Former NBA All-Star walks back claim about LeBron James, steroids

After the clip went viral, Teague quickly walked back his comments. In a post to his Instagram Story, Teague claimed that he was joking.

“Y’all weird,” wrote Teague. “I was joking about Bron. He was just that dominate [sic] chill.”

If that was a joke by Teague, who played in the NBA from 2009-21 and competed against James for many years in the Eastern Conference, that was a very specific joke. It is not like Teague said something like, “LeBron was so dominant in his Heat era that he had to be on steroids.”

As for the merits of Teague’s claim, there is at least some reason for doubt. For one, the NBA did not start blood-testing for HGH until the 2015-16 season (when James was no longer a member of the Heat). Teague might have been referring to the time that James infamously took a two-week absence from Dec. 2014-Jan. 2015 because of knee and back injuries (dubbed by the media as a “sabbatical”). But that occurred when James was already back with the Cleveland Cavaliers and also before HGH testing officially began.

Now 40 years old and about to enter his 23rd season in the NBA, James has never failed a drug test in his career (according to the official record). As for Teague, he is known for attention-grabbing hot takes on his podcast, so perhaps this was his latest way of drawing publicity.