Lakers: Patrick Beverley Tries to Recruit LeBron James to Timberwolves on ESPN
LeBron James is no stranger to switching teams. James has been a seminal figure in the NBA's player empowerment era. He helped usher in an age where superstars can essentially switch teams as they please. For better, or for worse.
Although LeBron is under contract with the Lakers for next season, and is eligible to sign an extension in August, but that didn't stop one of the NBA's biggest villains from trying to recruit LeBron to his team.
During his recent stint on ESPN's Get Up, Timberwolves guard Patrick Beverley had an intriguing answer to the question of whether or not LeBron can win another championship in LA.
"He's LeBron James he can really go anywhere and try to make a championship out of it."
Beverley's response was pretty typical, but then, the host called him out for a "vague" answer. That's when the guard went into salesman mode when explaining his vanilla response to the question.
"Because I want him with the Minnesota Timberwolves and I don't want to get our team fined either. I'm trying to give the right answers. I would love him with Minnesota. We're a young group of guys, we got a little bit of experience, we got a lot of toughness, we got a lot of athleticism. He can help mentor Anthony Edwards - but I don't want my team to get fined. "
To be clear, there have been unequivocally zero reports at the moment of LeBron wanting to leave the Lakers this summer. Even if LeBron requests a trade, Minnesota probably wouldn't be on his wish list. Beverley was doing what any NBA player does these days - making his pitch to a superstar to come join his team.
Those facts, in addition to LeBron's tweet about Beverley's antics during the play-in tournament, definitely do not point to James bolting to Minnesota this summer to join Beverley, Karl Anthony-Towns.
This isn't the first time that the veteran guard has openly talked about wanting to play with LeBron, and it probably won't be the last.