LOS ANGELES — LeBron James was forced to imagine how Los Angeles would celebrate his title with the Lakers, the city unable to host a parade while it managed a strategy to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in its relatively early stages.
It’s why he tweeted about a joint celebration — pandemic champions like the Lakers and Dodgers celebrating with the Rams. He knows how special it is, and he knows that title-winning Lakers team won’t get it.
“I already know what we missed and, more importantly, I feel bad for my teammates who won their first championship and what they missed,” James said Tuesday. “… The parade is like, it’s really a culmination of everything. You really get to rejoice and celebrate with the fans in a more intimate setting, so I feel bad for, like, my teammates who didn’t get the opportunity to have that feeling — I’ve done it three times.”
He knows the Rams’ victory parade Wednesday will be that team’s moment with the city, fans in blue and yellow honoring their win in Super Bowl LVI on Sunday at SoFi Stadium. James was at the game witnessing it from his suite surrounded by family and friends. He called the experience “phenomonal.”
James is close friends with a number of Rams players, especially wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. Despite being a Cleveland Browns fan, as an adopted Angeleno, James was pulling for the Rams on Sunday.
“As a kid growing up, the Super Bowl and Christmas kind of went hand in hand for me, as far as excitement,” James said. “I couldn’t sleep the night before Christmas when I was a kid and I couldn’t sleep the night before the Super Bowl.”
James probably got a good night’s rest after the game, though. He joked that he drank tequila for 12 straight hours — his Lobos 1707 brand, of course. Name-dropping the tequila after practice was free advertising compared to the Super Bowl ad he starred in Sunday for Crypto.com, with James meeting his 17-year-old self face to face.
“My mom couldn’t understand how she was seeing her son from 20 years ago once again,” he said. “My best friends said the same thing … they didn’t understand what the heck was going on. It was pretty cool.”
For James, who had seen the commercial before its airing, the nostalgia hit hardest during the halftime show because it felt mixed with progress.
“To have a performance like that where Black hip-hop artists are performing at the Super Bowl? I had a moment of like, chills. A moment of like, ‘Black Panther,’ the movie feeling. I had a proud moment to be there and to see hip-hop being represented at the highest spectacle of any sport,” James said. “… And it only made it right that Snoop and Dre did that in L.A.”
James knows that for the Lakers to have any of that postseason excitement in their house, they have much work to do. The Lakers (26-31) host the Utah Jazz on Wednesday with a chance to snap a three-game losing streak.
“It’s to be seen. Obviously, we don’t know,” James said of building momentum. “I feel like we had a great 48 hours on the practice court, got a lot of work in. And hopefully, we can carry it until tomorrow night.”
Anthony to sit again
After some optimism that he’d be able to return Wednesday, the Lakers ruled out Carmelo Anthony, who continues to recover from a hamstring injury.
“He did some work yesterday,” coach Frank Vogel said. “He didn’t play live yesterday but had a pretty good workout and then got up and down [the court] today.”
