LeBron James begins his 76ers era by making the stakes clear in Philly

LeBron James is a Philadelphia 76er. That is the strange truth, and it still takes some getting used to. Maybe for James, too.

LeBron joined his new teammates for Sixers media day on Monday and finally spoke about the decision that took a lot of people by surprise, including pretty much everyone in Philadelphia. It was easy enough to imagine him returning to Cleveland once again for an encore performance or taking his talents back to South Beach for another go-round with the Heat. You could even close your eyes and see him finally teaming up with Steph Curry in Golden State. By his own admission, he even saw a scenario where he finished his career in New York in front of fawning fans at Madison Square Garden. 

It was harder to envision him choosing the Sixers, a franchise that has not had much go right for the majority of its existence and certainly not over the last quarter century or so. This is, of course, an organization that drafted not one but two first overall picks in Ben Simmons and Markelle Fultz who promptly forgot how to shoot. They had to toss one of their general managers overboard due to a scandal now forever known as Burnergate. One of their players, Zhaire Smith, suffered a serious food allergy incident that left him "fortunate to survive" after he ate something at the team facility that he shouldn't have. Adding to everyone's misery, they traded for Smith on draft day in exchange for Mikal Bridges, a local kid whom everyone loved and who eventually washed up in New York and won a championship with the hated Knicks. That is how things have gone for the Sixers. 

Also, they've been bad at basketball. Maybe you've noticed. The last time the Sixers won a championship was in 1983. That was…a long time ago. You get the idea. Things don't usually work out for the Sixers.

And then, on a Friday in late July, LeBron James chose to sign with them. Players don't tend to willingly pick the Sixers -- and even when they do it hasn't always gone great. Paul George picked Philly, but mainly because the Sixers were offering the max when the Clippers didn't want to pay him anything close to that. Tough stuff when you come out on the wrong end of a financial call and the Clippers end up looking like better decision-makers than you. James Harden also picked Philly. That went so poorly that he ended up traumatizing a bunch of Chinese school children just to force a trade. Read that last sentence again. That could only be a thing with the Sixers. 

Yet James still picked Philly. You figure it out because it remains hard to fathom. Genuinely exciting, sure. It's just difficult to make your brain process it as a reality. But it is real. There he was on Monday in his red, white and blue Sixers jersey with the drop-shadow number 23 and Phila across his chest. James said all the right things about his new team and town. About Philly and the fans, he joked that there's always been mutual respect even if, before now, "the vibe is we hate you." (As a native Philadelphian, I can confirm that's the city's love language and we tend to hate everything -- including ourselves.) 

As for the on-court product, James wasn't shy. Expectations for the Sixers ratcheted up when they managed to swap George for Jaylen Brown. But adding James has increased the pressure exponentially. It's one thing to faceplant in the playoffs every year when Joel Embiid is dealing with his latest injury or Simmons passes up a dunk, it's quite another to underachieve when you have arguably the greatest player of all time on the team. The Sixers have been so familiar with failure for so long and now failure isn't an option because they somehow landed LeBron and he says so.  

"You have to fall in love with doing things that's uncomfortable," James said. "If we can do that, we can be a great team. If we don't do that, we'll be like 'Oh man that was a great team on pape,r and we had a lot of great talent -- and we lost in the second round.' I don't want to do that. I didn't leave my family to lose in the second round, I know that for sure."

LeBron James 🗣️ "I didn't leave my family to lose in the second round, I know that for sure." pic.twitter.com/MmBEN2PQ3q

— The Sporting News (@sportingnews) September 28, 2026

There's a lot to unpack there. It's interesting that LeBron's external monologue basically matches the conversation a lot of people are having about the Sixers. They do look great on paper. Tyrese Maxey, VJ Edgecombe, Embiid, Brown and LeBron -- that's a fantastic starting five. In theory. We'll see how it goes in practice. Setting the bar for success at getting out of the second round might initially seem like fairly low expectations, until you consider that the Sixers haven't pulled that off since Allen Iverson dragged them to the finals way back in 2001. Maxey had barely been born. Edgecombe hadn't been yet. LeBron, who is about to begin his NBA record 24th season, wasn't even in the league.  

Overcoming that kind of negative ancient basketball history and penning a new narrative would be too daunting for some to even contemplate, let alone attempt. Evidently not for James, though. Maybe it's only possible for someone like him who's achieved so much already and has nothing left to prove. Maybe taking on a challenge as monumental as [waives hand in the direction of everything that's happened to them] the Sixers doesn't seem so taxing to LeBron. Maybe, though that's as hard to imagine as him being a Sixer in the first place.

For his part, James admitted "work needs to be done" and he's ready to do it. He also hilariously, if not so humbly, said "the luxury of my game is I can do everything. Literally, I can do everything." 

Now we'll see whether the "everything" means changing the Sixers fortunes. Because when he said he didn't leave his family just to lose in the second round, what he was really saying -- whether he realized it or not -- was he didn't leave his family just for the Sixers to keep being the Sixers. That's a lot to take on, even for LeBron.