LeBron moving forward from China issue
LOS ANGELES: Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James told reporters on Tuesday he believes his comments on Monday — regarding a tweet by Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey in favour of an independent Hong Kong — were taken out of context, calling the circumstances as a whole “tough.”
“I mean obviously it’s a tough situation that we’re all in right now, as an association,” said James, who added that he often feels that his words are taken out of context. “Us as athletes, owners, GMs, whatever, so forth. I think when the issue comes up, if you feel passionate about it or you feel like it’s something that you want to talk about, then so be it.”
After backlash to James’ comments, he tweeted a follow up on Monday night, writing, “Let me clear up the confusion. I do not believe there was any consideration for the consequences and ramifications of [Morey’s] tweet. I’m not discussing the substance. Others can talk About that.”
James’ Monday comments and tweets drew plenty of criticism, including from many in Hong Kong, where protestors were seen stomping on and burning his jerseys on basketball courts in the city. James said he hadn’t see those images and wasn’t monitoring the backlash. “I haven’t been paying attention to it much besides what I said and what we’re trying to do here,” he said.
James elaborated somewhat on the discussion about free speech on Tuesday. “I also don’t think that every issue should be everybody’s problem, as well,” James said. “There’s multiple things that we haven’t talked about that happen in our own country that we don’t bring up. There’s things that happen in my own community.
“There’s issues all over the world, and I think the best thing we can do is, if you feel passionate about it, talk about it. If you don’t have a lot of knowledge about it or you don’t quite understand it, I don’t think you should talk about it. I think it just puts you in a tough position.”
James said he won’t discuss the subject moving forward, with hopes of avoiding distractions around the team.
“I won’t talk about it again, because I’ll be cheating my teammates by continuing to harp on something that won’t benefit us,” James said.