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Should Bronny James be in the NBA? | Good Word with Goodwill

Yahoo Sports senior NBA reporter Vincent Goodwill is joined by Bomani Jones to discuss if the Lakers rookie is worthy of a spot on Los Angeles' roster. Hear the full conversation on “Good Word with Goodwill” and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen.

Video Transcript

To say it's a lot going on in this conference and why it feels wild and unsettling for some people that they seem to be playing this Browning game.

I just don't get it.

I don't get the return.

Like I understand like I saw Shaq say something like he wished he could have been able to play with his son.

I feel like people are looking at this through the black father lens.

And my thing is y'all, we don't have to buy into the stereotype that, that black fathers ain't shit like lebron don't have to be the savior for all, for all the negative stereotypes that we gonna look at it through this lens and say we're not looking at this through competition, we're looking at this through nepotism and all these other things like y'all, this is merit.

Like I feel like I thought we've taken competition out of the discussion of what sports is supposed to be like.

I felt like it was really taken out of context or out of the discussion when we talked about Caitlin Clark and people weren't allowed.

We, we can't say that people are allowed to be competitive or feel certain things but like you said, everybody gonna be trying to get their, get back on brownie when he out there.

Yeah, like the, the, the point that I made when it first happened that went over so well, um, I understand these people looking at it through the context of lebron as a father, but I'm shocked by how many people don't look at it through the context of Ronnie as his son.

And I think I do think that there's kind of like crumbling trust of institutions and all of this stuff and people just look at it like get it how you live, get in where you fit in no matter what it is.

And so this is what gets him to the league.

They, they're bias to the accomplishment because you got him to the league.

I don't see it that way at all.

I don't, I don't think being in the league when you know, you don't belong, there is good for your psyche and I don't think this boy is under any delusions about whether or not he actually belongs in the NBA.

Why?

Because he has to guard these NBA players all the time and I'm sure they eating him up in practice and they eating him up everywhere else because he's just not that good right now.

Maybe there'll be a day that comes that he can be, but I don't think you send him to the D league.

He gonna be able underscore 25 points a game.

No, I think he gonna be in the D LEAGUE looking like the other dudes in the D League.

He just look like lebron James.

He look like food and you don't want to go to the G league and look like food.

No, man, these cat is playing for, they suffer, man.

Like that's one thing about this is that you got to really want it, especially if you come from where he comes from and look, I like off the top of my head.

I can pull Gary Payton the second as an example of a dude that probably don't need this money, but we got it the long way, right.

Went down to the D League grinded out.

Dwyane Wade has a son that's trying to get it the long way, grind it out in the D League.

So I don't wanna say that if you're somebody that comes from this measure of privilege that you don't have it in you to get it out of the D League.

No, it can happen.

I'm asking the question about this dude.

Like, is this really your dream in that way?

I'm asking the question about all of us.

Do we not forget that this kid had a cardiac arrest a little over 12 months ago.

Does it have to be on national TV?

On a Monday night football game for us to care that somebody damn near died?

Is it because we didn't see it, it didn't happen.

That's questions I got about all this stuff, man.

Yeah.

And look, I mean, well, I'll say this right fast on that though.

If they say he's healthy enough to play, then he's healthy enough to play.

And I truly want whatever works out best for him.

I would love if he just happened to be a 15 point game scorer this year.

Right?

If you told me that he's turned that next year, I would love every minute of it.

I'm just asking who has watched that boy play basketball and thinks that that is a reasonable outcome.

Well, my point about the cardiac arrest thing is whenever we saw DEMAR Hamlet, it was always viewed through the lens of he's a success story.

We're happy that he is alive.

He don't have to worry about this football thing.

He can go do something else.

And I, I know that Granite football is a much more dangerous and physical sport, but the heart is the heart man.

And I ain't no doctor, but I, I just feel like we don't even pose the natural concern that we should pose for him because we're only viewing it through the context of his father.

And I just think that is selling him short and for us it is a failing of us.