WITNESSing Greatness: LeBron Passes More Legends in Scoring and Assists

LeBron James is moving into more elite territory by soaring past some of the NBA’s legends, namely Alex English and Nate “Tiny” Archibald in career scoring and assists, respectively.

The past two weeks provided us with a roller coaster ride after James went into a mini two-game slump before he broke it with a 34-point outing versus the Denver Nuggets on December 29.

Legends are again falling by the wayside as the King continues his climb up the all-time career accomplishments.

The Cleveland Cavaliers’ own legend had been under fire the past week when NBA.com’s John Schumann released a list of the league’s worst shooters outside the paint with articles being published afterwards declaring LeBron as the NBA’s worst shooter based on the stats.

Since then, James has been putting up some astounding shooting numbers the past three games with 54.2, 61.1, and 63.6 percent FG shooting along with 33.3, 57.1, and 50.0 percent three-point FGs.

The stories and comments made about him provided a good motivation for James to work on his shooting more and gave him the spark he needed to focus on his fundamentals resulting in the astronomically higher percentages recently.

Here’s Lebron’s accomplishments career-wise the past two weeks including those he passed along the way and the NBA luminaries he is about to overtake in the coming weeks.

• Scoring – Alex English (25,613) was the latest legend to fall to the King in the scoring column when James scored 14 points versus the Phoenix Suns on Dec. 28. He is now in 17th place in all-time scoring with 25,706, trailing the still active Kevin Garnett (26,056) of Minnesota. Given Garnett’s 3.6 ppg average, expect LeBron (25.6 ppg) to pass him in the next month or so.

• Assists – James (6,485) moved ahead of two notable assists men the past two weeks. He flew by Stephon Marbury (6,471) also in the same game against the Suns with seven assists for the night. Two games later, he went ahead of Hall of Famer Nate “Tiny” Archibald (6,476) versus the Orlando Magic (1/2) in a 104-79 win. James occupies 21st place on the career assists department needing close to a hundred more to join the top 20 all-time. With his 5.9 apg average, LeBron will get there in 15 to 16 games.

• Steals – James (1,600 and 30th overall) is now just eight steals away from Mark Jackson (1,608) who is currently at the 29th spot overall. If he keeps averaging two per game as he has the past five games, he’ll tie Jackson after his next four games and pass him on the fifth.
• Free-Throws Made – With 16 made free throws in three to four games, Lebron will pass Los Angeles Lakers legend Shaquille O’Neal (5,935) for 19th place all-time in the category.
• Turnovers – James has now moved ahead of the aforementioned Jackson in the career turnovers department with 3,172. The two were tied two weeks ago but James is solely on the 20th spot. He is “poised” to move past Garnett (3,177) and Celtics legend Robert Parish (3,183) in the next few games. It’s a good thing other legends such as Karl Malone, John Stockton, Jason Kidd, Kobe Bryant, and Magic Johnson are much farther ahead on this list.

With 16 made free throws in three to four games, Lebron will pass Los Angeles Lakers legend Shaquille O’Neal (5,935) for 19th place all-time

The Cavaliers are on a roll once more with a four-game winning streak including two straight blow-out games versus the Orlando Magic (25 points) and the Toronto Raptors (22 points). James and the Cavs appear to be getting their groove back and are ready to take on all-comers with the Washington Wizards, Minnesota Timberwolves, and Philadelphia 76ers next up on the schedule.

Stay right here on KingJamesGospel.com for upcoming instalments of WITNESSing Greatness, chronicling LeBron James’ career feats during the 2015-16 season.

*I apologize again for being late (A week, this time. I know, unforgivable!) with WITNESSing Greatness. Christmas and New Year came and I was just so swamped with activities. I’ll do better next time.