Former NBA player Matt Barnes recently appeared on Scoop B Radio, where he was asked which record is likelier to be broken, LeBron James’ scoring record or John Stockton’s assist record. Barnes stated he doesn’t believe either will be but thinks LeBron’s is the one more likely to be broken.
“I think that there’s going to be a better chance of breaking LeBron’s scoring record which I think is out of reach because the ball doesn’t move the way it used to move,” Barnes said. “It’s more one-on-one now. There’s not anymore of the old-school Chris Pauls and Steve Nashes, the John Stocktons, Magic Johnsons… those kinds of point guards have kind of gone away.
“There are more scoring guards now so, if there’s any record that’s going to be broken and I don’t think LeBron’s record is going to be broken; if I had to have me pick one, it would be the scoring record,” Barnes concluded.
James currently has 40,474 points to his name and with how he’s going, he will probably end up with about 45,000. Someone is going to have to play for 20+ seasons and average 27+ points per game to surpass the Los Angeles Lakers superstar and it’s hard to see that happening. Still, I do think it’s likelier that his record gets broken as compared to Stockton’s, who has 15,806 assists to his name.
The rules in the NBA continue to favor offenses and I think the scoring averages are going to keep going up. In the 2022-23 season, six players averaged over 30 points per game and four players did it last season. While I wouldn’t say it’s easy to put up 30 points on a nightly basis, it has certainly become easier and should keep getting easier.
While we’re seeing some big scoring numbers being put up by a fair few players, that’s not necessarily the case when it comes to assists. Tyrese Haliburton and Trae Young were the only ones to average over 10 assists per game last season, at 10.9 and 10.8 respectively. I can maybe see Luka Doincic joining them in the double-digit assists club in 2024-25, but that’s about it.
The traditional pass-first point guard has just gone out of fashion and I don’t see that profile making a return. It’s all about scoring now and most point guards are just shooting guards masquerading as one. We are also seeing more and more big men and wings run the offense, so those assists start getting spread out among the team as well.
Even if the league had a lot of those pass-first point guards, I think Stockton’s record would still have been almost impossible to break. Much like LeBron, he played forever and to add to that, he almost never missed time due to injury.
Stockton played 19 seasons in the NBA and in 16 of them, he played all 82 games. It’s why his record has proven to be well beyond reach even for other all-time greats. Jason Kidd, who also played 19 seasons, is currently second on the assists charts but is way behind Stockton with 12,091 assists.
Chris Paul, meanwhile, is entering his 20th season in 2024-25 and is third on that list with 11,894 assists. Paul probably will pass Kidd but is not even going to get close to Stockon. You never say never in sports, but the Utah Jazz icon will never be displaced from the top spot in my opinion.
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