LeBron James knows that Team USA’s biggest opponent in their quest for the gold medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics is complacency.

Team USA is not fooling around in their quest for redemption. Coming off a fourth-place finish in the 2023 FIBA World Cup, Team USA deployed one of its most stacked rosters in years, with LeBron James, Stephen Curry, and Joel Embiid, among others, being called upon to lead the nation to a gold medal in the 2024 Paris Olympics. Nonetheless, as talented as their roster may be, this doesn’t mean that they’re just going to trample on their opponents in every game.

In fact, Team USA has been pushed to the brink in their tune-up games in preparation for the Olympics, most recently in a 92-88 win over reigning FIBA World Cup champion Germany in their final exhibition before flying to Paris. But James, the elder statesman on the team and a previous winner of two Olympics golds, recognizes how important it is for them to encounter this kind of adversity at this juncture, dropping a fiery message for his team in the aftermath of their victory against the Germans.

“Good job to close out the preliminary games. We saw some adversity, which is f**king good. We were down two games in a row and it’s gonna be good for us. But like [Kevin Durant] just said, the real s**t begins now. Alright?” James said, via ClutchPoints on X, formerly known as Twitter.

"We saw some adversity, which is f*cking good."

LeBron James to his teammates in the huddle following Team USA's win vs. Germany 🗣️

They finished 5-0 in exhibition games before the Olympics.

(via @usabasketball)pic.twitter.com/l3zxk9EDtP

— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) July 23, 2024

Indeed, it’s good for Team USA to develop a healthy level of appropriate fear of their upcoming Olympic opponents this early. The last thing this talented roster needs is complacency, and LeBron James knows that being tested the way they were over the past five games will only help in their quest for gold in Paris.

LeBron James proves he’s Team USA’s alpha dog heading to Paris

It’s always a question as to who will step up and take the number one option role on the court when it matters most for a team as stacked as Team USA is. Over the past few games, LeBron James proved that he will still be the player the team turns to when their backs are against the wall, especially with Kevin Durant still out due to a calf strain.

Against South Sudan in a game where they were pushed to their limit by a young, upcoming basketball nation in a game that they were 43.5-point underdogs in, it was James who took and made the go-ahead basket that gave Team USA a 101-100 victory. And then against Germany, James scored all of his team’s 11 final points, outscoring Germany 11-8 down the stretch to earn a four-point win.

LeBron James has been so good for so long that everything he’s doing on the court is coming as a shock to absolutely no one. But everyone has to remember that James is almost 40 years old, and nothing he’s doing should be taken for granted, especially when he already said that Paris will be his last time representing Team USA in the Olympics.

Team USA’s bid for the gold medal will begin on July 28 when they take on Serbia in their first group stage game.