Jae Crowder explains why he wanted to guard ‘greatest player in our league’ in LeBron James during playoffs

Phoenix Suns forward Jae Crowder got the better of Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James in their first-round matchup in the 2021 playoffs.

Though James played well at certain moments in the series, the Suns won the series handily in six games.

During a recent podcast appearance, Crowder was asked how it felt going into games knowing that he would guard James. The veteran recalled trying to make it difficult for the four-time MVP and explained why he relished the opportunity to go against a player of James’ class.

“I’m up for the challenge,” Crowder said. “I don’t know what else to say. I mean, I wanna guard the best player because I wanna give my team the chance to win. I feel like I do a good job of just making it tough. I don’t stop anybody. It’s tough to stop a guy in this league with the way we score and the way the league is scoring. But you wanna make it as tough as possible on and be an a-hole sometimes, and I’m able to do that here and there. But obviously, LeBron is a great player. He’s the greatest player in our league right now. I just wanted to make it as tough as possible for him and get him frustrated a little bit and, hopefully, things would go our way. I think that’s what happened.”

It seems that James has Crowder’s respect after a tough first-round battle.

At 36 years old, the 17-time NBA All-Star did everything he could to carry the Lakers in the first round. He averaged 23.3 points, 7.2 rebounds and 8.0 assists in the six-game series.

Unfortunately, his production was not enough, and the 2020 NBA champions saw their bid to defend their title end rather quickly.

Los Angeles now faces an offseason with a lot of questions to answer.