Alvin Gentry Won’t Compare Zion Williamson To LeBron James ‘Not drinking that Kool-Aid’

Pelicans star Zion Williamson is having his preseason debut 16 years after LeBron James had his with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Many have compared these two, but Pelicans coach Alvin Gentry doesn’t like that at all.

They shouldn’t do that [comparing],” Gentry said. “We are not doing that. We are comparing Zion to Zion. We want Zion to be the best Zion Williamson that he can be. Not anybody else. We want him to be the best basketball player he can become using his name and no comparison.

“I know that it’s inevitable that that’s going to be the case, but we are not drinking that Kool-Aid.”

“There’s very few guys — at 19 years old — who can come in and impact this league,” Gentry said. “There’s one in California but there’s also not anybody like him.”

Many said that LeBron and his friend, Paul Rich were trying to recruit Zion prior to the 2019 NBA Draft, and the king didn’t like that a lot.

“A recruiting trip? I didn’t talk to anybody,” LeBron told ESPN. “They’re only saying that because it’s Rich. When Shaq [Shaquille O’Neal] came to see me play in high school, when AI [Allen Iverson] came to see me play in high school, they weren’t saying it was a recruiting trip then. But because it’s Rich Paul and LeBron, now it’s a recruitment trip. Now Rich is a threat to everybody, and they look at it and they want to keep trying to jab my agent and jab my friend. And what is he doing that’s wrong? They don’t say that about no other agent when other guys go see [players]. They don’t say that about no other agent, but my guy because he’s a threat. And he’s African-American, too. Throw that in there.”

Zion was eager to meet LeBron though. He even wanted to ask him for an advice. “I probably will hit him up – hopefully he responds to me!” he said. “My questions would probably be like, what do I have to do to maintain? What do I have to do to stay consistent?”

Well, Z

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