With greatness comes a giant microscope in which an athlete is scrutinized and measured. This microscope is only reserved for the players who test the bounds of true greatness and when the microscope is used it will produce the most brutally honest assessment as we determine whether or not a player is indeed as great as they may appear to be. The odd thing about this microscope is that it is being looked through by a million different people and even though they are all apparently looking at the same thing, the conclusions that are drawn can often be completely different from one another. As for the case of LeBron James.
LeBron is one of those rare players who has been so great that he has gotten the microscope treatment. Unlike some of the other so-called “greats” that have been put in our collective microscope however, I honestly do not understand what some of you people are seeing when you look at LeBron James. Unlike some other players whom you’ve looked at at said, “yeah, he’s doing a lot of great, but he is not that great,” I honestly do not understand how a person cannot recognize the greatness of LeBron James at this point. Furthermore, I do not comprehend why you would not want to just sit back and enjoy being a witness to said greatness.
If Game 1 of the 2018 NBA Finals wasn’t enough to convince you that LeBron is the greatest then there is no helping you. LeBron had 51 points, 19 of 32 shooting, and the greatest offensive team ever beat in their own arena with 4 seconds to go. It took the biggest botch in NBA Finals history to rob him of that historic win. It is time to stop with the comparisons to Michael Jordan and just recognize that LeBron is doing something that is completely different that cannot and should not be compared to anything else. He is not only always in the NBA Finals, but he is constantly giving an effort that is beyond what we once thought was physically possible for a human being.
I get that there were people who doubted what they were witnessing. I was one of them. I resisted the Nike and Sprite campaigns; the billboards, the slogans, the decisions. LeBron does come off as arrogant and over dramatic. Over time I learned to stop working myself into a shoot over this and I accepted that yes, I am a witness to the greatest basketball player there ever was and perhaps the greatest athlete who ever competed.
What helped me accept being a witness was the fact that even though he was coming off as an arrogant short cut taking jerk on the surface, the real truth was that LeBron James was handling the most powerful microscope any athlete has ever been put under and he was handling it in the most legitimate way possible. He was going out and giving a full effort every single night without rest and leaving no reason to put an asterisk anywhere near his name. Other athletes whom have been placed under the microscope of greatness have achieved amazing things but they left doubt as to how they reached those heights. Bonds had a PED cloud over his head. Brady has an evil coach who was proven to be a cheater. LeBron has left nothing for us to truly use against him when trying to argue against his greatness. You may say he had to play with other Hall of Famers, but literally every pro sport has free agency and that is a stupid notion simply for that fact. The only reason we use that excuse is because LeBron did it in such dramatic fashion, which is another reason why I learned to stop being a jagoff and enjoy being a witness to the greatness of LeBron James. No athlete has ever sat under the powerful microscope and proven his greatness in a more dramatic, entertaining way than LeBron and now that I am not a jagoff anymore, I can see the greatness so clearly and it is amazing. I am telling you. What LeBron is doing is glorious. All you have to do is shut up and just witness it.
– Alan Michael