Magic Johnson Drops Bombshell Statement On LeBron Usage ‘Don’t want ‘Cleveland model’

Lakers director of basketball operations Magic Johnson said that the players will follow their offseason plan of lightening LeBron’s load compared to how he was used with his former team.

“We are trying to make sure that we watch his minutes but also that we don’t run everything through him because now it is Cleveland all over again and we don’t want that. We want to get up and down,” Magic Johnson said during his interview on Sirius XM NBA Radio.

The Lakers signed LeBron this summer, and they are trying to keep him fresh for the next seasons. This season’s success is not as important as the next few years. The team also added Rajon Rondo and Lance Stephenson to play with Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, and Kyle Kuzma.

“Basically minutes, trying to make sure we don’t overplay him and then also usage of the ball in his hands. We got a lot of ball handlers so we feel we won’t overuse him in terms of his ballhandling and also every play has to run through him. I think we got proven scorers — Kyle Kuzma, Brandon Ingram … and then when you have two point guards like Ball and Rondo, we don’t have to have LeBron having the ball in his hands all the time,” Magic Johnson said.

“We’re playing up and down. We look good one minute or two quarters and then we don’t look good the next two quarters. So we haven’t been consistent yet. I think they are still learning how to play with one another and trying to adapt to Luke’s system.

LeBron played 38 minutes Thursday, and scored 38 points and added 9 rebounds and 7 assists.

“I’ve always said that in January we will look better and I still think that is going to happen. Tyson Chandler has added to our team because we defensively we needed a defensive-minded backup center to JaVale [McGee … we still haven’t come together. Once we do that, we will be a really good team.”