Former rival Tayshaun Prince explained why guarding LeBron James was so difficult.
LeBron James has been the greatest player this generation has seen, and many people think he is the greatest player of all time in NBA history. The King has made a terrific impact on the league and recently achieved another huge milestone in his impressive career.
After a terrific 38-point outing against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Tuesday, LeBron broke Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's all-time scoring record. That was an incredible night for the King, who made some big statements before going for the record. Besides calling himself the greatest of all time, James also claimed that he was the greatest scorer of all time, raising a lot of eyebrows around the league with those remarks.
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Still, nobody can deny that LeBron is indeed a terrific scorer, even though not everybody was convinced of that. He used a lot of tools to get to the basket and score all these points, and during an old interview, one of the players who had to guard him during the 2000s spoke about James' ability to get buckets.
Tayshaun Prince Explained How LeBron James Used To Beat Defenders With Pick And Rolls
Tayshaun Prince, a very important part of the Detroit Pistons of the mid and late 2000s, once talked about the differences between Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, explaining that with James, you had to go through a lot of pick and rolls during games, so that defenders would get tired and he would take over in the last minutes of games.
"With LeBron, it was a matter of--you gotta fight through 100, 150 pick and rolls throughout the whole game. He's gonna get Ilgauskas, Varejao. Pick and roll after pick and roll, he said, 'we're gonna wear him down. So in the 4th quarter, I'm gonna get into my package.' So it was two different things that you had to worry about. With LeBron, it was pick and roll after pick and roll. With Kobe, it was a matter of don't let him get to a sweet spot. He's gonna beat you up for three quarters and in the fourth quarter, it'll be too easier for him to get to his sweet spot."
This is a pretty good explanation of what it was like to go against LeBron during those years. He was young but could do a lot on the court, thriving for the Cleveland Cavaliers. The things he did were incredible and made the Cavs a way better team during those years.
He made it to the NBA Finals in 2007 after beating the prime Detroit Pistons who won the championship in 2004 and finished as runners-up in 2005. At 22 years old, LeBron showed that he was really special, and even gave the dropped a 48 points on them in a crucial Game 5 during that magical run. LeBron averaged 25.7 points per game, beating the Pistons in 6 games to go to the Finals.
LeBron has had different approaches to the game during his career and different ways to score, but all of them worked together to make him the top scorer in NBA history.
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