Chicago Bulls: LeBron further surpasses MJ for another record

Former Chicago Bulls legendary guard Michael Jordan does find himself behind Lakers forward LeBron James in one particular stat category.

The GOAT debate between Chicago Bulls legendary shooting guard Michael Jordan and the Los Angeles Lakers superstar forward LeBron James is only going to heat up if the latter of those two wins an NBA Championship this year. LeBron just led the Lakers, alongside superstar big man Anthony Davis, in a five-game series win over the three-seed Denver Nuggets to move onto the NBA Finals.

No one was able to take care of business against the ultra-stingy Nuggets the way that the top-seeded Lakers did in the Western Conference Finals up until that point of the playoffs. The Nuggets came back from down 3-1 in both the first and second rounds of the playoffs to beat the six-seed Utah Jazz and then the two-seed Los Angeles Clippers.

But LeBron, AD, and the Lakers stopped star big man Nikola Jokic and guard Jamal Murray in their tracks in just five games in the West Finals. Now the Lakers will go onto face either the five-seed Miami Heat and former Bulls star Jimmy Butler, or the three-seed Boston Celtics and the star wing pairing of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.

In all likelihood, it will be Butler and the Heat facing LeBron and the Lakers in the NBA Finals. The Heat own a 3-1 series lead in the Eastern Conference Finals over the Celtics. And Game 5 between the Heat and Celtics takes place on the night of Sep. 28.

However, LeBron was able to post more impressive records in the West Finals win for the Lakers over the Nuggets.

LeBron now has led his team in total points during the regular season and led his team to the NBA Finals 10 times. While he surpassed Jordan in that stat category a long time ago, reaching 10 such seasons is a milestone marker.

Now there are flaws to this stat since Jordan only advanced to the NBA Finals on six occasions. He played in less total seasons than LeBron, and never lost in the NBA Finals. Total points can be a flawed overall stat in this type of conversation in and of itself too.

But we shouldn’t take away from the fact that we are witnessing greatness from LeBron, just like we witnessed from Jordan when he was winning all of those titles with the Bulls in the 1990’s. GOAT debate aside, we should appreciate the greatness of LeBron while he is still around playing in the NBA.

LeBron averaged 26.7 points per game, 10.3 rebounds, 8.9 assists, 1.3 steals, and 1.0 blocks while shooting 54.7 percent from the field, 34.9 percent from beyond the arc, and 74.1 percent from the free-throw line in this playoff run to date. Those are great numbers and we’ll see if he can continue that pace in the Finals.