Yaxel Lendeborg is the NBA’s most entertaining rookie – and he’s not holding back
The Guardian · Owen Lewis ·
The Warriors rookie is antagonizing superstars, rejecting media training and lighting up the court. In an increasingly sanitized NBA, he’s a breath of fresh air
If a screen-addled pickup basketball player teleported into the body of a high-level athlete, they might resemble Yaxel Lendeborg. The most commonly cited fact about Lendeborg is that he used to spend 12 to 14 hours a day gaming, and didn’t debut on his high school basketball team until he was an upperclassman. Professional athletes often have origin stories that resemble the superhero more than the mortal, but Lendeborg really was just like us at one point. Lendeborg has also said that prior to entering the NBA, he didn’t really watch it, either. The Puerto Rican forward racked up more than enough accolades in college to qualify for the NBA, but still. Any of you reading this could smoke the man who may be this season’s rookie of the year in trivia about his profession.
The 24-year-old Lendeborg is a forward on the Golden State Warriors, a team caught between the ancient, gleaming remnants of the most fearsome dynasty of the 2010s and its future. The balance didn’t work out last season, as the Warriors produced flashes of old greatness to win one play-in game before flaming out in the next. Such results are a frustrating waste of Stephen Curry’s wonderful form even at 38 years old. Lendeborg is the best hope in a while to help maximize it. But even more importantly, Lendeborg is the character of the season so far. He’s spent its first two weeks antagonizing superstars, firing off unselfconscious takes in the press and vacuuming up the spotlight from his blander peers. What a joy to bear witness to an athlete who probably didn’t even hear the words “media training” until college.
Lendeborg and the Warriors kicked off their season with a resounding loss to the Los Angeles Lakers, which quickly became the most talked-about blowout of the season so far thanks to Lendeborg making an enemy of the Lakers’ star, Luka Dončić. The two jawed at each other throughout the game, in which Dončić torched the Warriors as a whole but somewhat struggled when working one-on-one against Lendeborg. After the game, the rookie took issue with Dončić’s style of play – presumably too distracted by playing NBA 2K, he’d previously only watched Dončić via highlights and wasn’t familiar with the crafty Slovene’s foul-baiting abilities. “You get the foul call. Congratulations, bro,” Lendeborg said in a press conference. “Then you talk to me like you did something great. C’mon, dog. That shit is weak. It kind of threw me off because I have so much respect for him. Gone, man. Gone.”
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