5 things to know about LeBron James
LeBron James, who made his NBA debut in 2003 has been breaking records ever since and is considered by many the best basketball player of all time.
It’s hard to argue against LeBron James being one of the greatest basketball players, but there’s often debate amongst the older and younger generations about whether he or Michael Jordan is the best of all time. In 2016, LeBron told Sports Illustrated that it was his life goal to surpass Jordan as the greatest, and some would say he’s on his way, though he is a few championship games behind Jordan at this point. Either way, LeBron is not known as “King James” for no reason. Here are a few things to know about the NBA’s icon.
He is a right-handed shooter but a left-handed writer (and everything else).
LeBron James is leftie, but somehow a right-handed shooter.He says he’s not sure exactly how that happened, but that it probably had something to do with watching his idols like Michael Jordan shoot right-handed and thinking it looked cool when he was younger. These days though, he says he thinks the lefty shots look cooler.
He shares some records with Michael Jordan
Michael Jordan is LeBron’s idol as well as his personal goal. At the moment, they actually share some records. They are the only two players to win the NBA MVP, Finals MVP, and an Olympic gold medal in the same year (Jordan in 1992 and LeBron in 2012).
James became the youngest player in NBA history to score 20,000 points in 2013
In 2013, LeBron eclipsed the 20,000 point mark by making a short jumper with 2:45 left in the second quarter to give him 20,001 career points, making him the youngest player (just over 28 years old) to reach the milestone, a record previously held by Kobe Bryant (who was 29).
LeBron was drafted out of high school first overall
He was only the second player to be chosen first overall straight out of high school. The only other was Kwame Brown in 2001. LeBron was one of the most highly anticipated picks and was selected by his hometown team, the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2003. In his first game in the NBA, he set a record, scoring 25 points against the Sacramento Kings, the most points scored by a prep-to-pro player in their debut.
As of 2022, LeBron James has scored the most career points of any active player
LeBron leads the list of active NBA players with a total of 36,526 career points scored at the time of this writing. He is third place on the all-time list after Kareem-Abdul Jabbar (38,387) and Karl Malone (36,928) in the regular season. It’s possible he could top that list by the end of his career. He recently became the leader in all-time points scored in regular and post season games combined in the NBA.