Is the LA great the all-time greatest?
Los Angeles Lakers All-Star power forward LeBron James made further inroads towards his claims of GOAT-ness last week, when he obliterated the 39-year reign of former Los Angeles Lakers All-Star center Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the NBA’s all-time leading regular season scorer. He also, you know, eclipsed Cap in all-time total points scored in February 2022, which given that that stat encompasses both regular season and postseason scoring, you’d think people would care more about. But apparently not. People care more about the regular season mark for some reason, even though, you know, you actually win titles in the postseason. Whatever.
Now, he has both the regular season and postseason scoring records, and given his remarkable durability — basically until he donned the purple and gold in his age-34 season — it’s hard to see anyone else approaching his numbers (which seem destined to balloon, as it sure sounds like he’ll be playing through at least 2025) any time soon.
Brandon “Scoop B” Robinson of Bally Sports wonders if getting over this latest hurdle is enough to make The Chosen One the official Great Of All Time (“GOAT,” if you will) of the NBA.
“Anybody who’s ever been around LeBron knows he’s always working on his body, always thinking about getting his sleep and proper nutrition, and it’s hard to talk to him where he doesn’t have some device hooked up to him or ice on some part of his body where he’s constantly recuperating from the bangs, the minor injuries that he’s constantly dealing with,” league commission Adam Silver told Robinson. “There’s that, and then there’s the physical and mental skill that it takes to pound through that many seasons and continue to perform at that high level night after night after night.”
James has sent a new benchmark for NBA longevity, even if he’s stubbornly still playing too many minutes and paying the prices with long-term injuries. He is certainly on the league’s Mount Rushmore, that debate is effectively over. And this latest achievement is pretty darn remarkable, and certainly helps burnish his legacy further.
The other generally-agreed upon candidates for that distinction include Chicago Bulls shooting guard Michael Jordan, Abdul-Jabbar, and Boston Celtics center Bill Russell.
Jordan went 6-for-6 in Finals appearances, won five MVPs and one Defensive Player of the Year award. He still holds the league’s all-time scoring average, 30.1 points per game, and did it in an era with much more lenient hand-check policies than what we see today.
Abdul-Jabbar has won more MVPs than anyone else (six), has also won six championships, and until James burst onto the scene was pretty much the league’s standard-bearer for enduring excellence. To be fair, James entered the NBA as an 18-year-old straight out of high school, while Abdul-Jabbar had to play all four years of college — during which he won three NCAA titles (freshmen were ineligible until 1972, and dunking was also banned while he was at UCLA, because I guess college hated fun?).
Russell won 11 titles in 13 seasons, a feat of dominance that hasn’t been approached ever since. Yes, even when he left the NBA there were only 14 teams and yes, he started playing in an era where the league was incredibly racist and didn’t have enough Black players on teams, thus ostensibly thinning out the competition. All that said, he also played against all-time greats like Lakers legends Wilt Chamberlain, Elgin Baylor and Jerry West, Cincinnati Royals/Milwaukee Bucks point guard Oscar Robertson, and New York Knicks center Willis Reed. So there was still plenty of talent to beat out.
James remains incredibly dominant on offense, but has not been the same All-Defensive behemoth he was in his Miami Heat prime for almost a decade. He’s won four titles, four MVPs and been to 10 NBA Finals. He is one of the league’s signature passers and yet leads it in scoring. The man is absolutely incredible, and a generational talent. Calling him the GOAT may be taking a bit of a leap. There isn’t necessarily a wrong answer when comparing these Hall of Famers from distinctly different eras. Yours truly will always be an MJ guy, unless the case for James just becomes indisputable (say, if he’s the best guy on two more title-winning teams).
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