Donovan Mitchell doesn’t care about your trade ideas

It was always a bit of a pipe dream.

Very few father and son duos have played together, though LeBron James is of course no ordinary sports dad, and his eldest boy Bronny has his genes.

And while LeBron – still one of the NBA’s best ten players – has held up his end of the bargain to make his dream a reality, the reasons to champion the idea stop there.

His team, currently ninth in the Western Conference, is not really in a place to be giving away roster spots – Bronny has shown promise but also growing pains as a USC freshman.

He could certainly go on to become an NBA player, but with current averages of 5.8 points per game and 35.6 percent from the field (on a struggling Trojans team), next year looks like a stretch.

So amid The Athletic’s report that the Lakers are ‘willing to explore the notion’ of adding Bronny next season, it’s worth exploring why that’s a bad idea.

LeBron James has previously said that he wishes to play with his son Bronny, but softened his stance on that in May

James, 39, has said multiple times in recent years that he wishes to play with his eldest son before he retired.

But even he softened his stance on that last May.

‘I’ve done what I’ve had to do in this league, and my son is going to take his journey,’ James told ESPN. ‘And whatever his journey, however his journey lays out, he’s going to do what’s best for him. 

‘… Just because that’s my aspiration or my goal, doesn’t mean it’s his. And I’m absolutely OK with that.’

Of course, Bronny will always be the son of an NBA legend.

But beginning his career with him in LA and not, say, on his own in Utah, would put an even bigger target on his back. The type of target that Bronny aimed to avoid in his younger days when he refused to wear his father’s jersey number.

There’s no previous example of a father-son duo sharing an NBA court together, but Austin Rivers played for his father Doc on the Clippers. 

And here’s something that Austin did not say when he recently said he didn’t want Bronny to play with his dad: there’s a real chance Bronny is never as good as Austin was.

Rivers was one of the best high school players in the country, a lottery pick and a longtime NBA veteran who averaged 15 points under his dad. If he’s not good enough to avoid the nepotism shouts, is Bronny?

‘I went through something similar,’ Rivers recently said on ESPN. ‘What happens is a lot of people start to discredit everything you’ve done.’

James is seen cheering on Bronny at a recent USC basketball game at Haas Pavillion

The most famous father-son sports duo was the Griffeys, as Ken Jr. and Sr. played together on the Mariners.

But it wasn’t the elder Griffey recruiting his doe-eyed son to play with him. Rather, the younger Griffey was already on his way to a Hall of Fame career, while his dad chose to join him in Seattle as his time on the diamond was winding down.

That charming dynamic would not be the case if LeBron brought his son to LA after a raw college season. It’s also worth asking if Bronny would even be worth a draft pick (he could also sign as an undrafted free agent).

Ultimately, it’s too soon to say that Bronny can’t be an NBA player, but if he gets there, he should be able to flail and mess up outside of his father’s shadow.

Deep down, LeBron probably agrees.

Donovan Mitchell doesn’t care about your trade ideas

When Evan Mobley and Darius Garland were sidelined with injuries earlier this season, it was easy to fire up the fake trades and plot Donovan Mitchell’s way out of Cleveland.

But Mitchell more than held the fort down in their roughly six-week absences, and with the recent returns of Mobley and Garland, the Cavs are an NBA-best 18-2 in their last 20 games.

That’s pushed Cleveland all the way to second place in the East ahead of the All-Star Break – a far cry from the idea that many had – myself included – that they should just rip the band aid off and blow it up.

Donovan Mitchell has been brilliant for the Cavs this season, with the team now 2nd in the East

If Cleveland, who have also been buoyed by the impressive play of center Jarrett Allen, can remain in the upper echelon of the Eastern Conference standings then they should at least have a favorable first-round matchup.

A trip to the conference finals, though, with the likes of the Knicks or Sixers in the way, would prove tougher.

Mitchell, who famously looked destined for the Knicks two summers ago, may still end up asking out of Cleveland, but he’s certainly raised his price during this scorching winter stretch, in which he’s topped 40 points on three occasions since the turn of the year.

For now at least, Cleveland is far more than a shop window for other teams. 

Clip of the week: Mikal Bridges lets his friends (and rivals) walk over the Nets

It’s often said that the current NBA lacks the rivalry and hatred of the league’s previous generations. And Mikal Bridges’ appearance on the ‘Roommates Show’ podcast was a perfect distillation of that.

Speaking to his good friends (and crosstown rivals) Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart, the Nets’ No. 1 put up no fight as his former college teammates discussed how the Knicks’ January 23rd trip to the Barclays Center was essentially a home game.

It’s not that Brunson and Hart were wrong, or that Bridges should be expected to ignore the obvious; I was at the game as well and it was a mᴀssive Knicks majority.

But is it too much too ask of Bridges to stick up for his team a little, instead of saying on a public forum that the game ‘felt like MSG? I certainly don’t think so.

Later in the show, which Brunson and Hart co-host, Bridges sat idly as Hart explained how New York would never be a Nets town, before making one of several not-so-subtle attempts to recruit his friend to the Knicks.

Mikal Bridges (left) played with Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart in college at Villanova

Bridges is a talented player, a generally positive character and has tried to make the most of a less-than-ideal situation since he arrived in Brooklyn in the Kevin Durant trade. It’s surely not been fun seeing his best friends thrive with the Knicks this season (fourth in the East) while the directionless Nets toil.

Still, there was a time when someone in Bridges’ shoes would’ve punched back a little – he could’ve mentioned to Hart for example, how the Knicks have mostly been as bad as the Nets over the last 20 years, or that New York at least felt a bit more like a Nets town with Durant running the show.

Perhaps he shouldn’t have gone on the show at all.

Bridges annoyed a lot of Nets fans with his laid-back display, but he’s certainly not the first player to let a friendship dilute a rivalry.