Леброн Жеймс НБА-д 24 дэх улирлаа тоглоно

LeBron James is back — we just don’t know where or what that actually means yet.

The legendary player announced Tuesday that he will be playing a record 24th NBA season, but it won’t be with the Los Angeles Lakers. Already, teams are lining up for his services. The Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers are the early betting favorites, but the Minnesota Timberwolves and other teams are reportedly in the mix. And the intrigue extends beyond the basketball court.

On Tuesday, we evaluated the cases for the six teams most likely to sign LeBron. Now, we’ve asked our NBA writers to evaluate where he should go, what would be the weirdest fit and when he should finally hang it up for good.

Which team should LeBron sign with this summer?

Shakeia Taylor: Going back to Cleveland is the perfect way to close this chapter. The situation is already set up to be a stamp on LeBron’s legacy. Cleveland, the team and the city, appears ready to welcome him with open arms. He’s already fulfilled the “local kid makes good” storyline.

As a lover of a good story, this is the move. Going home again.

I was sitting in downtown Cleveland having lunch the day after the Cavs completed their comeback against the Warriors in 2016 and a woman walked up and told us that she’d dug out her kids old LeBron jerseys that had been packed away in the basement just for the occasion. She was just so proud to have saved them, to have not given up on him. I remember what the city felt like. LeBron joining Donovan Mitchell, who was there for “The Decision,” would be a really fun time.

Jason Jones: Sentiment says Cleveland, but if money isn’t a concern, go to the Knicks.

If this is about a chance to win another championship, why not go with the defending NBA champions? Mike Brown was the first coach to reach the Finals with James, so finishing his career with a season with Brown would be some Lifetime movie-type stuff that’s perfect for television. I also believe getting out of the Western Conference and away from OKC and San Antonio gives James the best chance to return to the Finals. We have no idea what Boston will look like. The Pacers will be better, but how much better? Cleveland and Toronto aren’t nearly as daunting as having to go through the Thunder, Spurs, Nuggets, Timberwolves and others.

So let’s have some fun, LeBron, and make New York home!

Mirin Fader: Cleveland!

I’m sorry. I know as writers we aren’t supposed to like cliché or even storybook endings … but I love a good full-circle ending. I loooove a good storybook ending. I’ve felt like he should go there because it just feels right. Yes, this free agency recruiting process will probably be drawn out, especially when Rich Paul receives the alleged interest from all the teams who want to make an offer, but, in the end, I think LeBron should just go back to his hometown team. Because I’m assuming there are already documentaries being filmed, and have been filmed, I can imagine every night of being back ‘home’ to be the perfect ending.

Each game will be “The Farewell” game. It will be more than a tour; it will be a homecoming, an anniversary and because of how much attention these documentaries and specials need, I think they would be foolish to not take advantage of that.

Oh, yeah and he will be joining a competitive team that could make a run in the East again (if winning is the true goal here).

Mike Vorkunov: Who are we to tell anyone what they should do? It removes their agency, because our ideas are so good, so undeniable that then they will be followed. Must be followed. It is the gift and the curse of the modern sportswriter. But if we are spitting advice here, then LeBron should go to the Detroit Pistons.

What, were you not expecting that? A return to Cleveland is too cliche. The world doesn’t need more Hallmark movies and I personally don’t want to go back to live as an adult where I grew up. Who wants to run into that guy from high school while you’re getting groceries.

“Oh wow, YEAH it is good to see you again! It’s been so long!”

The Warriors seem too NBA2K. I have never seen “The Expendables” but the logline for that movie does not make me confident that such a concept would work. Now if he could recreate “The Fast and the Furious” somewhere and infiltrate an NBA team as a secret undercover FBI agent, I’m sold. The Spurs would just be for the Nike ads. The Timberwolves are the wrong midwestern city. Miami, been there, done that.

I can keep going, but, here’s why the Pistons are the right answer. Mostly, because the Pistons make basketball sense. It is a young team with a new star who can take some of the burden off LeBron and let him cook as a playmaker and basketball genius. He’d be part of the emerging West-to-East talent flow. And if the Pistons can win a championship, what a coda it would be for James’ career. It would be unexpected and it would be novel and Madonna-esque. The rare superstar who can still surprise us with his reinventions decades into their career. (And you know where Madonna is from…)

What is the weirdest, most chaotic LeBron destination?

Taylor: New York. I scrolled past a photoshopped picture of LeBron in a Knicks jersey and it just didn’t seem right! They’ve already won. They have their guys. It just feels like it would just be chaos. I really cannot even wrap my head around the idea. It would be like bringing your own elephant to the circus.

