LeBron James has handshakes with Sixers stars, role players and arena staff. He wants to make ‘everyone feel important’
While this tradition might seem paltry compared to James’ other accomplishments, those who know him say it’s anything but. James puts thought into the handshakes and they often build connection.
Not long ago, Dru Joyce was watching the Sixers at home in Pittsburgh when he saw something that brought him back to his childhood. The game was about to start, and players were jogging onto the court, high-fiving their Philadelphia teammates.
Amid the slapping palms and bumping fists, a 6-foot-9, 250 pound showman emerged, armed with his own choreography. As LeBron James traveled down the line, he paused at almost every Sixer, stuck out his hand, and proceeded to reveal new, tailor-made handshakes.
Each gesture was distinct. There was the finger-twirl with Tyrese Maxey; the imaginary mask with Jaylen Brown; the hip thrusts with Joel Embiid.
For Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, a former teammate of James’ with the Lakers, the four-time MVP pretended to load a clip. For VJ Edgecombe, the future Hall of Famer tapped his head twice and powerfully shrugged his shoulders.
And of course, James couldn’t leave out Dean Wade, the lone Caucasian on the roster.
“I just have the simple, ‘Hire me’ handshake,” Wade said. “I try to stay out of it because I can’t do this stuff.”
Joyce’s family was mesmerized. His wife and son asked about the Sixers star’s near-photographic memory. The head coach of Duquesne’s men’s basketball team had little insight to provide.
“You see him have new handshakes with new guys, and it’s like, ‘Man, another set of guys, another set of handshakes,’” Joyce said. “Like, why? Why and how?”
He might not have answers to these questions, but Joyce certainly has the context. He first met James when they were nine years old, competing against each other in the same Akron, Ohio, rec league.
One day, his father, also named Dru Joyce, knocked on James’ door in the Elizabeth Park projects to see if the hardcourt wunderkind would join his son’s AAU team.
Gloria James cautiously peeked behind the curtain with young LeBron by her side. He locked eyes with the young Joyce and before long, they were teammates, through their senior year at St. Vincent-St. Mary High School; a bond that endures to this day.
Joyce recalls the handshakes starting in ninth grade. They were far less elaborate back then — maybe one step instead of four — but James and his friends made them part of their pre-game routine, forging muscle memories that would last a lifetime.
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And the King is still preserving the practice today. At every stop of his NBA career, from Cleveland to Miami to Los Angeles, and now, to Philadelphia, he’s created handshakes. They are all intentional; often with some sort of underlying theme.
What’s more remarkable, though, is the sheer breadth of these gestures. James doesn’t just shake hands with stars. He’s expanded his repertoire to include role players, two-way players, and rookies.
He has custom greetings with coaches, team attendants, locker room managers and photographers; inviting them all into his Hall of Fame orbit, if only for a few seconds.
While this tradition might seem paltry compared to James’ other accomplishments, those who know him say it’s anything but.
“He’s an incredible athlete, an incredible man,” said James’ former teammate, Quinn Cook. “But I think for him, his superpower isn’t his talent. His superpower is making everybody feel important.
“Anybody that’s around him, he’s going to make them feel like the biggest person in the world.”
‘He just ripped it’
Before James signed with the Sixers in July, he talked to Maxey about the scrutiny his presence would bring. There would be more cameras, more media, more pressure.
There would be outside noise in both the figurative and literal sense; players would have to get used to the sound of his helicopter, for example, soaring over the team’s practice facility in Camden.
James, the league’s all-time leading scorer, was used to this. The Sixers were not. But for all of his far-reaching fame, he’s also shown an unlikely ability to relate. Cook experienced it firsthand when he was a rookie in training camp with Cleveland in 2015.
He and the future Hall of Famer weren’t strangers. Cook and James are mutual friends with Kevin Durant, and Cook attended James’ basketball camps growing up. But they’d never gotten to know each other well, and upon joining the Cavs, James immediately gravitated to the undrafted point guard.
As Cook tried to earn a roster spot, he became James’ and J.R. Smith’s designated rookie. This status involved menial tasks like carrying around a bag of playing cards and gum when the veterans were in need, and picking up Krispy Kreme donuts in the morning.
But the payoff was worth it. On road trips, Cook would sit alongside his vets. They’d always pay for meals, donating their per diems to the cause. Even after the rookie was sent to the G League, James continued to attend his games, driving 60 miles from Cleveland to Canton.
