What LeBron James is giving Bronny comes from a father’s love

How should a father love his son?

That is the heart of the Bronny James NBA draft story. Strip away all the intrigue and maneuvering, the declarations and predictions, and what we have is yet another unprecedented chapter in the life of LeBron James Sr. – a Black man at the pinnacle of wealth, privilege and fame, trying to help his firstborn achieve a dream.

Fatherhood is already tough enough. Black fatherhood, even more so. LeBron and Bronny’s path is strewn with sensitive, complicated, historically troubled narratives. Done right, fatherhood is the most beautiful struggle – the hardest and the most rewarding job in the world. How will LeBron do it?

No matter how he chooses to help Bronny, it’s coming from a father’s love.

Before the NBA draft commences Wednesday night (8 p.m. ET, ABC/ESPN/ESPN+), let’s get a few things out of the way:

1. Bronny will play in the NBA next season, and the only reason is because he is LeBron’s son. Bronny might develop into a legit NBA player, but at this point, any other 19-year-old with his résumé – 6-feet-2 in sneakers; a heart ailment before his freshman college season; then 4.8 points per game off the bench at USC, shooting 27% from 3-point range – would not be anywhere close to the League.

2. Bronny will almost certainly play with his pops on the Los Angeles Lakers. Maybe the Lakers draft Bronny with their No. 17 pick in the first round. More likely, they take him at No. 55 in the second. Maybe Bronny goes undrafted, the Lakers bring him to training camp, then sign him to one of their 15 roster spots. LeBron is waiting until after the draft to decide whether to re-sign with Los Angeles. (The L in his name stands for Leverage.) All signs point to LeBron, who turns 40 years old in December, being the first player in NBA history to take the court with his son. The father-son alley-oop is inevitable. The only thing we don’t know is which James will throw the lob, and which will throw it down.

3. The agent for LeBron and Bronny is Rich Paul, founder of Klutch Sports Group. I helped Paul write his memoir, Lucky Me: A Memoir of Changing the Odds. I have never talked to Paul about Bronny playing with LeBron.

This fatherhood saga begins with the name on Bronny’s birth certificate: LeBron Raymone James Jr. It was bestowed on the first child of LeBron Raymone James Sr. and his childhood sweetheart, Savannah, on Oct. 6, 2004. LeBron was 19 years old, about to start his second season in the NBA, and already a superstar. Why give the boy such a weighty and inescapable name? It could bless him with great expectations – or sentence him to life in his father’s shadow.

“I still regret giving [him] my name,” LeBron said in 2018. So he knows now that it is a burden – but back then, LeBron was still teaching himself how to provide a love he never felt himself. LeBron’s mother Gloria gave birth to him when she was 16. LeBron grew up in extreme poverty and never had a relationship with his biological father. “Not only is [my son] gonna be a junior, but I’m gonna do everything this man didn’t do,” LeBron said.

In that sense, we can call Bronny’s name a mistake LeBron made because of LeBron’s love.

It’s wild that it is not publicly known who fathered one of the most famous people on the planet. This ties LeBron to one of the most crushing Black stereotypes: the fatherless Black child. About 70% of African American children are born to unmarried parents, which is both a direct result of racism and a far higher percentage than other demographic groups.

LeBron also represents the beauty of Black fatherhood, and the fact that Black men engage in their children’s lives at higher rates than other unmarried fathers. LeBron and Savannah got married in 2013, after the birth of sons Bronny and Bryce, and before daughter Zhuri arrived. The love and joy LeBron shares with his family is evident, not only from their fun-filled social media posts, but in the simple fact of LeBron’s constant physical presence with his children.

In a single generation, LeBron went from a complete lack of fatherhood to doing the most a father can do. This endpoint is where Bronny’s NBA path gets complicated. 

Daddy Ball is one of the worst things in sports, uglier than a raging coach, more frustrating than a volume scorer who plays no defense. The classic case of Daddy Ball is the father as coach, with his mediocre son as point guard. Then there’s the Sugar Daddy funding the team, spending thousands or sometimes millions for an experience his untalented son can’t earn on his own. The common theme is the son gets something – playing time, shots, the uniform itself – that should go to a better player. 

Bronny is not mediocre or untalented. But he is cutting to the front of the NBA line, thanks to his name. He has NBA potential, and it is common for teams to invest in teenagers who they believe will contribute a few years down the line. Some say Bronny should spend another year in college to develop – but what better place to learn how to be an NBA player than in the actual NBA, under the tutelage of his father’s brilliant basketball mind? That said, Bronny getting drafted means another player more deserving than Bronny does not.

Fathers provide. One of the hardest parts of the job is knowing how much.

This is especially tough to figure out for we Black dads who escaped poverty and trauma. We can’t give our sons our scars, but we can’t raise them soft. Our sons can’t comprehend what we’ve been through, but they have to understand how good they have it. We took our boys out of the struggle, then wish they could feel it.

A father like LeBron also paid – with his childhood pain, and his tireless work – for some privileges. Sharing those privileges with your offspring is the American way. LeBron plays for a team that the principal owner, Jeanie Buss, inherited from her father. That is widely accepted, but now people are complaining about how LeBron is bringing Bronny into the family business.

Fathers help sons achieve their dreams. But we have to make sure that the dreams actually belong to our sons, and not to us. 

LeBron has been transparent about his wish to play on the same team as Bronny. I don’t blame him one bit. Just playing pickup with my two sons is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever experienced. I like to believe that they chose basketball on their own. But I also know that they saw my dedication to the game, how it was embedded in my identity, and the respect I earned as a hooper down here in my humble basketball world. So while I told my sons they could do whatever makes them happy, my actions sent a different message about my love.

The biggest mystery of Bronny James is what he wants from all this. Does he even want to play with his dad? Did Bronny choose basketball, or did LeBron unconsciously choose it for him? How will Bronny perform under the relentless scrutiny and doubts coming his way? Years from now, will LeBron have the same kind of regrets that he expressed about giving Bronny his name?

Even for LeBron James, Black fatherhood is a beautiful struggle.