I’m not sure how, but LeBron is still becoming more impressive every day.
It has gotten to the point that if they treated the NBA Top 10 Plays of the Week as a legitimately honest meritocracy, last week probably would have been Brandon Roy’s walk-off overtime three at #1, Derrick Rose dunking on Blur at #2, maybe Flash’s put-back dunk somewhere and then seven LBJ moments of terror.
That block on TJ Ford was absurd and rightly included near the top. And if NBA TV wants to pretend that a Leon Powe routine dunk in transition, a Tyson Chandler alley-oop that happens three times a game and an unguarded Gerald Green tomahawk all aren’t outclassed by something LeBron does every quarter then, fine, it’s understandable to market other players in the League too.
But it’s not a fantasy world I want to participate in.
I watched the entire Cavs/Pacers game and those two-handed thunder dunks folded into his spot on the Top 10 along with the block on TJ, while impressive for their sheer force and explosiveness, weren’t even his own personal highlights that night. Check the impossible running, behind-the-back kick-out at 0:46 here followed by the retarded double-clutch dunk in traffic at 1:10 and the Dr. J-ian up-and-under floating reverse lay-up at 1:23.
Then, look at the unbridled anger and rancid disgust for mankind he shows on this Magic/Shaq-hybrid drive/spin/dunk triumvirate move at 0:58 here against the Bulls. There has really been a more impressive play than that this season? Okay, sure. And if we’re gonna consider the Gerald Green uncontested, solo-dunk to be especially noteworthly, we may as well pay homage to the complete nonsense LeBron unleashes out on the break at 0:23 as well.
His performance in the first act of the home-and-home with the Bulls in the week wasn’t quite the same onslaught, but the no-look, over-the-head toss-in at 1:30 is the type of stuff that had us all jumping off our sofas while watching Come Fly With Me, not to mention the five or six passes a night he makes similar to the one at 1:41 that only he and about four other dudes on the planet are even physically capable of. Similarly, the pass at 0:55 here is Bird-esque and reeks of pure victory.
And all of this took place during four games in the course of one week — all of which were Ws, by the way. Seriously, there are only around ten guys, maybe fifteen, in the whole League who will have a personal highlight reel as impressive as that after even 82 games — let alone in a seven-day span. He’s really that far ahead of the curve.
Then, there is the video embedded below from last night (which can also be seen here in higher resolution, yet at a worse camera angle). (Also, hat tip to JerseyChaser)
Umm…Yeah.
Between all this stuff, his nightly 41 and all the Oscar Robertson-ian peripherals, t’s really almost reached a time that that you can’t even objectively argue for Kobe being the best player in the League. I’m not sure poppa Jelly Bean even believes it anymore. And as good as CP3 is and as much as I have been and will continue to be driving his bandwagon to Mount High, trying to make the argument for Paul, Duncan, Flash or KG now just seems silly.
Because every time I get hyped on someone else and start to make the mental case to myself that maybe one of those guys is just as good as King James — or, god forbid, better — I witness another fresh round of nightly LeBron absurdity.
The crazy part is that it’s the exact same “Oh…wait, I’m really, really dumb” feeling that I get after watching Larry Bird: A Basketball Legend or one of Legend’s classic games (most notably his 60-point game against the Hawks in New Orleans I saw a few weeks back) and hyping myself up into thinking he was the best player ever, only to subsequently watch MJ’s flu game or any one of his fifteen personal DVDs and realize that Bird couldn’t even hold Money’s jock in a suitcase.
Of course, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’m not even remotely implying anything like that. LeBron’s gonna have to start winning some titles and MVPs before he gets anywhere close to their legacies and certified positions on their All-Time pedestal. Looking at the totality of their careers, he’s also of course still looking very far upward to even see Kobe, Groundhog Day or Diesel.
But, for now at least, he is currently dominating on a physical level that is completely unparalleled — yes, even by Shaq-in-his-prime, Dwight Howard or Amare. And that, in and of itself, makes his quest to eclipse some of those other guys seem not only realistic, but probable.
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