When the Los Angeles Lakers traded for Anthony Davis ahead of the 2020 season, expectations for the team shot up as they were immediately considered one of the favorites to win the championship. Pairing Davis with LeBron James would bring the Lakers back into greatness and they would indeed go on to win a ring that year.
Both knew the pressure that they were facing with the Lakers and thus the work they were putting in began well before the season started. But according to then-Lakers assistant coach Lionel Hollins, the two weren’t working out together because Davis wasn’t waking up early enough to get in the gym with James.
“We got AD in a trade after I had joined the team,” Hollins told Sirius XM NBA Radio. “AD comes into the weight room in the morning and he says, ‘Bron you said if I came here we was gon work out together, man we haven’t worked out yet.’ [LeBron] said, ‘well you gotta get up a little earlier to come and work out with me.’ It was a true statement because LeBron is a morning person, he gets up, he does what he has to do and AD was hugging that pillow a little bit later. But he’d get there and then he’d do his work, but he couldn’t be with LeBron because LeBron was already finished.”
Hollins made sure to say that Davis was putting in the work, he just couldn’t get to the gym in the early hours like James. Davis, however, would take to social media himself and call out Hollins’ story as being fake:
🧢
— Anthony Davis (@AntDavis23) August 3, 2026
Perhaps Hollins just caught a particular day in which Davis didn’t make it there in time to work out with James, but the big man is making it clear that he was there in those early hours as well. Whatever the case was, Davis and James came together and took the Lakers to the 2020 Championship when some questioned whether they could.
Even though both are no longer with the franchise, it can not be denied that they took the Lakers from their lowest point in franchise history, to the mountaintop of being champions.
LeBron James reportedly felt Lakers were ready to move on
James’ time with the Lakers officially came to an end this offseason as he chose to sign with the Philadelphia 76ers in free agency this offseason and despite the Lakers saying they wanted to re-sign him and have him end his career with the franchise, he reportedly felt the organization was ready to move on.
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