The Harsh Truth About the GOAT Debate

to get the new 14 for the lakers lebron look below oh my lord it's never going to end it's lebron's reign over the nba i just came to the conclusion that lebron is hacked into the matrix and has transcended aging lebron is in his 19 nd NBA season and somehow he is still one of the best players on the planet. This is not supposed to happen. 99 of NBA players peak in their late 20s and then slowly regress as they age, eventually becoming a liability to their team and inevitably sailing away. towards the sunset washed and content with his achievements, but no lebron, the man is fighting against his age as if he had a grudge against time and the more he accumulates these mind-blowing feats, the more we must ask ourselves the question and I.

I really hate to do this, but Lebron is the greatest basketball player of all time and if he isn't, what would he have to do to truly be the

goat

once and for all? About five years ago I uploaded my first basketball-related video to this channel. the title of that video is lebron the

goat

, you can still watch this video today, but since it is an absolute production, i recommend you stay away from it to summarize the video. I gave 10 reasons why Lebron would retire quickly like the goat. Fast forward five years and thousands of hours watching games collecting data and gathering context in this sport we love.

Since then I changed my ways and realized that Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player of all time, but my original evaluation from five years ago didn't change completely because I never said Lebron was the goat at that time, I just said 10 Reasons Lebron Would Retire as the Goat But since I posted that video, I've pretty much avoided the goat conversation entirely, I've given it a spin. Regarding the idea of ​​the best players in certain aspects of the game, I've talked about top scores, I've ranked players using purely numbers, but I've never broken down who the best player is in my opinion because I just feel like the topic is a bit redundant and ESPN already gives you a daily update on the goat

debate

anyway so there's no need for me to do that but I think it's time we discuss this because what LeBron is doing at this point in his career is simply absurd.

At the moment there are more or less three different sides in the whole goat

debate

: people who think Michael Jordan is the goat, people who think Lebron is the goat, and people who are wrong, I'm just joking of course, but not really, I would say about 75 percent of people fall into the MJ goat category, about 20 percent of people fall into the LeBrons goat category, and about 5 fall into the other category. Usually these other fans think the goats are Wilt, Kobe or Kareem, there aren't many of them, but. Wow, will they die on that hill? Look, what's going on here is that a lot of the fans in MJ's corner believe that he is and will forever be the goat, but realistically, is there anything Lebron can do to get over it?

I mean, there has to be some kind. of objective metric that we can use to distinguish the best player of all time, without opinions, without prejudices, just the facts, if Lebron somehow won four more championships and retired with eight rings, he would undoubtedly be the goat, so There are paths for him to become the greatest of all time, but where is that threshold and what would Lebron have to achieve to get there first? Let's take a look at the basic numbers between michael and lebron lebron has more career points rebounds assists blocks more triple doubles higher field goal percentage and higher three point percentage and michael has more steals and a higher free throw percentage, but this whole argument, the career totals argument, is only useful in demonstrating Lebron's longevity and sustained excellence.

These numbers don't prove that Lebron is a better scorer, rebounder, defender or shooter than Jordan, they just show that Lebron has been good at these things for a long time. These numbers also show how versatile Lebron is, arguably his most valuable asset, so instead of looking at his career totals, let's look at his career averages. Michael averages more points and more steals. and lebron averages more assists and more rebounds and as much as it pains me to say this, this is where the argument for the goat usually ends, since most people make an obligatory comment about his final records and you practically have a version condensed from the majority. goat debates, but there's a lot more to unpack here, so let's break it down so you know how much I like advanced stats, they don't tell the whole story, but if you know which ones to look for, you can uncover some nuances in a player's life. game you won't get just by watching them play player efficiency rating win actions per 48 offensive boxes plus minus defensive box plus minus value over replacement and true shooting percentage these six advanced stats give us efficiency, production value, impact and pretty much everything the rest. and in these six advanced statistics michael jordan outperforms lebron in five of them he is more efficient overall contributes to more wins contributes to more points he is better at defense and is generally more valuable on the court than lebron is the only advanced statistic where lebron Lo Jordan's best is true shooting percentage now in terms of who is the better basketball player.

Almost every metric points to Michael Jordan, but if you take a look at these numbers, it's surprising how close Lebron is to MJ across the board, just a fraction behind Jordan. pretty much everything, but these numbers don't even address who is better because that conversation would involve accolades and achievements and impact on the game, take away the rings, the influence, the intangibles, the opinions and it's practically objectively true that Michael was a better basketball player than LeBron. but the goat debate isn't necessarily about who is the best player, it's about who is the best player. We have to unpack a little more now.

We can't have a thorough discussion about goats without discussing each player's accomplishments. Numbers are great and they serve a purpose, but numbers alone are not indicative of greatness, they are just a vehicle to greatness. That's why, even though James Harden spent half a decade putting up some of the highest scoring numbers in NBA history, most people don't consider him older than some players with much lower offensive numbers. praise, not the other way around. This is also why I consider Wilt Chamberlain to be a better basketball player than Bill Russell, but Bill Russell was older than Wilt.

