TORONTO — A postgame media crowd gathered around LeBron James’ locker for about the 2,000th time. A veteran of an NBA-record 23 regular seasons, 22 preseasons, and 18 postseasons, James played off Thursday’s buzzer-beating road victory over the Raptors as any other contest in his historic career.
Of course, it wasn’t. The Los Angeles Lakers’ win in Toronto marked the first time since Jan. 5, 2007 that James failed to score 10 points in a game, ending an unfathomable streak of 1,297 consecutive double-digit performances. To put that number in perspective, only 23 other players have even appeared in that many NBA games.
It was completely fair to wonder how the league’s all-time leading scorer felt about that run ending as part of an eight-point, 4-of-17 performance. James wouldn’t entertain the thought.
“None,” James responded tersely when asked if he had any feelings at all about the streak ending. “We won,” he added with a laugh of near-disbelief that reporters would think he was focused on something else.
James was burying the lede.
The reason the Lakers beat the Raptors (other than Austin Reaves’ excellence) was because James found Rui Hachimura in the corner for a wide-open look at the game-winning triple. It was James’ 11th assist of the game on a night he didn’t turn the ball over. His 11 dimes also accounted for 30 points.
The most cynical of James’ doubters will insist he was being disingenuous – that he would’ve preferred to keep an individual streak alive rather than record another random win in the 23rd December of his career. But that would be missing the entire point of that career.
If there’s one thing you can’t take away from James, it’s that he always makes the best basketball decision available.
On a night James looked as vulnerable as we’ve ever seen him on an NBA court, he had the ball in his hands and the chance to keep the streak going if he made the game-winner himself. But the basketball supercomputer in James’ head refused to process anything other than the highest-percentage outcome.
“Once they doubled (Reaves) and the ball got swung to me, I knew it was a numbers game. We had a four-on-three advantage,” James told reporters. “I looked over at (the Raptors’) bench, and I saw their coach telling Scottie Barnes to possibly double (me), so I wanted to keep Rui on the same side as me to be my payoff spot.”
James hit Hachimura’s shooting pocket as perfectly as any playmaker in the game’s history could have, and the Lakers handed the Raptors their first home loss of the season.
It’s ironic that James’ streak ended on a team-first play because it’s the kind of decision he was once constantly criticized for making.
“I remember everything that’s been negatively said about me and my game throughout my career,” James said. “That aspect was always one of the most foolish things I’ve ever heard, as far as me making the right pass, making the right play. We are in the business of winning basketball games, and my whole life, I’ve just played the game that way. I’ve taught the game that way. And I’ve won at every single level I’ve played at by playing the game that way.”
How many more wins, or even games, James has left will remain a hot topic until he clears the air. The pending free agent has looked uncharacteristically weary since returning from a back issue that wiped out his training-camp and preseason availability just months after a knee injury delayed the start of his usual offseason regimen.
We’ve always assumed James wouldn’t retire without announcing it before his final season so he could get the league-wide retirement tour he deserves. But watching him these last few weeks, it feels like his calculus might’ve changed.
On Thursday in Toronto, James was a shell of the inevitable force fans once feared. His burst came and went. He labored to get up for rebounds. He couldn’t finish at the rim. He looked gassed and defeated. His jumper was flat. Even the turnaround that once birthed “LeBronto” was easily stuffed at one point by Barnes, a rising star 17 years James’ junior.
James failed to get to the free-throw line for only the 37th time in 1,568 games, three nights after he failed to record a rebound, steal, or block for the first time in his career. James assured us that he’s just getting his rhythm and legs back after missing camp, preseason, and the first month of the regular season. But even on a night that ended so triumphantly, the end is clearly closer than James or his fans care to admit.
And yet, he affected the game in ways no near-41-year-old should be able to. James’ body may finally be failing him, but the sharpest basketball mind we’ve ever come across is still firing. And its message will always be clear: Make the right play. The winning play.
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