Lakers superstar LeBron James is on the verge of rewriting history again. After years of speculation, discussion and predictive models, James will soon surpass Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the NBA's all-time leading scorer.
While James is now in his 20th NBA season, he isn't showing many signs of slowing down. Upon turning 38 years old, James turned in back-to-back games of 47 and 43 points to move 500 points away from the all-time record, which prompted a sitdown with ESPN's Dave McMenamin on the upcoming accomplishment.
"I don't know," James began, attempting to place where being the NBA's all-time leading scorer ranks among his career accomplishments.
Vote now for your favorite NBA All-Star starters!
"I don't know because I have not set out to do that — it wasn't a goal of mine when I entered the league," James continued. "Making All-Star team, being Rookie of the Year, being First Team All-NBA, First Team All-Defense, winning a championship for sure, being MVP of the league (were goals).
"The scoring record was never ever even thought of in my head because I've always been a pass-first guy. I've always loved the excitement of seeing the success of my teammates."
Abdul-Jabbar became the NBA's all-time scoring leader in 1984 and retired in 1989 with 38,387 career points. James breaking a nearly 40-year-old scoring record is a product of longevity and sustained greatness.
During his conversation with McMenamin, James explained how he has evolved to be able to still score at a high clip in Year 20.
MORE: LeBron James is still the NBA's greatest show
"Over the course of my career, I've just gotten better with every facet of my game," James said.
"There were times when I didn't really have a low-post game — I wasn't a low-post threat. There were times when I wasn't a threat from the mid-range. There were times when I wasn't a threat from outside. There were times where you could literally just try to bait me into doing things that I wasn't great at.
"I've evolved into where I do what I want to do on the floor."
Entering LA's meeting with Atlanta on Friday, Jan. 6, James was 484 points shy of Abdul-Jabbar's record. This season, James is averaging 29.0 points per game, meaning he'll likely move to first all time within the Lakers' next 20 games.
Given how long Abdul-Jabbar's record stood, James' sustained high level of play puts him in a position to make the all-time scoring record virtually unbreakable.
