Joel Embiid, the day before LeBron James officially joined the Los Angeles Lakers in 2018, took to the internet with a thought.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Lakers are FOREVER gonna be Kobe\u2019s and Magic\u2019s team\u2026. Process that,\u201d the 76ers center tweeted<\/a>.<\/p>\n More than eight years later, Embiid and James will be teammates in Philadelphia<\/a>, with that tweet serving as an awkward footnote as the two players now team up to form one of the most talented frontcourts in the NBA.<\/p>\n That tweet wasn\u2019t the only time Embiid\u2019s opinions about James caused controversy. Ahead of the 2024 Olympics, Embiid discussed James\u2019 age in an interview with New York Times Magazine<\/a>, pointing to that when asked about the U.S. chances of winning a gold medal.<\/p>\n \u201cThe LeBron now is not the LeBron that was a couple of years ago. So it\u2019s a big difference. Everybody would also tell you, and you can see for yourself, the athletic LeBron, dominant that he was a couple of years ago, is not the same that he is now,\u201d Embiid said of his teammate, who was 39 during those Olympics. \u201cI think people get fooled by the names on paper. But those names have been built throughout their career, and now they\u2019re older. They\u2019re not what they used to be.\u201d<\/p>\n James would go on to play a pivotal role as Team USA won gold.<\/p>\n Why LeBron James chose the Philadelphia 76ers<\/p>\n Joe Vardon and Jeshua Kidd<\/p>\n James also has some history with Jaylen Brown. The 76ers\u2019 trade for Brown earlier this summer was a key reason James chose to play for Philadelphia, according to a source with knowledge of the decision who was granted anonymity to discuss ongoing deliberations.<\/p>\n But during a Lakers summer league game in 2024, cameras caught Brown sitting courtside saying he didn\u2019t think Bronny James was good enough to be an NBA player.<\/p>\n