To say the Bronny James experience with the Los Angeles Lakers has been a rollercoaster ride would be an understatement.
James has been called a nepo baby, he’s been called a bust, and, as of late, he’s been celebrated for finally getting things together, with the discourse surrounding his young NBA career swinging violently from one extreme to the other seemingly based on how he plays in any given game.
And yet, if James does hit, if he remains a solid player and can help the Lakers into the future long past his father’s Hall of Fame induction, the decision to take a shot on the USC guard could go down as one of the all-time great second-round selections, as Nick Wright explained to Colin Cowherd on his FS1 show.
Do you know what a rotational player is? A top five percent outcome for all second round picks in NBA history,” Wright declared. “If he is a rotational player, he will end up being one of the best two or three picks of the entire second round of his draft. Which is why the criticisms of the pick, which is why folks when he had a bad 10 minutes with the Sixers, going on and begging LeBron as a father to put an end to this farce and treating Bronny James like he was a make a wish prospect is wildly unfair.
Now granted, Wright is being a bit shortsighted in his assertion; Nikola Jokic was famously drafted in the middle of the second round during a Taco Bell advertisment and plenty of starting caliber players are selected after pick 30 each year, including Jaylen Wells, GG Jackson, Max Christie, and Herb Jones in each of the last four drafts.
With that being said, if James does become a starting-caliber player or at least a top-8 rotational option for the Lakers, he will likely go down as one of the better second round selections in this year’s class and a major winner for a Los Angeles team that is really starting to solidify a post-LeBron core for the future.
