Better than Jordan, Better than Kobe, Better than Bo.
By: Ryan Schmid
Tags: Basketball, ESPN, NBA, LeBron James, Athletes

Better than Jordan, Better than Kobe, Better than Bo.

Photo by GQ

Better than….. you fill in the blank and it will be a true statement with LeBron James. Past or present, players of all sports it can be hard to judge who is the greatest athlete of all time, guys like Michael Jordan, Bo Jackson, Serena Williams and Lionel Messi all get talked about as athletes who get talked about as being the most dominant in their sport, and as the most dominant athlete ever. All these players have great resumes that help their case like Jordans 6 for 6 in the NBA finals, Bo Jackson being an All-Star in two sports or Serena Williams being one of the most dominant tennis players ever, male or female. The one person who tops all of these great athletes on and off the field is LeBron James.

With the debate of sports always being centered around statistics and championships, while that makes the most sense, the best way to debate athletes from different sports is to look at other things. On ESPN’s world fame 100 written in 2018, LeBron James came in 2nd. The article written by ESPN takes into account social media following, a “search score” which is something they came up with in order to track how many times an athlete is looked up, and money they get from endorsements alone. This article also takes into account fan following globally which is where Cristiano Ronaldo get is rank at number 1 being the best soccer player in the world. While LeBron’s endorsement money beats Ronaldo by over ten million, Ronaldo has more than 60 million total followers on all social media platforms. These two athletes stand high above anyone else who ranks on this top 100 and it shows in the media. James’ name is talked about more on SportsCenter annually than any other athlete in the world, so much more that on the multiple hours that SportsCenter runs on TV a say LeBron is talked about just under 1 time a day; no other athlete even comes close.

With the ESPN top 100 it is very centered towards current athletes, this is because the media talks way less frequently about former athletes and a lot of them don’t have social media. To take a look at former vs current athletes you need to look at level of competition and how they are performing against who. LeBron is going up against the toughest competition to ever play the game of basketball, and after 15 years in the league he is still dominating.

“Indeed, if you stack up all 13 teams these two faced in the NBA Finals, six of the top eight would be LeBron opponents”

This was said in an article written by Fox Sports talking about who faced overall tougher competition throughout the playoffs in their career, James or Jordan. This article goes deep into the reasons why LeBron's career was faced against harder competition. They also talk about other NBA greats and compare them to other players now like Bob Cousey and how he would have no chance in keeping up with the explosive Russell Westbrook.

Other athletes and coaches get asked about LeBron’s greatness all the time, especially Warriors head coach Steve Kerr who has seen his fair share of James in the NBA finals. back in 2015 Kerr was asked if he thinks LeBron is the greatest athlete of all time, he said:

“He’s arguably the best athlete that any of us have ever seen in terms of size and speed and strength. I mean, he’s a force. We know that.”

Kerr was a teammate of Michael Jordan’s for many years, been an NBA T.V announcer and now coaches arguably one of the best teams to ever play in the NBA. LeBron continues to earn the respect of his competitors and continues to amaze everyone. He sure has lived up to his nicknames of “King James” and “The Chosen One.”

Overall LeBron James has been dominant in his sport to earn the title has the G.O.A.T as well as take the world by storm giving him credibility to being the most dominant athlete ever. With the platform he has made for himself he also does great things for the social atmosphere going on in our lives.