LeBron James was seen being very friendly with Los Angeles Lakers owner Jeanie Buss last week. And Rachel Nichols wasn’t here for all the jokes.
Ankle soreness kept James from playing in the Lakers Friday night win over the Milwaukee Bucks. But he still caused a stir by sitting between Jeanie Buss and Linda Rambis during a timeout. With Rambis touching LeBron’s arm and Buss resting her head on his shoulder, the internet quickly noticed the affection shared amongst the trio.
Nichols joined FS1’s Undisputed Monday morning to discuss the interaction and said she believes Buss may have handled the situation differently in retrospect.
.@Rachel__Nichols weighs in on Jeanie Buss placing her head on LeBron’s shoulder going viral:
“Smart man. He wants the max.” pic.twitter.com/5VjSo4TCih
— UNDISPUTED (@undisputed) March 11, 2024
“A little schmoozing doesn’t hurt,” Nichols said of LeBron sitting with Buss ahead of looking for a contract extension. “He is putting himself in position, saying all the right things. As for the Jeanie Buss situation, I don’t have an issue with most of the jokes that went across the internet. Most of them were in bounds. She’s tough. It’s fine.
“I did, unfortunately, see some out of bounds stuff that was there and just so gross. You had Antonio Brown of all people, tweeting a photoshopped picture of two women, who were naked, who resembled Jeanie and Linda, in bed in a compromising position…This woman is the owner of one of the most successful franchises in the entire world and someone is demeaning her in this way.”
Keyshawn Johnson and Skip Bayless urged Nichols to consider the source, both believing that you can’t put much stock in anything Brown says or tweets.
“She’s got a former Super Bowl champion basically calling her a porno actress,” Nichols continued, seemingly disregarding Johnson and Bayless suggesting that Brown’s tweet doesn’t matter. “I think given that, if Jeanie had to do it over again, she would probably do it differently.”
Brown’s tweet may have been a breaking point for Nichols, but it’s hard to imagine Buss is paying much attention to the photoshopped image, even if it is “gross.” LeBron, Buss and Rambis might have handled their brief conversation differently if they knew it was going to go viral, but hopefully Brown’s latest absurd tweet, in a long list of absurd tweets, wasn’t the cause for any regret.
