LeBron James received some pretty hefty criticism at the hands of David Griffin yesterday which came as a surprise to many throughout the league. Griffin was the general manager of the Cleveland Cavaliers when they won the championship in 2016 and at the time, it was an incredible achievement. Despite this, Griffin admitted to not being a fan of how he built the Cavaliers roster and that he felt LeBron was simply not motivated to win championships anymore. This elicited quite the response from James and today, Griffin went on ESPN’s The Jump where he clarified what he meant.

“I failed miserably in getting everyone to the right sense of urgency following the [2016] championship,” Griffin said. “My belief at that time was ‘there’s no way anyone can be born in Akron, Ohio, deliver the first championship in 52 years to Cleveland, Ohio and be the same human being. It’s not possible. You’re a person. You’re a human being. And my fear at that time was that he wouldn’t have that same animal-like desire to win.” 

https://twitter.com/_/status/1157371119902572544

Griffin went on to say that his comments were taken out of context and that his comments went beyond what was portrayed by the media yesterday.

“What we’ve seen obviously is that he’s gone to multiple Finals since so it was an unfounded fear I had at the time,” Griffin said. “But the article doesn’t give you the context that I was talking about that particular point in time.”

LeBron and Griffin’s next meeting will certainly be an interesting one.