Why a random Jewish college basketball coach is beefing with LeBron James
You come at the King, you best not … lose 24 straight games?
University of Wisconsin head coach Doug Gottlieb (L) and LeBron James, NBA’s all-time scoring leader and reigning sports dad. Photo by Getty Images
By Louis Keene February 18, 2025
When Doug Gottlieb took the head coaching job at University of Wisconsin-Green Bay last summer, he got to keep his old gig as a nationally syndicated sports talk radio host. The unprecedented arrangement meant Gottlieb, who is one of about a dozen Jewish coaches in Division I college basketball, could bring a unique authority to his college basketball commentary — for example, by claiming a famous basketball prospect wouldn’t make his college team’s starting lineup.
The show would also give listeners — say, that prospect’s father — an unusually direct referendum on the coach-analyst’s perspective.
That is how LeBron James, the NBA’s all-time leading scorer and its foremost sports dad, came to post an astonishingly petty, emoji-filled comment on Gottlieb’s struggling Green Bay Phoenix on Monday:
You see, last July, a couple months after his Green Bay hiring, Gottlieb entered the discourse on LeBron James, Jr., known as Bronny, an aspiring hooper who had been drafted by his father’s team, the Los Angeles Lakers. At the time, Bronny was underwhelming in the NBA Summer League, a showcase for recent draft picks and fringe NBA players, leading many to believe — and a few to say out loud — that Bronny, despite his pedigree, didn’t deserve to make the cut.
Doug Gottlieb was one of those few. On The Doug Gottlieb Show on Fox Sports radio, Gottlieb said Bronny probably wouldn’t make his starting lineup at Green Bay, a mid-major program that hasn’t made an NCAA Tournament since 2016.
“Bronny James is struggling,” Gottlieb said at the time. “And I’m not dancing on his grave, I’m not laughing at him. I’m telling you, I know what it takes to make an NBA team, and I saw all this coming.”
Later, Gottlieb directed criticism at LeBron himself, calling him a “bad basketball parent because he’s making people elevate his kid to a level that his skill is not close to being at.”
Unfortunately, Gottlieb has not fared much better on the sidelines. The Phoenix lost a school-record 21 straight games before winning Monday; their record of 3-24 puts them at the bottom of the little-known Horizon League conference. James, otherwise idling during this week’s NBA All-Star break, took the opportunity to highlight this failure — tacking on 23 crying-laughing emojis plus five emoji turds for emphasis.
“Earned 2 not given! Gotta give him credit though!” James commented on a post about the team’s losing streak.
Gottlieb’s Jewish identity has featured prominently during his nearly three decades as player and coach. As a freshman point guard at Notre Dame, Gottlieb was profiled in the Washington Post, which reported he was one of just 11 Jewish students on campus; Gottlieb, who told the Post he was bar mitzvahed but did not grow up observant, later coached Team USA to gold medal at the Maccabiah Games in 2017 and 2022.
Being dunked on by the game’s greatest player (and perhaps its pettiest) had the radio host feeling no less vindicated, however. It does not require much number crunching, after all, to see that Bronny has not been very good this season. A recent streak of hot shooting has brought the James scion’s field-goal percentage to 25%, fourth-worst in the league; at this point, his purpose on the roster seems primarily Freudian.
Instead of pointing to Bronny’s Basketball Reference page, though, Gottlieb called out the Hall-of-Famer.
“Me talking trash to (LeBron James) would technically be punching up; and him it’s punching down so, I don’t know,” Gottlieb said on the show Monday. “I mean, I guess pettiness and insecurity aren’t limited to the people who aren’t super successful in their field…It doesn’t make any sense. Like why, on a President’s Day Monday when you have the day off, are you worried about me?”
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