LeBron James was on the UCLA campus on Wednesday taking part in a pickup run against incoming Bruins freshmen Jaylen Hands, Cody Riley, and LiAngelo Ball and redshirt sophomore guard Prince Ali. Two things to know:
LeBron James lost a pickup game against LiAngelo Ball and other UCLA players, according to Twitter
LeBron looks amazing in these highlights, though.
Ricky O'Donnell has covered basketball at all levels for more than a decade at SB Nation. He’s currently the Associate Director of Programming.
- LeBron looks great in these highlights.
- According to Twitter, the UCLA kids beat LeBron’s team.
James looks lean and incredibly fast in the footage. He’s exploding off the ground effortlessly for dunks in a way no 32-year-old has any right to do.
LeBron’s team included Darren Collison, Aaron Gordon, and Nick Young. He posted this dunk off a feed from Collison on Instagram :
James has been posting a lot of his workouts on Instagram this summer, but he appears to be playing more pickup lately. Perhaps the Kyrie Irving trade sparked something inside of him?
Either way, get ready for a lot of reports like this as training camp nears:
The real question is .... how did a bunch of 18-year-old freshmen from UCLA beat LeBron’s team? We can’t find a scoreboard anywhere, so just going to have to suspend disbelief for a moment.
Who are these guys? Well, Hands is a 6’3 McDonald’s All-American point guard who will attempt to fill Lonzo Ball’s sizable shoes next season. Riley is a 6’8, 240-pound big man who played his high school ball with Marvin Bagley III at Sierra Canyon and was ranked as the No. 45 player in his recruiting class by ESPN. The whole world already knows Lonzo and LaMelo’s middle brother, LiAngelo.
UCLA checked in at No. 25 in our too early preseason rankings back in May. Do we have to adjust that ranking now that we know they beat a team with LeBron on it in pickup? I think so.
James did pick up at least one victory, though:
We’re guessing that win over Draymond is all LeBron really cares about.
See More:
