Lakers’ LeBron James Sends Clear Message on Dillon Brooks Incident

A series of heated incidents occurred during the Los Angeles Lakers and Phoenix Suns game on Sunday night, with superstar LeBron James in the spotlight with Dillon Brooks.

The two players have a history with one another, and things got chippy again in a game that went down to the wire. Brooks was ejected for his actions, and LeBron scored 26 points to help the Lakers win 116-114 in Phoenix.

Following the win, reporters asked LeBron about his altercation with Brooks, and he downplayed the incident as being in the spirit of competition. According to LeBron, in an interview on the court after the game ended, he suggested it was “all about competing” with the “big boys” of the NBA.

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“Just like to compete. He’s gonna compete. I’m gonna compete. We’re gonna get up in each other’s face. Try not to go borderline with it. You know, I don’t really take it there,” LeBron also said later in his locker room interview remarks.

In the first quarter, Brooks aggressively ran into James and pushed him several times, drawing his first technical with 10:36 to go in the quarter.

During another heated moment, Brooks batted the ball out of the air, and it hit off LeBron, causing King James to explode, even grabbing a referee. Lakers coach JJ Redick walked over to LeBron to prevent things from escalating further.

Later in the game, Brooks nailed a three-pointer and seemed to be knocked down by LeBron, with no foul called. Brooks quickly walked over to the Lakers star past the half-court line and aggressively bumped him with his chest, drawing a second technical and an ejection from the game.

Some fans disagreed with the call, voicing their frustrations on X, but LeBron James felt it was the right call for the refs to make in the moment.

“Well, it didn’t matter if he had one already or not; that’s definitely a tech. If it was a tech on me in the first half, that’s a tech on him there,” he told reporters.

Redick downplayed the altercations and heated moments between LeBron and Brooks during his postgame remarks.

“In terms of the back and forth, our group was unaffected by it. We were very cohesive tonight,” Redick said.

Both Redick and LeBron praised the Lakers’ bench for their contributions in overcoming the Suns’ energetic charge and the heated moments on the court, helping the Lakers win the game.

The Lakers are now 18-7 overall and continuing to hold their own in the stacked Western Conference. They’ll visit the Utah Jazz on Thursday, Dec. 18, for their next game on the road trip.

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