It is not often that you get to say you saw one of the greatest moments in the history of sports, but all of us will be fortunate enough to witness one such moment this week. LeBron James is now just 36 points away from becoming the NBA’s all-time scoring leader, and in all likelihood, he’ll either do it on Tuesday against the Thunder or on Thursday against the Bucks.
When Kareem Abdul-Jabbar retired with 38,387 points, no one would have thought the record would be broken, but LeBron is set to blow by it, and one can only wonder how many points he will end up with. James is averaging 30.0 PPG in his 20th season in the league, which is just absurd, and we almost certainly won’t see another player with this kind of longevity. We should appreciate him and that is the message that Stan Van Gundy wanted to get across.
Van Gundy is one of the few coaches who can boast about beating LeBron in the playoffs when his Orlando Magic squad beat James and the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2009 Eastern Conference Finals. He has a tremendous amount of respect for LeBron, though, and wanted to give some perspective to James being on the brink of becoming the all-time leading scorer.
https://twitter.com/realStanVG/status/1622689286083514385
“Let me try to put LeBron James imminent all-time NBA scoring record in perspective. There will very soon be only 6 men (Kareem, Malone, Jordan, Bryant, Nowitzki and Chamberlain) within 10,000 points of James. 10,000 points more than all but 6 players in history!”
Shaquille O’Neal is currently at 8th in the scoring charts with 28,596 points, and LeBron will almost certainly be more than 10,000 points clear of him not too long in the future, which is amazing. James being somewhat of a polarizing figure meant fans got on Van Gundy and in response, he praised James for his greatness.
https://twitter.com/realStanVG/status/1622803405063487488
“Amazing how so many of you want to downplay this incredible accomplishment and LeBron’s phenomenal career.”
Van Gundy also pushed back when a fan tried to downplay the significance of James breaking the record.
https://twitter.com/realStanVG/status/1622802487844687873
“Well if it is easy as you make it sound then the record wouldn’t have stood for as long as it has. Someone is going to be the leading scorer every year. Someone is going to be the MVP every year. This is a career achievement that won’t be broken for a long time, if ever Longevity is a huge part of his greatness. 20 years and still averaging 30. Sustained greatness.”
Those who went up against LeBron at any point seem to realize just how great he is, more than the average fan who loves to downplay all that he has accomplished. It is going to be an unbelievable moment when he breaks that record, and it is one you will never forget for the rest of your life.
JJ Redick Dismissed The False Narratives Regarding LeBron James
Despite LeBron getting closer to the record, there are those that still do not consider him one of the greatest scorers ever. He is viewed as a pass-first guy and not a pure scorer, but Kevin Durant shot down that notion by saying LeBron always was a scorer who could pass. He also added that calling LeBron a pass-first guy was underselling him.
JJ Redick also pushed back on the notion that LeBron is breaking the record only because he has played for so long. He pointed out how James has the 5th highest scoring average in NBA history and that he is pretty close to being in the top 3. He is also a more efficient 2-point scorer than both Michael Jordan and Durant while ranking in the top 10 for three-pointers made. Redick went on to say that most of these narratives surrounding James are just not factual.
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