LeBron James wants whoever came up with play-in tournament fired

With the Los Angeles Lakers on the brink of falling into the NBA play-in rournament spots, LeBron James is not a fan of the person who concocted that idea.

LeBron James wants nothing to do with the NBA play-in tournament.

His Lakers have lost serious ground in the Western Conference while dealing with injuries and currently claim the No. 6 seed. The Trail Blazers are right on their heels. If they pull ahead, Los Angeles will end up in the play-in.

James and company will want to avoid that fate. If it were up to him, the play-in wouldn’t exist at all.

“Whoever came up with that s**t need to be fired. But whatever,” James said.

It’s clear where James stands on the subject now, but just last year, he was singing a different tune.

LeBron James supported a 2020 play-in, but 2021 is different

When the NBA suspended the 2020 season, the topic of how to resume had to be debated. If the NBA jumped straight into the playoffs, what would that mean for the teams who were battling for playoff spots before the season ended?

James had an idea…a play-in tournament.

“You got Portland. You got Memphis…New Orleans and Sacramento tinkering around there…so if there’s five or ten games left…why not those guys battle it out? Make them play each other all five games?” James said on the Road Trippin’ Podcast.

That may make for a satisfying gotcha moment, but it’s really not fair to James to compare the two situations.

In 2020, a pandemic forced the league into the most unusual of circumstances. With part of the season cut away, it made sense to let teams continue to compete.

In this case, a 72-game regular season will be in the books. The play-in punishes the No. 7 and 8 seed while gifting the No. 9 and No. 10 seed an opportunity they didn’t grab during the season.