One of the most popular athletes in Los Angeles was one of its most laughably irrelevant just a year ago, but Lakers’ guard Alex Caruso has quickly become a made-for-Twitter social media phenomenon whose name always seems to become the top comment on ‘Who is the GOAT?’ conversations that are meant for LeBron James and Michael Jordan.
The 24-year-old bench player was a sparingly used scrub for his first year in the league, but the undrafted point guard out of Texas A&M started to become an unsuspecting fan favorite in the second half of the season last year when LeBron's groin injury torpedoed the season at Christmas.
Caruso was always one of the most recognizable players on the court, with his hairline of a 45-year-old man and scruffy goatee, but fans really started to jump on his bandwagon after his memorable put-back slam against the Golden State Warriors last April, which was arguably the play of the year.
As the Lakers roster was cleaned out in the offseason with the exits of Lonzo Ball, Brandon Ingram, and Josh Hart, the hype of Caruso started to pick up, as possibly challenging for the starting point guard position.
Adding to his phenomenon this week was a story that was sparked from Instagram, when a photoshopped picture of Caruso was making the rounds on the platform, with fans stunned on how SWOLE Caruso had gotten this summer.
Days after the picture swirled around the internet, Caruso took to his personal IG to let his followers know that he had received a ‘random’ drug test from the NBA.
“*Last week: Photoshopped weight room pic of me surfaces on social media*"
“*This week: Random offseason drug test.*”
Although the two images below aren’t blatantly altered, you can clearly see the biceps, triceps, pecs, and traps have been inflated in the above picture compared to the one below.
Caruso looks to battle Rajon Rondo and Avery Bradley for a spot on the Lakers’ second team behind starting guards LeBron, Danny Green, and Kyle Kuzma.