All-Time Scoring Record About to Fall

[Hoopvortex]

LeBron James is 480 points behind Kareem Abdul-Jabbar for the record. He’s currently averaging 28.5 ppg. At this pace, he’ll break it in 17 games, before the All-Star break.

He scored 47 tonight.

The Lakers are in Boston in game 14. The game is televised on ABC.

[Csfan1984]

Hope he keeps padding numbers in blowouts so he can be within 30 to get it when he comes here and he only scores 17 lol.

[CelticsWhat35]

You’re assuming he’s not gonna have any “rest days”.  Also, I bet he’d rather break it at home, especially since he’ll be passing a former Laker great.

Also, I don’t understand the people that say this milestone will cement him as the GOAT.  It’s no doubt going to be an incredible accomplishment, but longevity isn’t what makes you the GOAT.  Honestly, it’s astonishing to me that people still make the argument considering how many times he came up short in the Finals.  I would think the eye test should do it as well.  However, I think people are so fixated on wanting to be able to say they watched or played with the GOAT and have a recency bias.

[Birdman]

Going break record than have an “injury”

[SparzWizard]

Then we need to smoke him and the Lakers out the building in Game 14. Make sure he loses while he breaks that milestone.

Or...don't let him break it at all in that game

[Neurotic Guy]

Isn’t “all-time” a bit of an embellishment when you consider that “all-time” means 75 years?  That’s only a decade older than me.   Big deal.  75 years from now there will have been a half-dozen new GOATs. Same will be true in football.  When I was a kid (apparently in ancient times) no one was ever going to break Ruth’s home run record or Gehrig’s iron man record.  No one would ever compare to Jim Brown or Russell/Chamberlain. 

GOAT is just a moment in time.

[footey]

Lebron is to be congratulated when he breaks the record. Will get there sooner than we realize (47 points last night on his 38th birthday; my goodness!)

However, wish journalists would point out that Kareem first played 4 years of college before starting his NBA career at the age of 22. Lebron starting tallying points at the age of 18 out of HS. 

Kareem didn't retire until he was 42, and I suspect Lebron is going to keep playing for as long as possible, maybe beyond that age.  When he retires, his total tally will be unsurmountable.

Until Luka breaks it 20 years from now.  And Victor breaks his record 25 years from now.

Records were made to be broken.

[hpantazo]

Lebron is to be congratulated when he breaks the record. Will get there sooner than we realize (47 points last night on his 38th birthday; my goodness!)

However, wish journalists would point out that Kareem first played 4 years of college before starting his NBA career at the age of 22. Lebron starting tallying points at the age of 18 out of HS. 

Kareem didn't retire until he was 42, and I suspect Lebron is going to keep playing for as long as possible, maybe beyond that age.  When he retires, his total tally will be unsurmountable.

Until Luka breaks it 20 years from now.  And Victor breaks his record 25 years from now.

Records were made to be broken.

The one thing with Luka is his fitness and diet. If he doesn't get his act together on that, he won't last long enough physically to compete for any of these records.

[Big333223]

I'm old enough to remember when people were pronouncing James as the next Magic Johnson. And then, sometime after his first championship in Miami, everyone started noticing that he's one of the most prolific and consistent scorers ever. Now he'll have the record.

Here's something kind of interesting about the top 5 scorers in NBA history: MJ has 10 scoring titles, Kareem and Kobe both have 2, Lebron only has one, and Karl Malone, sitting at #3 now, never won a scoring title. Dirk, at #6, also never won one.

[kraidstar]

Isn’t “all-time” a bit of an over embellishment when you consider that “all-time” means 75 years?  That’s only a decade older than me.   Big deal.  75 years from now there will have been a half-dozen new GOATs. Same will be true in football.  When I was a kid (apparently in ancient times) no one was ever going to break Ruth’s home run record or Gehrig’s iron man record.  No one would ever compare to Jim Brown or Russell/Chamberlain. 

GOAT is just a moment in time.

TP.  Eras are so different it's impossible to compare. Imagine if Russell and Wilt had access to modern nutrition,  training, PEDs, equipment, etc. Imagine if Bird had modern medicine, or if he'd grown up in the modern 3pt age.

Same with Malone, Kareem, Jordan.

It's just a different ball game now.

[GreenEnvy]

I don’t think LeBron hangs around too long once he becomes a beta or leading a truly awful team (he’s close to that right now) with no end in sight.

I think he’s too much of an egomaniac to accept a lesser role than unquestioned number one. We’ve seen many other stars hang around for awhile after, but I doubt he does (even if he can be an 18+ppg scorer still, which he definitely can based in what he’s doing right now).


