LeBron James: Updated Odds for His Next Team as Retirement Becomes Less Likely

When last we addressed the future of LeBron James in any depth, he was coming off of a second-round sweep against the Oklahoma City Thunder . Several of the teams potentially in the running for his services were still playing, and little was known about the conditions of the free-agent market he was entering.

Slowly, that is changing. The 2025-26 NBA season is over. The New York Knicks are the NBA champions and, for a variety of reasons, that probably knocks them out of the running for James in free agency. On their path to the title, they eliminated the Cleveland Cavaliers and exposed some very real flaws in James' former team. We have a slightly better idea of how the Lakers plan to proceed this offseason, what James expects out of them, and which other teams might be ready to mount a real pursuit.

And so, with free agency now only weeks away, let's take another stab at an exercise we first attempted back in May: setting odds for the next and potentially final decision of LeBron's legendary career.

Los Angeles Lakers -- 40%

Inertia is the most powerful force in sports. James is settled in Los Angeles. The Lakers looked like at least a fringe contender when they blitzed through March with a 15-2 record. And at least for the moment, there just isn't an effective use of their cap space obviously available. The Lakers have about $48 million in possible cap space, but that does little good in a weak free-agent class. The Lakers can take back contracts through trade with that space, but anyone worthwhile would cost draft capital, and the Lakers don't have much of it.

There are three possible paths for this Laker offseason, and two of them leave feasible paths for a James return:

- The Lakers operate above the salary cap. This one is straightforward. They would just retain the rights to all of their free agents and try to re-sign them using Bird Rights. In this world, James would be able to re-sign for anything up to the max, though the Lakers would likely aim a bit lower in order to preserve flexibility. - The Lakers operate below the cap, add one or two meaningful pieces, but preserve some space to spend on their own players. The amount available here would depend on the players acquired, but let's just take that $48 million number. Say the Lakers spend half of it acquiring an external player. They could throw the other half at James. Or maybe they add someone more expensive, but offset some of the money brought in by trading out Jarred Vanderbilt's $12.4 million. Note that The Athletic's Dan Woike recently reported that the Lakers are expected to prioritize younger free agents Rui Hachimura and Jaxson Hayes over the summer, so that will factor in here. If the Lakers want to keep both of them and James, the money they'd have available to pursue external talent would be pretty small. Maybe someone like Herb Jones at $15 million could make sense. - The Lakers operate below the salary cap but focus exclusively on external players and their own internal, younger free agents with their cap space. In this scenario, the Lakers may be left with only the cap room mid-level exception at $8.8 million to offer James or, if that is spent elsewhere, only the minimum.

We don't expect James to take the minimum, and there are too many different permutations within each broader pathway to say much with certainty. But the Lakers have the capacity to pay James, they have home-court advantage and they have a good team. James will, in all likelihood, give the Lakers the chance to either present him with a fair offer or, as has been reported , attempt to justify a pay cut to him. The field opens up if he is unsatisfied with those conversations, but until there's hard information pointing in that direction, the purple and gold remain the favorites.

Golden State Warriors -- 30%

The Warriors , to this point, appear to be the strongest external suitor available. ESPN's Brian Windhorst has even cited Golden State as the team to watch if James does not return to the Lakers. NBC Sports Bay Area has reported that there is "at least curiosity on both sides."

James has battled Stephen Curry and Draymond Green in four NBA Finals, with Golden State winning three of them. James has publicly expressed a desire to one day play alongside Curry. The Warriors tried to James a few years ago. He shot the deal down then. Would he be interested now?

There are two potential questions here. The first is money. For now, Golden State is really only positioned to offer the non-taxpayer mid-level exception at about $15 million. If that's not enough, the Warriors would have to construct a sign-and-trade offer. Tricky, given how little matching salary they have to work with. For now, we should assume that if James goes to Golden State, it's for that mid-level figure. He wants to win. That's a salary at which he can do so.

Tied into that notion is what sort of roster Golden State can put around him. The Warriors have been linked to big names like Kawhi Leonard and Giannis Antetokounmpo , with the idea that they could trade Jimmy Butler's big salary, along with draft picks, to improve next year's team and give James a better roster to join. There are still questions. Green has a player option. He could use it to sign a cheaper, multi-year deal to help give the Warriors some extra flexibility. They have to re-sign Kristaps Porziņģis as well, and they'll likely have competition.

But the Warriors check a lot of boxes here. They're close to Los Angeles. They have a player James would want to play with. They're aggressive enough to push all in to try to win a championship. If someone is going to steal James from the Lakers, Golden State feels like the likeliest destination.

Retirement -- 20%

James is the last player in the NBA left from the 2003 Draft. And 2004. And 2005. He's the oldest player in basketball pretty comfortably, so retirement is always on the table. There just hasn't been much intel suggesting it's all that likely at this stage.

