James is not trade-eligible until the start of the 2023-24 season this summer, when he will be 38 years old and entering his 21st season.

So whether or not he does want a trade, James certainly knows better than to request one.

The (predictable) fake accounts-spouting-BS pandemonium isn't the only thing hurting Twitter these days. In a leaked missive to his remaining employees recently, Musk painted an ominous picture of the company's financial future.