A funny story about LeBron James and motorcycles

I hope this makes you laugh.

Throughout the course of the relationship between star athlete and beat writer, there are disagreements. There are also conversations that take place privately, away from the cameras and boom mics, inside empty locker rooms or off to the side on practice courts, where inside jokes are shared, grievances aired and commentary exchanged that is not meant to see the light of day.

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I have had plenty of those during my time covering LeBron James, and for a whole bunch of reasons I am not going to share them here. (For starters, I still talk to, interview and write about LeBron, even though he lives in Los Angeles and I do not).

There was one time we disagreed in public, though. With the NBA on hiatus — and for good reason as we combat the coronavirus — this seems like a good time to revisit that moment.

It was October 2015, LeBron’s second season back with the Cleveland Cavaliers, the season that ended in historic triumph for him, his team and the city. At the time, I was also in my second season holding a unique job of covering him (not the Cavs, just him) for cleveland.com and the Plain Dealer newspaper. Virtually anything that happened regarding LeBron — a 40-point game, a lifetime Nike contract, a political stance — was part of my beat.

So in the preseason of 2015-16, on a Friday morning when the team was off for the day, my Google alert for “LeBron James” brought me to a video posted to GQ Magazine’s website with an on-camera segment featuring LeBron.

He sat with two GQ style editors, and the angle for the piece was LeBron showing off his favorite items in his closet. And during this interview, he said he owned and rode motorcycles.

Um, excuse me!? … I gasped, upon watching the video.

One of the GQ guys even asked LeBron, “What’s the team think about your bikes?”

“Oh, man. They’re like, ‘What are you doing?,’ ” LeBron said in reply. “I’m like, ‘What you think I’m doing? I’m getting a breath of fresh air. I’ve got one life with this, man. So, that’s what I’m doing.’ “

My thoughts about LeBron riding motorcycles — he said he owned a Harley and a Can-Am Spider, and a “crazy helmet with like a skull and everything” — were fairly straightforward. Why was the face of the NBA, the cornerstone of the Cavs’ franchise, who was on a two-year, $47 million contract, risking injury riding one of those things? Does he at least wear the helmet? And did his contract prohibit it?

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I wrote about the GQ piece for cleveland.com, reached out to the Cavs and to LeBron’s people, and didn’t get very far. The issue would have to be settled the next day at practice.

Before we continue, there are a couple of things you should know about our respective personalities.

I have a hard time letting things go. Before I moved to Cleveland, I was a politics and government reporter at the Columbus Dispatch. The job there, above all else, was to hold the politicians accountable, always. Elections, tax dollars and public safety were at stake. The politicians (sometimes) lie. Haggling over the smallest of details could lead to major discoveries. It took me years to understand it was possible to strive for truth and accountability in the NBA and, you know, relax. 

LeBron, meanwhile, didn’t get to let his guard down often. He was his own gatekeeper of his public image, and beyond that, was paying someone who was very, very good at protecting him. It was clear, for whatever reason, the day LeBron sat with GQ … he was relaxed. He even said something else in the interview he had to walk back, something that was not related to motorcycles at all. He said whenever he played against an opponent who was wearing a version of his Nike signature shoe, he knows “I’m a bust your ass. Straight up.”

Obviously, LeBron was feeling fast and loose, didn’t mind showing off with GQ, and didn’t seem to think the audience would be wide enough to notice.

Our personalities collided.

Saturday practice came, and LeBron knew I’d be there with questions. He was clearly annoyed, but answered in full. He said, “First of all, I don’t ride motorcycles. Second of all, I was talking about my team, meaning my LRMR team and the group around me,” and not the Cavs.

Now, see, there is this thing I used to do that could really piss people off. When I knew an answer was not the truth, I’d say something like, “I’m confused,” and then I’d repeat his own words back to him that do not align with what he just said. In this case, I was “confused” by LeBron telling the GQ people he is “getting a breath of fresh air,” if he didn’t mean he in fact rode the motorcycles? Also, how in the world could he have thought GQ was asking him what his business associates and friends (LRMR) thought, as opposed to, you know, the Cavs!?!?

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“I don’t ride them, but I own them,” LeBron responded. “There’s a lot of stuff that I own but I don’t use. I got a coffee maker, I don’t drink coffee. I won four of them, don’t drink coffee.”

The issue was as decided as it was going to be. The interview session, involving not just me but everybody covering Cavs practice that day, moved on.

When he was finished, though, as LeBron walked away from the scrum, he yelled to me from the baseline where he was standing to the sideline where I’d moved: “Hey Joe, what’s your motherfucking address?”

Everybody laughed, me included.

“No, I’m serious, what’s your address? I’m going to send you the damn bikes.” 

Sensing, wrongly, this was a time for jokes, I started to make one. And he cut me off.

“Nah, I’m not in the mood to fuck with you right now,” he said, as he hoisted some additional 3-pointers.

I checked my mailbox for weeks.

(Photo: Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images)

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