Among LeBron James’ multiple achievements in his career, he can boast a historical streak of eight consecutive NBA Finals appearances from 2011 to 2018, among a total of 10 appearances in his 22-year career so far.
LeBron James recently released the live episode from the Fanatics Fest that he recorded for the ‘Mind the Game’ podcast with Steve Nash. He spoke about this historical NBA Finals run and, in Steve Nash’s words, the “basketball nirvana” of playing on a team he can trust that much.
“I think the best feeling for me as a player is that, when a national anthem is going on and I usually stand on the end, is that when I can look down the rope and I know that I got 11 other guys, 13 other guys that’s in a foxhole with me. And I know for sure that if it’s a grenade thrown in a fox hole, we don’t all stand there. Like we want to die for this game.”
“You know, and that is a beautiful feeling when you can look to your left and look all the way down the road either if I was teammates with Dwayne Wayne, Chris Bosh, Udonis Haslem, James Jones, Mike Miller, you know, the rest of the crew.”
“Or if I looked to my left and I saw, you know, Kevin Love, Kyrie Irving, you know, J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert, Tristan Thompson, Channing Frye, Richard Jefferson, or Anthony Davis, you know, Alex Caruso, Rajon Rondo, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, you know, Danny Green, and looking at my– just knowing guys that, you know, who are willing to die for it on the floor and be in a fox hole with you. There’s no better feeling than that, man. There’s no better feeling than that, absolutely.”
LeBron James has four wins to his six losses in the NBA Finals as he went in 2007 and 2020 as well, in addition to his streak from 2011 to 2018. James has always built his team from scratch with players that he trusts.
Ever since he came into the league, he had been handed the reins to every team he has been on. So he puts a special emphasis on having guys around him that he trusts.
When his streak ended in 2019, he scouted Anthony Davis and convinced him to come to the Lakers and then immediately built a roster with the Lakers that won the championship in 2020. James highly values building a roster with key pieces that trust each other, like a battalion of troops in a warzone.
Even when his teammates thought it “s**ks” to play with him, they pushed themselves to achieve the common goal they had their eyes on. This is a type of camaraderie that keeps the bond strong between these players for life.