Cook had been going through some challenges at home. His grandfather had recently died, and his aunt, who suffered a stroke earlier in her life, was having health problems.
James could tell it was weighing on him. So, he began to check in.
“Any time I had an hour, two hours, or they were off, Bron’s like, ‘Man, meet me at the house,’” Cook recalled. “‘Let’s go to the facility and just talk.’
“At this time, I’m fully in the G League. I’m not even with the Cavs anymore. I’m with the minor league team. And Bron, literally, anytime they were in town, and he had an hour, two hours: ‘Hey, come here, let’s play Madden.’”
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To Cook, the handshakes are an extension of this side of James. The NBA star doesn’t discriminate; he’s crafted greetings with everyone from Dwyane Wade to Jarred Vanderbilt; from Jayson Tatum to Zydrunas Ilgauskas.
This extends to arena staff, too. Cook has seen James exchange handshakes with janitors and social media managers. In 2011, when the forward joined the Miami Heat, he developed a rapport with one of the team attendants, Marvin Ulysse.
He’d often compliment Ulysse on his sneakers, which invariably led to other topics: where they grew up, how they grew up, their love for the game. One time, during the preseason, James walked into the Kaseya Center, and guided Ulysse through a five-step process.
The team attendant was stunned. While Ulysse knew James had a long history of custom hand-shaking, he figured he’d be the last person to ever receive one.
But there he was, later that night; standing in front of a mirror, practicing each twist and turn and arm bump, to make sure he didn’t forget.
“I was a team attendant,” Ulysse said. “I’m not thinking I’m gonna get a handshake like the players are. But then he made a handshake with every team attendant in that locker room.”
James continued his hand-shaking ways when he signed with the Lakers in 2018. Caldwell-Pope saw his role change that year, to more of a three-and-D player; James began to call him “sniper.”
The following season, the four-time MVP approached him at practice with a phrase any of his current (or former) teammates would be familiar with.
“He was like, ‘I got a handshake,’” Caldwell-Pope recalled. “And we just did it. Mine, specifically, is being locked and loaded. Basically, we just loading the clip. Just getting ready to g—damn play, and shoot the ball at all times.”
For Rui Hachimura, it was a respectful bow, like they do in his native Japan. For D’Angelo Russell, it was a nod to the ice in his veins. For Anthony Davis, it was a flurry of high-fives, followed by an interlocking-finger finale. For Dalton Knecht, it was a raised bow-and-arrow aimed toward the sky.
Drew Timme was on the Lakers’ G League team when he was introduced to James in 2025. The future Sixer was on a rehab assignment, and they started joking about the time James sported a mustache with the Cavs about a decade ago.
Timme — who still has his signature handlebar — was signed to a two-way contract last November. One night, before a Lakers game, he was standing in the tunnel when James turned to him.
The Akron native dapped Timme up, and then lifted his hands, tracing an imaginary mustache above his mouth.
“I was like, ‘I can f— with it,’” Timme said. “He just ripped it. I was like, ‘That’s why you’re the GOAT, man.’”
A small gesture with a big impact
It didn’t take long for James to get to work in Philadelphia. By the second day of camp, he’d already concocted a greeting with Maxey: slapping the back of their hands, raising them for a high-five, and then twirling their fingers in the air.
Rookie Labaron Philon Jr. and second-year shooting guard Edgecombe noticed the veteran teaching his new handshakes in practice. The one with Caldwell-Pope, in particular, stood out; the two first-round picks were in awe of the intricate routine after seeing it at a team dinner.
They decided to patiently wait their turn.
“Me and Labaron were like, ‘Maybe one day,’” Edgecombe said with a laugh.
That day came sooner than Edgecombe expected. A couple of weeks ago, before the Sixers’ season opener in New York, James walked up to the guard with a message: “V, I got one for us.”
He started tapping his head — “like when you dunk on somebody” — and shrugging his shoulders, like a boxer ready to fight.
The future Hall of Famer provided no explanation, but somehow, it fit Edgecombe perfectly. Maxey says this isn’t by accident. For as spontaneous as James’ handshakes might appear, he does put thought into them.
And just like they did in Akron, and Cleveland, and Miami, and Los Angeles, the gestures still make an impact. A few seconds of daps and twists and bumps, to remind a teammate that they matter — even to one of the all-time greats.
“You got a handshake with LeBron James, man,” Maxey said. “Especially for guys that don’t play as much... that’s a memory.”
