Amid all the controversies surrounding Team USA in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, journalist Jason Whitlock is oddly putting the blame on LeBron James. Whitlock, who's known to give his harsh takes on different things in and around the sport of basketball, singled out the Los Angeles Lakers champion and said that it's because of James that people, including the NBA stars, are starting to feel ‘indifferent‘ towards the Olympics.
“American basketball is in a worse place than where LeBron found it. That's what separates him from Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Julius Erving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar [and] Bill Russell. LeBron dropped the basketball torch handed to him by the game's greatest ambassadors,” Whitlock opened.
American indifference to basketball and the Olympics falls at the feet of one man. LeBron won't be remembered the way we remember Ali, Jordan and Magic. pic.twitter.com/1KlvWUeCSL
— Jason Whitlock (@WhitlockJason) July 26, 2021
The journalist went on to explain how the likes of Jordan, Magic, and Bird led the 1992 Dream Team to an Olympic gold medal and put basketball on the map. And now, per Whitlock, it seems this generation took a different turn as the leaders of the sport ‘act like they hate the country'. Whitlock's statements also suggest that today's players, including the four-time MVP, seem to be way too vocal on issues in society like the whole Black Lives Matter movement.
“Indifference defines these Olympics and it defines a lot of old school sports fans' feelings towards our professional basketball players,” Whitlock said. “It's not all Lebron's fault, he's just the face of the me-first, social media athlete,”
I mean Mr. Whitlock here does have a point – it is an old school way to look at things. I'll just leave it at that.
LeBron opted not to join the Olympics this summer as he tries to use the off-season to recover from another crazy NBA season. Based on Whitlock's logic, it's somehow his fault that the team the US sent to Tokyo is struggling.
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