JJ Redick wanted to make one thing very clear during the Lakers’ introductory press conference for Bronny James and Dalton Knecht on Tuesday: Bronny earned his spot on the Lakers.
Since the Lakers decided to select the son of their superstar LeBron James with the 55th overall pick in last week’s draft, basketball fans have raised concerns about nepotism over the pick.
But the Lakers have seemingly denied that to be the case and Redick went out of the way to tell reporters that Bronny was not given anything.
“Bronny has earned this. Bronny talks about his hard work. Bronny has earned this through hard, hard work,” Redick said. “For us, prioritizing player development, we view Bronny as Case Study 1, because his base level of feel, athleticism, point of attack defender, shooting, passing. There’s a lot to like about his game and we sort of build out our player development program holistically, he’s going to have a great opportunity to become an excellent NBA player.”
The Lakers made their belief known in the USC product during the second day of the NBA draft when general manager Rob Pelinka called the younger James to inform him that the Lakers were taking him.
“You’ve worked incredibly hard, man. You’ve put in a ton of work,” Pelinka said in a behind-the-scenes video released by the Lakers.
Los Angeles is seemingly backing up its words by signing Bronny to a multiyear standard NBA contract that comes with multiple guaranteed seasons, The Athletic reported.
The decision to sign a second-round pick to a guaranteed contract is rare, but it isn’t unheard of.
Jalen Pickett had been inked to a four, $8.2 million deal that came with $5.8 million guaranteed after being taken by the Nuggets with the 32nd overall pick last year.
Chris Livingston was taken with the last pick of the second round last year by the Bucks and he signed a four-year contract with the Bucks worth $7.6 million and included $3 million guaranteed.
Bronny agent Rich Paul is also the agent representing Livingston.
Bronny is coming off an unimpressive freshman year at USC where he averaged 4.8 points, 2.8 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game.
The move to sign Bronny to a roster contract does help the Lakers with any potential luxury tax penalty, because committing a roster spot to a player making rookie minimum minimizes the penalty, The Athletic reported.
