A couple of weeks before his 40th birthday, Michael Jordan sounded a bit skeptical about a teenager named LeBron James. Jordan thought the immense exposure and expectations that shaped James’ world would make his NBA entry more challenging than anyone else’s … ever.
Jordan said it would be unfair to expect the 6-foot, 8-inch James to be as good as Kobe Bryant and Tracy McGrady were when they jumped straight from high school to the pros.
“I think he would be an average player in our league right now,” Jordan said in an MSG Network interview, “with the potential to be a better player.”
Average. Potential. In a different time and place in the sports world, long before James, No. 23 for the Los Angeles Lakers, on Tuesday landed in a place no NBA player had ever been -- a 23rd season -- I weighed Jordan’s words and figured he had a point. James had made the cover of Sports Illustrated as a high school junior. He had somehow gone viral a few years before Twitter was launched.
Nobody could possibly be that good, at that age, right?
A day or two later, I called Ernie Grunfeld, the longtime NBA general manager and former player, to ask about Jordan’s scouting report. I was checking in before I drove to Trenton, New Jersey, to watch the phenom from St. Vincent-St. Mary High School in Akron, Ohio, play on his latest stop. Grunfeld had a one-word piece of advice in case I was planning on underestimating one of the world’s most famous 18-year-olds.
Don’t.
On Feb. 8, 2003, returning from an absurd suspension for accepting $845 worth of Wes Unseld and Gale Sayers jerseys, James put on a show to end all prep basketball shows. He scored 52 points to match the total output of his overwhelmed opponent, Westchester High School from Los Angeles, one of the nation’s finest teams, making a dizzying array of 3-pointers, high-flying layups and dunks and throwing in a buzzer-beating 35-footer for good measure.
Trevor Ariza, the UCLA-bound forward who would enjoy a highly credible 18-year NBA career, was the poor soul assigned to James. In the middle of the onslaught, someone in the crowd came down behind one basket, waving his arms and frantically shouting instructions at Ariza. I’ve never seen or heard a more futile attempt to rally a young athlete.
“There was nothing we could do,” Ariza said.
Like my 9,000 fellow witnesses in Trenton, I discovered that the reality of LeBron James was even bigger and better than the buildup around him. He inspired visions of a young Mozart, a young Tiger Woods. To watch him was to understand the Lakers would be crazy not to trade a 24-year-old Kobe for the No. 1 pick in the next draft.
More than two decades later, as he neared his 41st birthday, James missed the start of an NBA season for the first time in his life. He explained that in his recovery from sciatica, he needed to get his lungs back from a newborn baby’s to a grown-up man’s.
James said he felt like a child on his first day at a new school. He didn’t need to confirm how much he still loved the sport because he had proved it by practicing with the Lakers’ G League squad to expedite his return.
On Tuesday, he suited up for his team’s 15th game of the season and made a big difference, because of course he did. He helped the 10-4 Lakers become the 11-4 Lakers by playing with a youthful joy, firing passes all over the place against the Utah Jazz while Luka Doncic scored 37 in the 140-126 victory. Better yet, James’ teammate and son Bronny had a front-row seat for his old man’s return, at least until he entered the game in the closing minutes and drained a 3-pointer.
In 30 minutes, LeBron James delivered 12 assists, 11 points and a strong message to Hollywood that he will happily assume the role of best supporting actor while letting Doncic play the lead.
More than anything, by playing in a 23rd season, James gave all of us another reason to step back and appreciate his staggering staying power. He entered the league in 2003 as the most famous teenage athlete of his or any other generation, and man, did he ever exceed the hype.
Kobe, Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird were the transcendent perimeter players who preceded him. And how did James fare when pitted against those four legends, including the three he never faced on the court?
He scored more points than Jordan and Bryant.
He dished out more assists than Magic.
He won more championship rings than Bird.
At 40, James was still voted one of the 10 best players in the world. He made the All-NBA team for the 21st consecutive year. At a time when he should be off somewhere playing beach volleyball and beer-league softball or overhauling his hot mess of a golf swing, he’s raging against gravity and time.
James entered Tuesday’s game needing 50 appearances to break Robert Parish’s NBA record for regular-season games played (1,611) and 959 regular-season minutes to become the first player to reach 60,000 minutes. He is the postseason games leader at 292 appearances -- nobody else has reached 260 -- and the postseason minutes leader at 12,062 -- nobody else has reached 10,000.
James has scored more than 50,000 combined regular-season and postseason points, while nobody else has touched 45,000. Neither Jordan nor Bryant touched 40,000.
James has done all of this while playing a sport that punishes the legs and puts a premium on speed, stop-and-start quickness and leaping ability. In the NBA, you can’t be a 40-something Tom Brady planted in the pocket and protected by an offensive line. James is more explosive at the end of his career than was an aging Jordan, who spent his final two seasons shooting turnaround jumpers for the Washington Wizards.
It has been a surreal run for James, starting with his hometown Cleveland Cavaliers. Before a game in Philadelphia during his rookie year, I was talking to him at his locker about high school players who might declare for the 2004 draft. He mentioned Sebastian Telfair and Shaun Livingston. I mentioned Al Jefferson, Josh Smith and Robert Swift.
“Dwight Something,” James offered.
“Dwight Howard,” I replied.
The future No. 1 pick, future James teammate and yet another star who would ultimately retire before he did.
“There’s not going to be anyone left in high school,” James said before tipoff that night. “I was fortunate. The Cavs had the No. 1 pick, and they just liked me because I live 30 minutes away in Akron. I don’t know why they picked me. I can’t play basketball.”
He was smiling.
Nobody has played the game quite like James has over a career that is nearly five years older than he was on his draft day. As he said Monday: “There’s not one team, one club in the world, that I can’t fit in and play for. I can do everything on the floor.”
Off the floor, James has avoided the kinds of scandals that have swallowed whole many megastars before him. He has committed an unforced error here or there, but given the scrutiny he has had to navigate in the social media age, he has lived an exemplary public life.
He was raised in extreme poverty before basketball, which, he said in September, “got me out of the situation I was in.” He added, “I could get away from reality for two, three, four hours, being on the basketball court as an 8-year-old kid.”
All these years later, the court is still his sanctuary, his home sweet home. James outlasted absolutely everyone. And near the end of an incomparable career, that stands as his greatest achievement.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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