Wilt achieved greatness through his numbers, while Russell achieved greatness through contributing to a relentless style of winning basketball, so let's take a look at the achievements of Michael Jordan and Lebron James. Now there are many other awards a player can win in the NBA, but these are the ones that really stand out. on a player's resume mvps final championships regular season mvps defensive player of the year all nba selections and all defensive team selections and among these six categories jordan beats lebron and five of them and michael achieved all this in just 15 seasons for lebron's 18 seasons, the only category in which lebron surpassed michael is in all nba selections and most will argue that, again, this is a longevity achievement more than anything else, which in this point seems to be the general theme in the goat debate up to this point in his career. most fans will agree that lebron has been one step below jordan in terms of greatness so now the race to become the goats has become a marathon because eventually the sheer volume of numbers and achievements Lebron's career can become so overwhelming that we will have no choice but to admit that he is, in fact, the greatest player of all time, which brings us to a real dilemma in this age-old debate: the flame that burns twice as hot. bright burns half as long a great quote from ancient chinese philosopher lao tzu regarding the idea of ​​excellence and its sustainability, almost as if you can have longevity or be exceptional, but now you can't have both in the world of basketball and In sports in general, being exceptional translates into longevity and vice versa.

Michael Jordan was excellent. For 13 seasons in the NBA, his flame was violently bright and burned for quite a long time, but what if there was a flame that burned about 95 percent as bright as his and lasted much longer? At a certain point, the radiance of even the brightest flame is surpassed. For the flame that just won't go out, of course, Lebron isn't on fire—he's a six-foot-nine-inch, 250-pound freak of nature in basketball shoes—but his light shines about 95 percent brighter than the by Michael Jordan and lasts a long time. For longer, when does the longevity of Lebron's brilliance simply surpass Michael's slightly greater but much shorter brilliance because, as we've discussed, Mike surpasses Lebron in almost every metric except longevity and overall production, per so the real question here is how much longer will it last? lebron has to be great before most will agree that he is better than michael the man who is in his 19th nba season and is leading the nba in scoring is still one of the top five players in the league and his pocket gets deeper and deeper with each season here is a table of lebron's total points, assists and rebounding averages throughout each season of his career.

Each point on the graph represents the average total points, assists and rebounds for each season of his career, so for example, this season Lebron is putting up 8 6 and 30 per game, so his total for the season is 44. Now in the NBA, any value over 40 is exceptional. Lebron's total production has exceeded 40 in 17 different seasons. Here is Michael's average total points, assists and rebounds for each season of his career. is by far the biggest argument for Lebron in the goat debate: the man has simply maintained excellence longer than Mike, and while numbers are just a vehicle to greatness, there has to come a point where Ignore that LeBron's numbers are getting to that point, but some fans will argue that there were other players who were still really good at this stage of his career, i.e. like Kareem, Kobe or Carl Malone , they weren't even close.

LeBron was already the only player to be. Part of the 30k 10k 10k club, apart from a strange injury, will undoubtedly break Kareem's scoring record. He will probably play the most seasons in an NBA career. He already holds the record for most NBA picks and is still adding to who he is. probably the longest reel of his career with moments like this, if Lebron keeps doing this in a couple of years and at the same time keeps putting up all the numbers in the NBA, I really think it's going to be hard to say he's not the best player of all time, do you know what I am?

I'll just say it as Lebron's legacy grows as he plays more seasons. Michael's legacy would have been slightly diminished if he had played more seasons. Of course, this is not a fact, but all evidence points towards this assumption. Michael Jordan retires after playing alone. 13 NBA seasons in 1998 was the best thing he could have done for his legacy. The Bulls were not going to win another championship and the backbone of the dynasty he had built would have all but vanished by the start of the 1999 season had he played. During that three-year retirement period from 1999 to 2001, he would have stayed with the Bulls and put up big numbers on a losing team or signed with a different team and chased rings, both options being far less illustrious than him coming out on top with the team that drafted him michael's career was the perfect storm he was drafted by a franchise that was ready and willing to build around him he was on a roster that suited his abilities extremely well and he and the bulls peaked as the dominant teams of the 80s and early 90s like the lakers, celtics and pistons began to fade, you couldn't have written a better career if you had tried, on the other hand, despite his success, lebron really fell He took the brunt of the deal many times throughout his career.

He spent his first seven seasons in the NBA playing for a team that couldn't have cared less about building a cohesive team around him. He spent four consecutive Finals going head-to-head. With the most dominant dynasty in modern NBA history outside of Jordan's bowling, while Michael was surrounded by players who were all willing to accept his system, Lebron has spent many years saddled with bad rosters and seemingly incompetent teammates, part of which is his fault for trying to play GM and build squadspoor things and I mention these little nuances because the goats debate has many nuances, as much as people want to act as if the whole 6-0 in the final is the end of the discussion, it's just not that if the rings were the only thing that mattered, then Bill Russell would do it. be the goat, oh, but he played a long time ago, that doesn't count, well then Robert Ori is the goat because he has seven rings compared to Jordan six, well, yes, but Ori was not the best player in any of those championships, It's okay, it is too. the arguments about rings or is it about being the best player on the court or a mix of both is a player's performance no matter how masterful it was all in vain if his team loses the line becomes less and less clear the more Deep goes deeper there is no single metric that can be used to determine this debate and analyzing every little detail is a necessary burden, but unfortunately it is a burden that most fans won't bother taking on at this point.

I personally think that Michael Jordan is the best basketball player of all time. I also think he is the greatest basketball player of all time, but unlike some fans, I don't think the door has been closed on Lebron. I think if Lebron can continue to dominate the league for a few more seasons and continue to shatter our previous notions of what we thought was possible in a single NBA career, I think he has a chance to retire as the greatest player of all time, but, Of course, only time will tell, and luckily for LeBron, time always seems to be on his side.