Rusty Weiss
LeBron James just reminded everyone why he remains the most unfiltered, polarizing superstar in the NBA.
On the latest episode of his Mind the Game podcast with Steve Nash, the King broke down the exact moment Austin Reaves first caught his eye after the Lakers signed the undrafted guard out of Oklahoma.
With Reaves sitting right next to him, cracking up, LeBron didn’t sugarcoat it:
“After we signed him, I went back and watched a lot of his Wichita State highlights and games and then a lot of his Oklahoma highlights and games as well,” James said. “The first thing I noticed, it’s kind of funny… he didn’t play like a white boy. It was very different. His wiggle was very different.”
James tried to wiggle his way out of what he had just said.
“I grew up in Northeast Ohio, so I know white guys playing like white guys and white guys playing like the brothers,” he continued. “What I could see in his game was that he had a lot of wiggle… we didn’t have that.”
LeBron James says Austin Reaves doesn’t play like a “white guy”
— Hater Report (@HaterReport) March 24, 2026
“After we signed him, I went back and watched a lot of his highlights and games… The first thing I noticed… He didn’t play like a white boy. It was very different.”
(h/t @NBA__Courtside)
pic.twitter.com/sfq9zLd5VY
LeBron James Says Austin Reaves Didn’t Play Like a White Boy — And Meant It as Praise
Reaves took the blunt compliment like a champ, laughing along as LeBron praised what made the Arkansas kid different from the typical undrafted stereotype.
The clip exploded online because everyone knows exactly what he meant.
Bottom line, the four-time MVP called it exactly right. Reaves has turned into a legit stud, averaging over 15 points the last three seasons and putting up 23.5 this year while becoming one of the better shooting guards in the league.
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To be fair to LeBron on this matter, black men have dominated the NBA for generations — that’s just facts. Hell, they made a whole movie about it with Woody Harrelson called White Men Can’t Jump.
One of the game’s all-time greats, a very white Larry Bird, openly admitted one thing that always irritated him during his NBA career: when opponents tried to guard him with a white guy. He viewed it as a direct disrespect to his game.
“Y’all got a white guy trying to guard me, that’s disrespectful. There’s not a white guy on the planet that can guard me.”
— Hoops (@Hoopss) March 10, 2025
— Larry Bird to Charles Barkley during an actual NBA game pic.twitter.com/hpBwi9PhTB
Over his first four-plus seasons, Reaves has averaged 15.8 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 4.4 assists per game across 326 regular-season contests, while improving dramatically each year.
In the 2025-26 season, the 27-year-old shooting guard has broken out as a full-fledged star, posting career-high averages of 23.5 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 5.5 assists on efficient .494/.362/.867 shooting splits through 46 games.
Not bad for a white guy.