Dan Patrick couldn’t avoid replaying Stephen A. Smith’s rant directed at LeBron James and Bronny James rant “First Take” during his show Friday.
He imitated the tone of Smith’s voice.
He decried the somber tone the ESPN host used when describing Bronny’s role with the Lakers, which only worsened Thursday with a 1-for-6 performance across 12 minutes during their win against the Wizards.
“You’re not sending him to Afghanistan — good god,” Patrick said on the “Dan Patrick Show” during a segment. “Oh my god, I wasn’t that serious at my mom’s funeral. ‘Stop this. Stop this. Pleading with you.’
“Wow, if you didn’t know the context, but I just said, listen to his voice, you’d be like, ‘Oh my God, somebody passed away. What happened?’”
Smith’s rant occurred Wednesday, the day after Bronny went 0-for-5 from the field and turned the ball over three times across a career-high 15:26 of playing time.
The Lakers selected him in the second round of the 2024 NBA Draft, and Bronny and his father made history during the opening game of the season when they became the first father-son duo to appear in the same NBA game.
But across limited playing time, Bronny has averaged less than a point, less than a rebound and less than an assist per game, shuttling back and forth between Los Angeles’ main team — where he plays sparingly — and their G League roster, where he can collect more minutes to spark development.
That all boiled over for Smith on Wednesday, and he said he was “pleading with LeBron James as a father: stop this. Stop this.”
“We all know that Bronny James is in the NBA because of his dad,” Smith continued. “The first game of the season, opening night, the Griffeys in attendance, father-son duo playing in an NBA game for the first time, an absolutely, positively wonderful story. And then reality sets in. We love what we’re seeing from him in the G League because that’s where you belong as you hone your skills and you get better and you legitimately earn — which I believe he has the potential to do, I am rooting for Bronny James.
“It would be cruel to root against him. He’s a wonderful kid, I wish him nothing but the best. But he’s LeBron James’ son and everybody knows what attention that brings.”
Patrick, a former ESPN host, complimented Smith for being a “great actor” and always adding “theatre,” and he joked that the rant sounded like Liam Neeson in “Taken.”
“He got into a basketball game,” Patrick said. “He’s not in Iraq.”
The Lakers, which sit fifth in the Western Conference with a 27-19 record, face the Knicks at the Garden on Saturday with a chance to secure an eighth win across their last 10 games.
