ORLANDO, Fla. _ When finally his anger boiled over, LeBron James decided to get up and leave before the meeting was over. With him went Lakers teammates.
It was Wednesday night, and they'd spent more than an hour in a ballroom at a hotel convention center on Disney World's property, discussing the fallout from the Milwaukee Bucks skipping that afternoon's game in protest of Jacob Blake getting shot. Now, their game against the Portland Trail Blazers and another between Houston and Oklahoma City had been postponed, but there was still no coherent plan for what to do next.
James, who prides himself on well-planned activism, had enough with the indecision. He was ready to stop the season. Still, there were those on his team who wanted to keep playing, who needed the season to continue with an eye on their future.
By Thursday morning, most of the Lakers were in agreement: they wanted to finish the season.
"LeBron's emotions got the best of him yesterday and today he calmed down," a person familiar with the meetings said. "He talked to a lot of different people. Yeah, he changed his mind about playing, but he was always for what everyone else wanted to do, whatever the majority was. It wasn't until what Milwaukee had going on that kind of sent him over."
