With the Los Angeles Lakers on the verge of winning another NBA championship, it’s easy to forget just how bad they were prior to this season. They didn’t come close to sniffing a winning record since 2013 prior to landing Anthony Davis and LeBron James. One of the low points for the franchise was the drama that went on between Nick Young and D’Angelo Russell during the 2015-16 season.
Russell was eventually traded and developed into an All-Star while Young isn’t on a team right now. Despite the fact that years have passed, the two men might still have beef with each other. Young was recently on the Load Management podcast and was asked who is most annoying teammate was during his career. He believes it was Russell.
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What Exactly Happened With Young & Russell?
For those who don’t remember, the reason that Young and Russell started to have a beef was because the latter took a video of the former talking about how he was cheating on his fiancee. Russell thought it was a funny prank while Young obviously did not. It didn’t take long for Young and his fiancee to break up after the video emerged.
Prior to this incident, Young and Russell had become close friends. That’s clearly not the case anymore. After the incident, Russell was shunned by his teammates and it caused irreparable damages in the locker room. The Lakers eventually had to trade the promising young player for pennies on the dollar. Russell was able to turn things around and has a potentially strong career ahead of him. If he could’ve not made the mistake of causing locker room issues, he might still be on the team.
Young Recently Had Wild Michael Jordan Take
Though Young thinks Russell is the most annoying teammate he ever had, there are probably a few who would use the term to describe Young. He’s always been one of the most lively characters in the NBA. In fact, he recently was in the news for his patently absurd take on Michael Jordan.
Jordan didn’t play against superstars, huh? Young conveniently forgot about Magic Johnson, Karl Malone, John Stockton, to name a few. That’s not to mention some of the great Eastern Conference teams the Bulls had to get through to even get to the Finals. Apparently, Shaquille O’Neal, Patrick Ewing and Isaiah Thomas weren’t anything special, according to Young.
There are plenty of arguments in favor of LeBron James in the greatest of all-time debate but this is perhaps the weakest one yet. Yes, LeBron has had to go against some amazing talent. Young could even argue that LeBron has had to against tougher teams in his Finals appearances than Jordan did. However, that doesn’t mean that Jordan didn’t have to face off against some great teams. If LeBron tries to make his case that he’s the best ever, he should probably not bring Young to the debate stage.
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Ex-Laker Rips ‘Annoying’ D’Angelo Russell