Premature Legacy

   (James’ first title proved many doubters wrong, but he has long ways to go if he wants more glory)

Lebron James is quite an individual in the game of basketball, and sports in general. His both failures and successes the last couple of years have managed to cause a rather vigorous stir among world’s sport journalists, analysts, coaches, players and virtually every basketball fan out there.

Winning that long-expected title surely did wanders for him in terms of extingushing all the criticism he was all of a sudden overwhelmed by the season prior to that one, when he failed to do the same in, for some, unexpected fashion in a subpar effort during some of the deciding moments and games against the Dallas Mavericks of 2011.

Nevertheless, it’s not the act of winning the title per se which perpetually impresses the audience of the show, it’s of course more of the question of James’ capabilities on the court. Thus, we find ourselves facing an excessive number of ever increasing articles ascending James into the very heavens on their way to creating the cult of Lebron James. Consequently, some of the writers go to such extremes as daring to speculate about James in terms of the greatest ever.

“For the first time, we could start thinking about him in Jordanian terms” was what Bill Simmons  put on  “Grantland”  recently.

Standing 6’8’’, 250 Ib, with a strong and shaped body and blazing speed in the open court on top of everything, James has been putting on a few performances here and there in both playoffs and regular season as of late, proving he has even mastered inside and outside game, making a serious offensive threat of himself. He hasn’t been shy on the defensive end as well, averaging an impressive 1.9 steals per game and a decent 0.7 blocks. All things considered, you wouldn’t be making a mistake if you described his style of play all around.

However, you also wouldn’t be making a mistake if you said the league had already seen impressive displays on offense and good, solid D from some other players in the past too. Namely, Kobe Bryant. Now, before you start laughing while in your mind comparing the Kobe Bryant of today and mighty James around the very peak of his career, I’ll just remind you of the reactions the Kobe Bryant of, say 2006, managed to trigger: One-man scoring machine, gunner for the ages. Imagine, the words from the very same author – Bill Simmons, no less. An interesting claim came from another, recent article about him too: he has all the tools to eclipse the greatest players in history (www.1888articles.com).

The point? Let’s try not to overanalyse the overhyped predictions happening way before their time and make rash decision concerning such an important matter as positioning a player on the greatest of all time throne. Last but not least, the popular ‘GOAT’ recognition should go a bit beyond the plain numbers and statistics, signifying the most special figure of sports who has shaped the whole new era of the sport during his time.

On another note, let’s not also diminish the achievements nor deteriorate the failures of Lebron James so far. He is still a spectacular and dominant force, and of course, the best player of today who has, as it was said about his rival on the other team, all the tools to eclipse the greatest players in history. We leave this to the hands of fate and see if he manages to use those tools to more than greatest of their potential and pave his way to wherever he longs to belong.

We might just be witnessing the changing of the guard at the mentioned throne or simply another great career from an amazing player, which would be not in the least the less exciting episode to watch.