Charles Barkley is never shy about his opinions, and he recently sat down with Martin Rickman of UPROXX's DimeMag to discuss the current NBA season. The conversation touched on a handful of topics, including the Los Angeles Lakers, how players have to combat aging, and much more.
When it comes to the Lakers, Barkley was fairly blunt in his answers. According to him, LeBron James will have to adjust a bit in order to make the Lakers successful:
“Age wise, you always have to adjust your game,” he said. “Anthony Davis is probably going to have to be the best player on the team. You don’t get to keep the mantle of the best player your whole life, it passes on. So I think AD is probably going to have to be the best player on the Lakers if they’re going to win the championship.”
Barkley went on to say that while Anthony Davis will have to be the best player on the Lakers, LeBron is in a great situation as he ages thanks to the presence of the superstar big man:
“He’s got it easy, though. He can pass it to Anthony Davis,” he said. “You go back and look at history, Kareem, when he got old, he could pass the torch to Magic and still be effective. So LeBron is actually in a great situation if he is slowing down, because normally when you slow down, there is not another guy on your team that good. Like, when I slowed down, I didn’t have another guy I could, like, ‘Oh, you take over and I can still be effective.’ Normally when a superstar starts slowing down it’s like it’s really a crash landing.”
Needless to say, Barkley believes the Lakers are in a great position this season, but it will depend a lot on how LeBron James and Anthony Davis pair together. While the Lakers dropped their first game of the season to the Los Angeles Clippers, the team is still very well positioned to make a deep playoff run, especially with two of the best players in the NBA on their roster.
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