Rich Paul thinks James could play five more years. It's hard to argue with him. James was just the best player in a first-round series victory over the Houston Rockets . He acquitted himself reasonably well against arguably the NBA's best team in the Oklahoma City Thunder. He was just a 41-year-old All-Star. He certainly can still play. The question is whether he'll want to, and he's indicated when he'll know he doesn't.

"It's up to the mind," James told Time Magazine . "Where the mind goes, the body will lay. When I'm not in love with getting to the arenas on game days five hours before to start my preparation, if I'm out of love with getting to practice 2 ½ hours beforehand, then I know I'll be done. Because then I'm going to start cheating the game."

In that interview, conducted during that Houston series, he made it clear he hadn't yet reached that point. "I'm sitting here talking to you. I don't have a voice, I've got practice in an hour. You think I'm not having fun still? I could have my ass at home, with a hot pack on my throat, having a f-cking hot toddy and some scrambled eggs," he said.

If the standard is the mind, well, there's just not too much out there to believe James has fallen out of love with basketball. He's still hosting the Mind the Game podcast, after all. If there's one pro-retirement nugget worth monitoring, it's something he said on that show . Essentially, he is in no rush. "I think at some point in June, late June, as July rolls around, free agency starts to get going, and as July rolls around and maybe into August, we'll start to kind of get a feel of what my future may look like," he said last month.

The deeper James drags his decision, the harder it becomes for him to be paid appropriately. Teams aren't going to hold their team-building resources forever, and the reporting thus far has suggested he is unlikely to take a minimum contract. So one possible retirement scenario would be that James simply is not ready to make up his mind early in the offseason, teams spend their money elsewhere, and he suddenly doesn't have a landing spot to be paid fairly. If that happens, retirement becomes a stronger possibility. For now, though, little has happened since his season ended that would suggest retirement is likelier than it was then.

Cleveland Cavaliers -- 5%

In a perfect world, James may want to retire in Cleveland. If money is a factor, though, that's going to be difficult. As of right now, the Cavaliers are $3 million or so above the second apron with their first-round pick accounted for. They'd have to get below the first apron to either give James the full mid-level exception or acquire him in a sign-and-trade. Doing either would mean shedding a lot of money.

Is that doable? Well... maybe? James Harden 's cap figure will probably come down a bit through his player option. He will likely re-sign on a longer deal that lowers his cap hit for next season. But if the Cavaliers are pursuing the mid-level path, they'd have to shed more than $30 million in total. Even if they lower Harden's salary meaningfully, that would mean paying someone to take a role player like Max Strus or Dennis Schröder. Maybe both, when you factor in filling out the roster. Given their limited draft capital, that doesn't seem especially responsible.

Could they entice the Lakers into a sign-and-trade with Jarrett Allen as the bait? Probably, but Allen is a valuable player coming off his best postseason. Cleveland has always been reluctant to make Evan Mobley a full-time center, and even if he made the move, they'd have no obvious way of finding a suitable backup. Is all of this worth a player who may only have one year left in his career?

It comes down to this: the Cavaliers would probably love to have James. It's just hard to imagine them jumping through the hoops it would take to offer more than the minimum. Maybe, if James really does delay a decision and his market dries up, he becomes more amenable to taking such a deal. Cleveland can't be ruled out entirely because it's a good team with sentimental attachment. But until there's real reporting suggesting that James is either open to a minimum salary or that the Cavaliers are willing to accommodate him, it's just hard to imagine the money working.

Los Angeles Clippers -- 3%

The Clippers are mostly a "we couldn't leave them off" team on this list. They're in Los Angeles, which makes them the second most desirable geographic possibility for James behind only the Lakers, and they have the capacity to create cap space, or at least give James the mid-level exception, so he could get paid here.

But realistically, no, this one doesn't really make sense. In 2017, there was even a report  that James would never play for the Clippers. There are too many questions about the roster. Is Kawhi Leonard going to be on it? What's happening with the Aspiration investigation? Is there any chance they'd be buyers and use the No. 5 pick to try to improve? The presence of Ty Lue might open the door slightly, but otherwise, there just isn't enough here to treat the Clippers as much more than a dark horse.

Miami Heat -- 1%

We're in "there is no actual reporting, but it potentially makes sense" territory. Bear with me:

The Heat are trying to trade for Giannis Antetokounmpo. Say they get him. Then what? They're a team built around two big men with minimal shot-creation and a talent deficit compared to the best teams in the NBA. The Lakers badly need 3-and-D wings and the free-agent market doesn't have many. James wants to get paid and there aren't many teams positioned to pay him. So... what if the three sides here worked together?

The Heat could accommodate a decent-sized James contract in a sign-and-trade by sending Andrew Wiggins to Los Angeles. The Lakers have been linked to Wiggins since last offseason, and he could either opt in and spend a year there or the Lakers could work out a multi-year deal and make thi

_Originally reported by [CBS Sports](https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/lebron-james-future-next-team-retirement/)._