LeBron James stayed in character after Monday night’s win in Philadelphia. He crashed into a fan, spilled the man’s wine, apologized, and then helped himself to a sip.

Asked about it after the Philadelphia 76ers’ 126-107 victory over the Chicago Bulls, James did not play coy about his motives.

“I crashed into him, spilled some of his wine. So I wanted to see if it was worth it on my arm and how good it was. It was alright,” James said in his postgame interview.

The moment came in the third quarter. James chased a loose ball out of bounds behind the basket, collided with a courtside spectator holding a cup of red wine, and the drink went flying. Rather than keep moving, he hugged the man, grabbed the cup, took a sip and handed it back. He finished the night with 15 points, nine assists and seven rebounds as the Sixers improved to 7-1.

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Daily Mail showcased a picture of it on their X-profile.

The fan’s side

The man James crashed into was Troy Clemons, a longtime 76ers season-ticket holder from Chestnut Hill who told The Philadelphia Inquirer he has been attending games for roughly four decades, going back to the Julius Erving years at the Spectrum.

Clemons told the Inquirer he was walking to his seat when James lunged for a loose ball and crashed into him. The drink went everywhere but mostly landed on his feet, he said, and James hugged him and apologized before picking up the cup.

“He hugged me and said, ‘My bad.’ Drank the drink and just kept it pushing,” Clemons said.

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Clemons declined to name the wine, telling the paper he did not want to get James in trouble. He described the fans around him as more worked up about the moment than he was.

Will the NBA step in?

A fine looks unlikely. Yahoo Sports noted that when Atlanta Hawks forward Mike Scott drank from a fan’s cup in 2019, the league looked into the incident but did not punish him. James himself pretended to sip a courtside beer during a 2017 playoff series between Cleveland and Toronto without consequence.

James joined the 76ers in July on a two-year contract worth around $8 million, the NBA confirmed when the deal was announced. The Sixers are 7-1 and back at home later this week.

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