Picture this: you’re 19, entering your first summer after your freshman year of college. You wake up in a Chicago hotel and open Instagram. It hasn’t been 24 hours since day one of the 2024 NBA combine at Wintrust Arena, and your performance, along with 75 other basketball players just a few years into adulthood, is being scrutinized at levels few 19-year-old basketball players have ever been scrutinized.

Just minutes after you wake up, you see a quote from possibly the most respected basketball analyst on television, Adrian Wojnarowski. It reads, “Bronny James is gonna have an impact for organizations. Not just on the basketball side, but potentially the business side. … He will pack G League arenas and merchandising. All of those make him an attractive player.”

After pouring all your effort into a draft combine performance where you finished fourth in vertical leap and second in three-point shooting, you have just been labeled a marketing chip for a minor league basketball team. You haven’t been labeled a possible NBA star or even a contributor, but rather the face of whatever NBA G League team is looking for a boost in ticket sales. All this because you are the son of LeBron James.

Lebron “Bronny” James Jr. was assigned incredible pressure the moment his parents named him. He carries a name that has gone down in sports history, immediately inciting expectations of greatness. That pressure only grew as the cameras followed him through his youth, something his father never had to go through. Finally, as LeBron showed strong signs of playing into his 40s, he said he would do “whatever it takes” to play with Bronny his last season in the NBA. Now, at 39 years old, he has walked back this claim, possibly in response to the suffocating media presence in Bronny’s basketball journey and the unrealistic expectations it has created for the younger James.

The Athletic reported that “another carrot to entice (LeBron James)” to remain with the Los Angeles Lakers this offseason could be the Lakers’ interest in selecting Bronny in the draft. The Lakers, after falling to the Denver Nuggets in the first round of the NBA playoffs, are expected to offer LeBron a three-year extension as they attempt to remain competitive in the Western Conference. Would they be drafting Bronny because he has a bright future as a franchise player, or would they be drafting him to keep his dad around?

Bronny does have a way out: he can continue his collegiate basketball career. While he did enter the 2024 NBA draft, the University of Southern California freshman also entered the NCAA transfer portal and has until May 29 to decide which route to take. He can select a different university to develop his game towards NBA readiness, potentially ridding himself of the consensus to get to the league as quickly as possible and focus a full year on fine-tuning his game.

If he goes to a different university, Bronny will become the focal point of that team, with the training and development staff focusing specifically on him. If he goes to an NBA team that isn’t truly invested in his future, Bronny’s training would be less catered to him, instead focused on a team-oriented approach.

I’m a full year older than Bronny and can’t imagine the pressure he faces. On one hand, he’s LeBron’s son, and the expectation to play with his father has followed him for nearly a decade. On the other hand, the expectation for him is to be seen as a name rather than a player. What kind of fulfillment does that accomplish, to sell tickets just because of your name?

If I’m Bronny, I’m seizing control of my own destiny. I know I’m just a few steps away from becoming a solid NBA player, but I also know I won’t receive the training necessary to truly develop if I make the leap now. To become the best basketball player I can be, I’m going to find an organization that is truly invested in me as a player.

For those like Wojnarowski, putting themselves in Bronny’s shoes might be beneficial. As a college student, investing in my future is far more valuable than risking an early plateau. Consider, I am offered two jobs when I graduate: one is lower paying with more room for vertical growth, whereas the other is higher paying with little room for growth. Bronny must decide which route gives him ultimate career fulfillment, and the world anxiously awaits his decision.