LeBron James is still weighing whether or not he wants to continue playing in the NBA. If he does retire, the Los Angeles Lakers star will walk away with his name plastered all over the record books and will almost inarguably be the most statistically accomplished player the league has ever seen.
Yet, there are many people who discuss the NBA who refuse to give James the respect he deserves. It goes beyond not calling him the GOAT, but there are some who don’t even consider him a top five player of all time. Hall of Famer and two-time champion Isiah Thomas explained where he feels those people are coming from when they say that.
“Jealousy. Envy,” Thomas said on “Run it Back” via FanDuel TV. “No no, on the real, you know I don’t mess around, right? I’m calling it out, guys are jealous, they get envious. Y’all bring them on the show and they want to talk about what they did or what somebody else did, and then they intentionally ignore the obvious. And when you intentionally ignore the obvious, then it has to come back to jealousy, envy or just some straight up BS. This man has every basketball record on the books, and he ain’t in your top five? You’re full of shit.”
It’s refreshing to hear a player that played in the Michael Jordan era talk about James in this way. Typically, older players are hesitant to give James the respect he deserves, and perhaps that’s because of the jealousy that Thomas mentions.
There are no authentic arguments against James being a top five player in NBA history, and there are almost no authentic arguments for him being outside the top three, either. Thomas gladly calls that out by mentioning all the records that James has his name attached to.
LeBron James outlines retirement decision
James was recently put on the cover of Time Magazine as part of a series on the 100 most influential people in sports. In the cover story, James was asked about retirement and what it would take for him to call it a career, and his answer focused on the mental side.
His belief is as long as his mind is willing to put in the work, his body will follow suit, and when he mentally wants to start cutting corners is when he’ll retire from the game.
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