Raptors drop fourth straight but gain valuable experience against Lakers' stars

TORONTO — Ja’Kobe Walter has met LeBron James before. 

The 20-year-old from Dallas, Texas, played youth basketball for a time with Bronny James, the son of the NBA’s all-time scoring leader, on a team called the Gulf Coast Blue Chips. Walter was in fifth grade.

“Growing up, I’ve been around him all my life, we’re the same age,” said Walter of James’ son “We have a good relationship. When we see each other, we’ll say, ‘What’s up?’ but on the court, there’s no friends.”

And as for meeting LeBron?

“He’s just a normal Dad, honestly,” said Walter. 

He’s not a normal Dad anymore. When the Raptors took Walter 19^th overall in the 2024 draft, LeBron James — and Bronny James, taken 55^th in the same draft — became both his co-workers and competitors. They're now his partners in the entertainment product that is the NBA and rivals on the floor, at least in theory. 

Your first NBA game is always memorable, but having it come against an NBA icon and his son — who you played with growing up — makes it especially so. 

“It’s like a fairytale situation,” Walter said about the prospect of starting his NBA career against the Los Angeles Lakers and James, who remains the most famous athlete in the sport and beyond as he rolls through his 22^nd season, showing no signs of slowing in any significant way as he approaches his 40^th birthday.

“I’ve been watching (LeBron) all my life. But I’m going to be prepared to do what my team needs me to do and do whatever I can do to get a win.”

Walter did his best in his first game back after missing all of training camp and the start of the season to this point with a shoulder injury, but there was no win to be had Friday night for the Raptors.

James and the Lakers made their annual visit to Toronto and left with a 131-125 victory that was a blowout for most of three quarters before the Raptors clawed back enough to make it at least a little interesting down the stretch. Otherwise, the elder James’ prophesy as he arrived at Scotiabank Arena wearing a ghost mask from the horror film Scream, the heading on his post to his 159 million Instagram followers reading ‘Live from LeBronto,’ came true without much drama. 

Who knows if this will be the last game James plays at Scotiabank Arena at his age and at this stage, but these things can’t be taken for granted.

The legend played the part, finishing with 27 points and 10 assists in 36 minutes. He was helped by Anthony Davis, who the Raptors had no answer for on his way to 38 points, 12 rebounds, three steals and two blocks.

Toronto made it interesting thanks to two more impressive games from Gradey Dick and RJ Barrett. Dick hit a new career high for the third time in four starts as he continues to show signs of a breakout second season. The 20-year-old scored 31 points (13-of-26 from the floor, 5-of-11 from three) and grabbed seven rebounds in 32 minutes, while Barrett had a career-high 12 assists to go along with 33 points and five rebounds in 32 minutes. 

“I’m just trying to play the right way, man, trying to win these games,” said Barrett, who has had 23 assists in three games since coming back from a shoulder injury that kept him out for nearly all of the pre-season and the first three games of the regular season.

It was the Raptors' fourth straight loss as they fell to 1-5 to start the season with more challenges ahead of them. Still, for Walter and the Raptors' core of rookies, who have been logging heavy minutes while waiting for some regulars to return from injury, it was likely an unforgettable game: their first time facing LeBron.

“I mean he’s somebody I’ve watched my whole entire life,” said Raptors first-year guard Jamal Shead, who found himself on the floor with James with 2:28 left in the first quarter. “I was born in 2002, and he was drafted in 2003, so pretty much everything that I’ve seen about basketball and the NBA is LeBron. So that was pretty cool, being up with him. I wish we got the dub, but it’s pretty cool matching up with a legend and a player of his calibre.”

Jonathan Mogbo was matched up directly against James more than any of the other Raptors rookies, which makes sense, given the Raptors' other first-year players are smaller guards and wings.

“I did a pretty good job, but I slipped up on one possession, where I jumped first. You have to be the second jumper,” said Mogbo, referring to a possession early in the fourth quarter where he guarded James well in isolation but fouled the Lakers star after he pump-faked.

“He knows the game, but there’s no excuse. You've got to stay down and compete. At the end of the day, you’re competing. As a kid, you grow up, you see him playing and everything, so being in the game is different. But you have to stay humble, stay focused, and you have to compete. I feel we did a great job, and I did a great job of that."

It took the Raptors a while to get on track.

The early going went as might have been expected. James was anchoring the Lakers' bench unit against a Raptors group that featured Barrett and three and — at one point — four rookies. The Lakers were already up by 20 when James checked in with 2:28 left in the period and finished the quarter leading by 24 when James hit his third triple of the period just before the horn.

But the Raptors didn’t stay starstruck for long. They began their long climb back into the game by holding their own against James and the Lakers' bench early in the second quarter.

Walter got his first NBA bucket when fellow rookie Mogbo faked a dribble handoff to him and then found him when Walter rubbed his defender off on Mogbo’s screen, with Walter scoring on the lay-up. A moment later, the rookie from Baylor sprinted the floor and blocked Lakers forward Rui Hachimura in transition, leading to a Barrett basket at the other end. It was a tough shooting night for Walter — he finished 1-of-8 from the floor and 0-of-3 from deep — but he got to the line twice, made all of his free throws and dove on a loose ball under the Lakers' basket and shovelled it to Ochai Agbaji for the easy score and his first NBA assist.

Mogbo had his moment trying to lock up James in isolation. Shead had a highlight when he picked the pocket of Davis — the Lakers' other hall-of-fame bound star — and took it the other way for a tippy-toe dunk. 

“He’s the greatest player of all time,” said Walter. “It hit me in warm-ups. I looked over, and I was like, ‘That’s LeBron’, but when were on the court, he was just an opponent to me.”

Rajakovic made a point of getting his rookies minutes against the Lakers' stars. How else are they going to learn? 

“They need to have these experiences to play against those guys,” said Rajakovic of his rookie’s trial by fire. “The first quarter, they looked a little bit starstruck but we were able to wake up from that and play a very good game from that point.”

Walter did get a chance to catch up with Bronny James — who only played the final seven seconds of the game — but didn’t exchange any greetings with his famous Dad. 

“I don’t think he remembered me,” said Walter. “I was super young (when they met previously).” 

In this, Walter was incorrect. “Ja’Kobe Walter? Yeah, he’s the same class as Bronny,” said James after the game. “I knew that for sure. I watched him at Baylor, and I watch all levels of basketball, so I know a lot of these kids,”

But now LeBron James knows the Raptors rookies not as kids but as competitors and vice versa. For the Raptors' rookies, it’s another step in becoming NBA players, rather than players who made it to the NBA.