But I don’t think any one statistic/record should make someone a GOAT. As great of an accomplishment as this is, it doesn’t change much. He’s easily top-10 all-time, and probably top-5, possibly top-3. I don’t think many people considered Aaron a better home-run hitter than Ruth, and he wasn’t ever considered the greatest all-around player above guys like Mays and Mantle.

LeBron is not a better scorer or player than Jordan was.

[Moranis]

Lebron is to be congratulated when he breaks the record. Will get there sooner than we realize (47 points last night on his 38th birthday; my goodness!)

However, wish journalists would point out that Kareem first played 4 years of college before starting his NBA career at the age of 22. Lebron starting tallying points at the age of 18 out of HS. 

Kareem didn't retire until he was 42, and I suspect Lebron is going to keep playing for as long as possible, maybe beyond that age.  When he retires, his total tally will be unsurmountable.

Until Luka breaks it 20 years from now.  And Victor breaks his record 25 years from now.

Records were made to be broken.

The inverse of that of course is, it means Kareem could enter the league and average 28.8 ppg as a rookie, 31.7 ppg in his 2nd year, and 34.8 ppg in his 3rd year.  More physically mature and more ready to come in and be a beast immediately.  It took Lebron to his 3rd year to match what Kareem did as a rookie.  Doesn't entirely make up the difference, but does favor Kareem some.  In fact, most top tier rookies back then came in and were dominate, that just isn't the case today.  Very few rookies even hit 20 ppg anymore, but that was common practice until the wide spread high schoolers and 1 and done players entered the league.

[bdm860]

Lebron is to be congratulated when he breaks the record. Will get there sooner than we realize (47 points last night on his 38th birthday; my goodness!)

However, wish journalists would point out that Kareem first played 4 years of college before starting his NBA career at the age of 22. Lebron starting tallying points at the age of 18 out of HS. 

Kareem didn't retire until he was 42, and I suspect Lebron is going to keep playing for as long as possible, maybe beyond that age.  When he retires, his total tally will be unsurmountable.

Until Luka breaks it 20 years from now.  And Victor breaks his record 25 years from now.

Records were made to be broken.

I remember predicting to friends before LeBron even played a game that a lot of records would be broken starting in about 20 years (this was said sometime in '00-'03 era), because the influx of high school kids and one-and-dones would mean all these players would have 3-4 more years to accumulate stats.

Looking at the records now, besides LeBron (who also has a chance for games and minutes), I was way off.  No other active/recent players are in contention for all time records for the main counting stats (points, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, games, minutes).  Obviously 3P has changed, so those records are mostly filled with current/recent players, but besides that the record books are still mostly filled with guys who played 3/4 years of college (except for assists which has a lot of Sophomores).

[Moranis]

Lebron is to be congratulated when he breaks the record. Will get there sooner than we realize (47 points last night on his 38th birthday; my goodness!)

However, wish journalists would point out that Kareem first played 4 years of college before starting his NBA career at the age of 22. Lebron starting tallying points at the age of 18 out of HS. 

Kareem didn't retire until he was 42, and I suspect Lebron is going to keep playing for as long as possible, maybe beyond that age.  When he retires, his total tally will be unsurmountable.

Until Luka breaks it 20 years from now.  And Victor breaks his record 25 years from now.

Records were made to be broken.

I remember predicting to friends before LeBron even played a game that a lot of records would be broken starting in about 20 years (this was said sometime in '00-'03 era), because the influx of high school kids and one-and-dones would mean all these players would have 3-4 more years to accumulate stats.

Looking at the records now, besides LeBron (who also has a chance for games and minutes), I was way off.  No other active/recent players are in contention for all time records for the main counting stats (points, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, games, minutes).  Obviously 3P has changed, so those records are mostly filled with current/recent players, but besides that the record books are still mostly filled with guys who played 3/4 years of college (except for assists which has a lot of Sophomores).

The reality is, most players go through the same general career arc and it makes very little difference at what age they start. 

They have 3 general experience groupings

Years 1 - 5 - the learning the league and maximizing individual stat era
Years 6 - 10 - their absolute prime years
Years 11 - ? - smarter, but not nearly as athletic

Some guys peak a bit a later, some guys stick around a bit longer in the middle grouping, but by and large whether they start at 18 or 22, they go through a pretty similar arc.  Now if they start older they are better faster, but they still have that same general arc, just not as quite as much variance on the up swing.

[celticsclay]

Kind of sad he is doing this in largely irrelevant games for the second year in a row. Feels a lot more Carmelo Anthony than Michael jordan earlier. Obviously James was best players on a ton of incredible teams but two years unable to make playin? That would be rough.