LeBron James Signals Lakers' Season is Dead By Casually Throwing Inbound Pass Off Back of Backboard

The Los Angeles Lakers lost to the lowly Phoenix Suns on Saturday night, in effect adding several shovelfuls of dirt to any grave being created for playoff hopes. The defeat moved L.A.’s record to 30-33 and they are currently 4.5 games behind the crosstown Clippers for the No. 8 spot in the West with only 19 games remaining.

Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Historians disagree. But current consensus is, yeah, the first year of the Los Angeles LeBron James experiment is going to be a failure.

James helpfully turned all subtext into text late in the third quarter when he casually inbounded the ball off the back of the backboard for a turnover. Look, this could happen to anyone but it’s usually a sign that focus has gone out the rearview window.

If a guy did this in pickup, you might think twice about playing on his team the next run.

So, yeah. In short, things don’t looks good for James and the Lakers. It is decidedly a very bad thing when headlines proclaim a team is looking for answers 3/4 of the way through a season.

There is hope, though. This whole rope-a-dope bit could be a form of viral marketing for Space Jam 2. If I know one thing about kids’ sports movies, it’s that the protagonists always face long odds before prevailing.

Can you imagine the buzz if James turned this squad around? That’s how you create a buzz in Hollywood.