During 8 of his last 10 NBA seasons, not including the current season, Lebron James’ teams have reached the NBA Finals. In the world of ‘Hot Take’ media this is looked upon as a tremendous accomplishment because James has added a virtual two additional season’s worth of games with his post season appearances. While this is certainly a tremendous accomplishment and should not be diminished in any way, looking at it in context and without a recency bias, we realize that there is one who has done this also, but on another level.
This is not another, “What about Bill Russell” piece, because Russell went to the Finals and won titles 8 years in a row and 11 times in 13 years, but granted, there were fewer rounds of playoffs and by default, fewer post season games. This is about the Captain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who during his last 10 years in the NBA, appeared in the NBA Finals 8 times, enduring 3-4 rounds of playoffs to achieve this. However, what makes this great is not that Kareem achieved a seemingly equal standard to Lebron. It is seemingly greater when the whole of the picture is examined.Lebron’s ten-year run occurred between years 6 and 15 of his career, while Kareem’s run happened between years 11 and 20 of his. This is a big difference in prime years, but the major difference is what happened before.
Lebron came to the NBA directly from high school, which means that he did not appear in any college games. Kareem stayed in college all four years, and though he was not allowed to play varsity ball during his Freshman year, his other three teams won the NCAA Title, meaning that they played 12 additional games combined during those three seasons, or an additional half of a college season. Add to that the fact that Kareem played in 79 playoff games during his first 10 seasons, and you see that Kareem had finished 10 seasons with enough games for 11 NBA seasons when his run started, and this was after 100+ Varsity College games coming out of high school.
What Lebron has achieved is phenomenal, just as Bill Russell’s career should never be overlooked, However, Kareem staying in college for four years, playing three full seasons where his teams played through the NCAA Title game each year, and then appearing in 20 NBA seasons with an additional 237 playoff games, including 158 playoff games and 8 trips to the Finals during his last 10 seasons, this is something that basketball fans should hear about more often.
Modern basketball fans know about the greatness of Lebron James, and people will accept that Kareem was great, but the career of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar might actually be greater than basketball fans realize.
