Dillon Brooks is seemingly always going to be involved in some type of headline whenever he plays against LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers, only this time, it was a different player than the King who got into a back-and-forth with the Houston Rockets playmaker.
As ESPN’s Dave McMenamin detailed, Lakers forward Jarred Vanderbilt was ejected from Monday’s contest after picking up two technical fouls for his interactions with Brooks.
The first one came because he shoved Brooks in the chest, while the second one came because he poked the 28-year-old in the side of the head.
There was surely some frustration in place for Vanderbilt and the Lakers, as Houston jumped out to a double-digit lead in the first quarter and seized quick control.
The Kentucky product came off the bench for Los Angeles in Monday’s contest and finished with three points and one steal in seven minutes before he was ejected.
Brooks going up against the Lakers is always going to turn heads given his history with James.
He didn’t back down from the future Hall of Famer when he was a member of the Memphis Grizzlies in the first round of the playoffs last season. Brooks went back-and-forth and exchanged trash talk with James multiple times and was even ejected from one of the contests because of a flagrant-2 foul he committed on the all-time great.
It was all for naught, as James led the Lakers to a series victory and then didn’t exactly hold back on social media:
Brooks signed with the Rockets this past offseason, which kept him in the Western Conference and ensured multiple games against James and Co. this season.
Houston entered play two games behind the Lakers and the Utah Jazz in the race for the Western Conference play-in tournament, so the head-to-head matchups will carry some extra weight.
While Los Angeles players surely get frustrated at times with Brooks, the team can ill-afford to be short-handed because of ejections like Vanderbilt’s on Monday.