Jones: The Clippers. Imagine the shock in Lakerland if James says, “I never wanted to leave L.A., I just didn’t want to be a Laker.” That would be a twist on the happiness narrative.

Head to the Clippers, play in a newer arena and partner with Brandon Ingram and Darius Garland. No need to move — just take a different freeway to work. With Kawhi Leonard gone, James would unquestionably be the biggest name in Clippers history. He’d reunite with coach Tyronn Lue, too. This would send Laker fans into crashout mode, watching a player choose … the Clippers over the Lakers? James expressing his faith in Clippers ownership and the front office would be the kind of action that would have Laker fans calling for Rob Pelinka’s ouster and begging the new ownership group to hurry up and remake the organization from top-to-bottom.

Fader: OK, I know this is not a team necessarily linked to LeBron but can you imagine him on the Pistons?! There’s just something about LeBron in Pistons red and blue that I feel wouldn’t look wrong in the way that, for example, Hakeem Olajuwon joining Toronto at the end just looked extremely wrong in purple; an aberration of all sorts. Full stop: it shouldn’t have ever happened.

There’s something so classic and throwback about a player like LeBron coming to Detroit, a city with so much soul and so much history that would be extremely cool. The retro jerseys, the sellouts. I mean, Detroit is a 60-win team that earned the right to have sellouts. But since they are kind of blowing it all up — Is Duren really going to the Lakers?! — why not throw a Hail Mary and bring LeBron.

At the same time, it is extremely unlikely, and it is a weird pitch. And although Cade Cunningham would learn so much from him, I would hope there wouldn’t be weird power struggles there between the two, and it could lead to awkward regression from a Pistons team that was finally finding its footing, to accommodating someone in their alleged last season. That might really suck.

OK, my second most chaotic destination is Golden State. Just because of the drama of podcasting between Draymond Green and LeBron. It would be too meta, too much, and I’m just over it. Also, what about the egos between him and Steph Curry? How would that work? I have too many questions. It would also crush my journalistic soul if LeBron got super tight with Silicon Valley and got into some really, really problematic AI stuff that will influence young people to further lean into AI in super destructive ways that some of us are hoping are still reversible.

Vorkunov: Brooklyn.

LeBron has flirted with New York all his time in the NBA. Who can forget 2010, when he made his Decision in a state that borders New York as both a tease and to rub salt in that wound. For years, the Knicks and its fans pined for LeBron.

Now? They’re good. They just won the NBA title. Maybe you missed it. Jalen Brunson sits on the throne. Going to the Knicks would be too frontrunnery. But Brooklyn? Now that is inspired!

The Nets are in an existential moment in the city. Always the small up-and-comer who hoped to carve their own niche and fan base in New York and make it a two-team town, that has never felt further. Again — I don’t know if you know this — the Knicks won the title last month. Did you see how the city exploded? Tough.

For the Nets, that felt like when the WWF came out on Nitro and announced it bought WCW. The Monday Night Wars are over. But LeBron in Brooklyn would be something. He’d put fans in seats and everyone would have to follow the Nets again. And the pizza, oh man, the pizza. New York is the second-best pizza state in the country (no, calm down, I’m not talking about you, Connecticut). The whole free agent pitch could just be walking up to Di Fara for a slice.

Somebody reported that LeBron is chasing happiness with this decision. Well, a great slice is the definition of happiness.

Should this be the final chapter – one more year and done? Or are you open to LeBron playing as long as possible?

Taylor: Wrap it up! I think this should be his final chapter. That’s why I think Cleveland is the destination. Let’s close all the circles, get some incredible stories and scenes, and say see ya later. We’ve seen him dominate a news cycle a few times already like no one else. We’ve seen him win in every city he’s joined. We’re aware he’s still “him.”

There’s nothing left to prove and it’s OK to leave while you’ve still got gas in the tank.

LeBron is still relatively young in real life (I obviously have a different view of aging) and there’s so much more he could do or not do after he’s done playing.

Jones: Tom Brady played until he was 45. James might as well keep as long as he can, too. If he can play at 46, he’d be the oldest player in NBA history. He will have almost every record at that point, so why not go for that, too. A “declining” James last season was pretty damn good. Maybe he’s averaging 15 points and five assists at 45? It would be fascinating to see how long James can keep playing at such a high level.

So play as long as you want, LeBron! It would get annoying if we have to wait year-to-year to see where he plays next, but it would also be entertaining. That a 41 year-old free agent dominated the news cycle proves there is still no one quite like LeBron James.

Fader: Final chapter, please. What he has done at his age for this long and at this level is simply astounding. There is nothing left to prove. There is nothing left to mine. To chase. He did what no one thought was possible and he did it like no one else will ever be able to do it.

