The GOAT debate has been a recurrent topic around the league throughout this year and that doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon. LeBron James and Michael Jordan are the two names that always come up when people discuss the greatest player of all time. MJ had a terrific career with the Chicago Bulls, going to six NBA Finals, winning all of them in two separate three-peats.
LeBron James just won his fourth title last Sunday and despite having a 4-6 records in the Finals, plenty of people consider him the best player that ever set foot on an NBA court. The fourth championship is a huge achievement for James and more folks see it that way, as LeBron is now considered the GOAT in more states around America than Michael Jordan is. NBA analysts at BetOnline used geotagged Twitter data on tweets to define where LeBron James and Michael Jordan are considered the GOAT.
James came out on top, with 29 states having him as the GOAT while 21 have Jordan as the best player in NBA history. This is a change since Jordan was considered the GOAT shortly after his award-winning docu-series ‘The Last Dance’ finished. 26 states saw Jordan as the GOAT, with 24 supporting LeBron.
Both players have had terrific seasons at 35, but if we take a look at it, Jordan’s dominance at this age was out of this world. His Airness had the perfect season when he was 35, and even though Bron was wonderful this year, too, he’s not close to Jordan.
LeBron still has job to do before catching up with MJ and it’s not certain that he’ll ever do it. Even though many think that James is now the GOAT, an entire hall of fame career still separates him from Jordan. Perhaps at the end of his career, Bron will finish higher than MJ, but as for right now, that’s just not real.
