The beef between LeBron James and Stephen A. Smith has gotten even more ridiculous.
The latest chapter began when James critiqued Smith’s approach to judging Bronny’s performance as a Los Angeles Laker. The disagreement eventually led to a confrontation between the two during a Los Angeles Lakers game.
King James appeared on The Pat McAfee Show Wednesday morning, where he broke down the moment, saying that Smith was having a “Taylor Swift” moment, adding, “Never would I not allow people to criticize players about what they do on the court. That is your job. That’s all part of the game. But when you get personal with it it’s my job to not only protect my damn household but protect the players.”
In true Stephen A. fashion, he ran with the clip to his Stephen A. Smith Show to puff out his chest about the confrontation and said he wouldn’t hesitate to throw hands with James if things became physical.
“And let me state for the record, while we bring up that, let me assure you it wouldn’t have gone down like that,” he said. “I would have gotten my ass kicked, because if that man put his hands on me I would’ve immediately swung on him. Immediately. That, I’m not going to tolerate.”
The ESPN frontman continued to defend himself, saying that when James approached him in such a public manner, it was hard for him to respond in a way that didn’t cause a scene. To be fair, they were in Crypto Arena, which holds 19,000, and that’s not even counting those on their cellphones documenting James’ every move.
He added, “It was during the third quarter, it was fresh out of a timeout, it was him walking to the basketball court. It was on national television, the cameras were rolling, and had I done something… what do y’all want me to do? You want this to be a reincarnation of Chris Rock and Will Smith?”
(@kingjames)Just as expected, Smith received the side-eye from just about everyone on the internet, including James, who posted a clip of the ESPN pundit boxing alongside Key Glock‘s “womp womp womp” reaction meme.
See the best reactions below.