When you know it’s your last, each game, each possession, truly does mean more, and I think we will see the best of him, both physically and mentally, if it’s settled that this is his last. I also think it will make for a much more introspective LeBron if he sets that up clearly from the get go. I don’t want more quotes about playing hard or sticking together or swinging the ball this way or that way.

I want to know what being back in your hometown feels like (Yes, I am assuming it’s Cleveland). A restaurant you used to go to as a kid that is no longer there, and how being back here, knowing it is your last season, reminded you of one memory you had there when you swore to a family member one day you were going to make the NBA. I want that type of introspection. Anecdotes we haven’t heard before. I want the podium to feel like fodder for a book. I want people to appreciate greatness in real time, and it’s hard to do that when you think time is limitless.

Vorkunov: Is it OK to say that I don’t care? Not in the objective sportswriter sense, but just generally. We are living in the age of the gilded gerontocracy. Why shouldn’t LeBron get to do it in his world, too. Once it’s over for him, it’s over. He can still ball and is not yet in the Ronaldo on the Portugese national team stage of life. We shouldn’t force him out. Because when it’s done, it’s done.

But the nice thing about life in 2026 is that we also get to choose our own realities now. If you’re over LeBron, there are plenty of ways to train your NBA algo to avoid him. Nobody will make you watch him against the Bucks on Peacock in January.

So let it ride, LeBron. Announce your next team while you film an Instagram reel with Taylor Swift from the dance floor of her wedding. Embrace your comeback to Cleveland or your Jordan Wizards era. Do you as long as you want.

Getting ahead of ourselves, but what should LeBron’s immediate move be after retiring from basketball?

Taylor: I once watched a video of one of the “I Promise” kids graduating from University of Akron and it actually brought tears to my eyes. To know that LeBron is the reason young people from his hometown are attending college just makes my heart smile. I’d love to see his post-playing career sidequests look more like that. Community impact is one way to not only enrich but extend the legacy he’s built. Northeast Ohio would be all the better for it.

Jones: The golf course.

If social media has taught us anything about James, it’s that golf is his new love. Channel that competitive energy to the golf course. Sit back, light a cigar, and contemplate where the James brand goes next. Seeing James bring his daughter on a road trip this season indicates just being a dad will be a big part of retirement. But there’s no need for James to be anywhere near a basketball court upon retirement, unless it’s a part of an ownership group.

I hope after he takes a lot of time to rest in between rounds on the golf course that James contemplates working as an analyst in some capacity. His “Mind the Game” podcast with Steve Nash is an interesting listen when he talks about basketball. I could see him joining a television broadcast at some point and talking about basketball. Maybe he’ll talk about basketball on a golf course.

But golf during the day and family the rest of the time seems like a reasonable plan for someone who has been in the spotlight since high school.

Fader: Is it wild that I say… rest?

I’m going to say this for all the wives and daughters and families of these players. They spend most of their lives getting used to the NBA player being gone, and speaking in fragments, and scheduling FaceTimes and texts at this hour or this day.

So when a career is over, I would hope they truly cherish the time with their families and not have to always be on the road. When you sign up to become a broadcaster or a coach after a playing career, it’s the same exact thing in terms of time commitment. Always another flight. Always another game. Always another film session that went past midnight. My hope for him is that he enjoys the well-earned rest with his family.

I am super excited for his daughter’s potential volleyball career to move forward if she chooses it. Wouldn’t it just be so cool to see him as AAU dad and not in the competitive way, but in the, “I just brought snacks and I’m in the back of the 20-court gym and even though everyone is here to see me, I am truly here to see my daughter,” kind of way

Now if I really want to suggest what he will do with his time — because I can’t imagine a competitive person like LeBron allowing rest for too long — my nerdy self wants him to create a book imprint. Podcasting isn’t what it used to be. It is too saturated now. But if you really want to solidify legacy and tell true stories, as he says he does with his brands, books are so valuable. The underdog of storytelling these days.

We see the criticism of shows like Netflix that try to tell these documentaries but in a surface, shallow way; LeBron, you get the chance to have an imprint that can change the sports world, and get the baddest writers and put them all together to tell stories that last a lifetime. How you would have wanted them to be told. Of course it could and probably very much will have the same bias as the documentaries, but if you really want to help the next generation (as you most certainly do, given all the efforts you have put into education), then I know you will love the idea of helping young children learn how to read and become life-long readers. Imagine how many will pick up a book because LeBron has an imprint and says reading is cool.

Vorkunov: Has LeBron considered professional wrestling? He probably won’t top Bill Russell’s 11 NBA championships, but there’s plenty of time to surpass John Cena’s 17 world titles.