LeBron James, forced to evacuate home, opens up about impact of Los Angeles wildfires

LeBron James and his family are among the more than 150,000 Los Angeles area residents forced to evacuate their homes at points in the past week as wildfires ravaged the area, leaving at least 25 people dead and destroying more than 12,300 structures.

For the first time, LeBron James opened up about having to evacuate their Brentwood home and the impact of the fires, speaking to reporters after his Lakers beat the Heat Wednesday night (quotes via Jovan Buha of The Athletic).

“There’s been a lot of emotions,” James said. “I have a couple of dear friends that have lost their homes in the Palisades. Obviously, my heart goes out to all of the families, all across not only the (Pacific) Palisades, but all across L.A. County and all the surrounding areas because of the fire and things of that nature. It’s been a lot of emotions.

“Personally, I’ve been off,” he continued. “Personally, my family, we’ve been evacuated since Thursday night, so I’ve been in a hotel since pretty much when we got back from Dallas. So, just figuring it out. But staying strong for one another. Obviously, that’s most important.”

LeBron had to evacuate his home due to fires once before, back in 2019.

“We had that experience and was able to lean on that a little bit,” James said. “The difference between ’19 and today, the one in ’19 was in the middle of the night so we had to get going right away. We had a little bit more time before we had to evacuate, so we were able to get some things, get some belongings or whatever the case may be, get some things that meant things to us. But our home has definitely not been touched since the moment we left, but it’s still standing and we’re grateful for that.”

The fires have impacted several Lakers. Coach J.J. Redick had the home he, his wife and two sons rented in Pacific Palisades burn down. Fortunately, the family was safe, but he had previously talked about an emotional toll. Among the memories lost were his sons’ growing NBA memorabilia collections, but Chris Paul and Victor Wembanyama helped them restart that collection.

Firefighters are still working to fully contain the wildfires in the region, particularly the sprawling Palisades fire (which is the one that threatened LeBron’s home and burned Redick’s). Fortunately for those efforts, the strong winds that had fanned the flames have died down.