LeBron James’ Ex-Rival “Not Impressed” With Team USA vs South Sudan, Demands Bizarre Condition for Puerto Rico Game

Team USA made light work of South Sudan on Wednesday with a convincing 103-86 win. Steve Kerr made some tactical changes by benching Joel Embiid which paid dividends against one of the fastest teams in the competition. Despite the 17-point win, some were not impressed enough to applaud LeBron James and Co.

“I’m here to win and win the gold, and that’s my only mindset,” LeBron said after the game, making it clear that it’s not about how they win, it’s only about winning. But from the other side of the screen, that wasn’t enough entertainment. From Team Avengers, they expect more. One of them being former NBA champion and ex-rival of LeBron, Paul Pierce.

During the latest episode of Undisputed, Pierce made himself crystal clear about Team USA’s performance. The former Cs forward was far from impressed with the quality of basketball on display by the men in blue as it failed to get him off of his seat. “Am I impressed? Not impressed. I mean, it was a good win, but I wasn’t impressed. There was no point in the game where I was just like, oh, man, the US is putting a smackin’ on them. Like, when I’m impressed with something, I’m jumping out of my seat, like, in disbelief,” Pierce said.

“We went up, though, at one point. But, like, they did for me you know, to be impressed would have been them covering the spread,” PP further added. He discussed how he had to look for the scorecard to find that Bam Adebayo led in scoring with 18 points. But it was not all negative for Pierce. “Now I was impressed by the defense. You know, I like what I saw defensively, forcing turnovers, getting out on the break,” Pierce pointed out.

He gave a shout-out to Derrick White for his hustle, reminding the viewers how he was the “underappreciated” member of the Celtics’ championship team last season. LeBron James scored 12 points on the night but had 6 turnovers to his name. He and his teammates have to shed the last bit of weaknesses in their game to impress Pierce as he challenges Team USA to a daunting task in the Puerto Rico game.

Paul Pierce sets bizarre condition for LeBron James and Co.

Team USA’s win sealed their place in the quarterfinals of the tournament. With that, one could expect LeBron James and the other leading names in the team to get a rest in favor of those who had fewer minutes out there. But Steve Kerr already announced his intentions of playing the core players against Puerto Rico. And that’s why Paul Pierce set a bizarre condition for them in order to impress him.

“I feel like, what’s gonna be an impressive win versus Puerto Rico, if they win by, like, 40…I wanna see that,” Pierce declared. After his co-host Keyshawn Johnson reminded him how Serbia outscored them by 41 points, Pierce set the bar even higher. “When you smack somebody down by, like, 40, 50, that’s what’s gonna impress me.” No matter what happens, Team USA will finish on top of Group C due to the point system. Will they be out to impress the critics? Maybe not as LeBron James has already declared his motivation for dumping stats in favor of gold.

And to absorb more interesting stories, watch the Dual Threat Show hosted by BG12 where the prodigy puts Bulldogs star Silas Demary Jr under the pump with loaded NBA questions and more in this video below.