Father Time remains undefeated, but LeBron James keeps him hanging on the ropes.
By the time the 2023-24 NBA season began in Denver, James was already playing at a higher level than any player in league history following his 20th season. But James has taken that distinction to another level this season.
For starters, he is averaging more points (26.4 points per game) than the other five players playing their 21st seasons combined (24.0). But what’s been most impressive about this 21st season is that James, who has already established an unprecedented level of efficiency and longevity during his GOAT-level career, has somehow become even more efficient in 2023-24.
In 13 games, James holds career highs in field goal percentage (58.6%), 2-point percentage (68.0%), effective field goal percentage (65.2%) and percentage of true shots (67.1%). More specifically, according to Cleaning the Glass, he is posting career-best shooting percentages on rim shots (82%), mid-range jumpers (47%), and non-corner 3s (40%). His 39.7 3-point mark nearly matched his career-best 40.6 percent from the 2012-13 season.
How is James achieving career-best efficiency at his age while dealing with a left calf contusion?
“I don’t know,” James told reporters after the Los Angeles Lakers’ 105-104 win over the Houston Rockets on Sunday. “Show. Show up, get to work, and then go out and trust.
James shows up and plays at an MVP level for the upstart Lakers, who have won five of their last six games largely thanks to his play. Without their late-night heroics, the Lakers’ slow start could easily have been disastrous. Instead, the Lakers are 8-6 and trending upward.
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James remains elite by most advanced metrics. He is fifth in the NBA in Estimated Plus-Minus (EPM), fifth in Estimated Wins (EW), fourth in Value Over Player Replacement (VORP), sixth in Box Plus-Mins (BPM), eighth in Player Efficiency Rating (PER). and 13th in Win Shares. He currently projects as a minimum of a second-team All-NBA forward, if not a first-team selection. He is still easily a top 10 player, a remarkable feat.
James has worn the mantle in crunch time, when the scoring margin is within five points in the final five minutes of a game. He is second in the league in points (38), first in field goals made (14) and third in field goal percentage among the 54 players who have attempted at least 10 shots in such situations (70.0%). The Lakers are 5-2 in James’ seven games that have featured significant minutes.
Most recently, James scored a season-high 35 points to help defeat the Portland Trail Blazers in the fourth quarter in a hostile In-Season Tournament last Friday. Two nights later, he scored a season-high 37 points on Dillon Brooks and the Rockets, scoring 23 points in the second half and icing the game with the go-ahead free throw with 1.9 seconds left after driving past Brooks and attacking a three Rockets defenders on the field.
“He was outstanding,” coach Darvin Ham said of James’ performance against the game. Houston. “The LeBron we have all come to know and love over these 21 years.”
Except James is playing differently than usual. With the Lakers placing the keys of the offense more heavily on D’Angelo Russell and Austin Reaves, James operates more as a dangerous off-ball threat, where he can utilize his basketball IQ, strength and athleticism in space. James creates his own offense less often than ever. According to Basktball-Reference.com, the percentage of his 2-point field goals (48.0%) and 3-point field goals (75.9%) assisted by others is at a career high.
His play-type usage also increased marginally in several noteworthy categories: He is used more off screens (from 1.9% last season to 3.6% this season), as a roller in pick-ands -roll (from 4.5% last season). to 5.9% this season), in passing plays (from 3.4% last season to 6.2% this season) and in spot-ups (from 9.5% last season to 11, 4% this season), according to NBA.com player tracking stats.
While most of these percentages are on the rise, they add up to a different offensive approach for James.
No Laker has benefited more from the Lakers’ increased spacing – at least when their new five-man offense is working properly – than James. Los Angeles has progressively used him in more creative ways, taking advantage of his ability to read his defender, teammates and the rest of the defense at maximum speed.
Here’s an example: Reaves passes the ball to Jaxson Hayes and cuts to the screen for James, who immediately receives a dribble from Hayes. With an early lead, James beats Sacramento Kings big man Domantas Sabonis to draw a foul shot.
In this variation of a similar play, Russell is driving the ball down the floor while Anthony Davis blocks James from coming out to the other side of the arc. Russell bounces an entry pass to Davis and then sets a block for James, freeing James to take a handoff from Davis, feints as defender David Roddy recovers and then dribbles to the rim. (Davis’ timely shot certainly helps, as he drags his defender, Bismack Biyombo, away from the fray.)
At times, the Lakers will be even more direct in getting James off the screen. This time, Reaves dribbles to the right side of the court and Christian Wood blocks James on the opposite side, allowing him to flare, cut or curl, depending on how the defender reacts to the screen. Here, James takes a broader approach before accelerating to the basket, using a dribble and shoulder to pick off Orlando Magic big man Goga Bitadze for the fingertip shot.
“He’s playing phenomenal right now,” Davis said Sunday. “His shot is falling. He is attacking the area, making the right readings, he does it in the defensive phase. “He’s doing everything for us and it’s our job to try to compliment him and help him with our shooting or playmaking.”
47% of James’ shot attempts this season have come at the rim, the highest percentage from that distance since 2018-19, his first season in Los Angeles, according to Cleaning the Glass. That includes dunking more — or at least trying to — with 7.3 percent of his field goal attempts being dunks, also his highest percentage since the 2018-19 season (8.1 percent).
“(My teammates) joked about me, saying I leave the ball too much when I have an open lane,” James said.
Turn the corner and fly 👑 pic.twitter.com/MoQqUyhRNv
— Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) November 20, 2023
But James was just as lethal beyond the arc, which is an important development for the Lakers’ crunch momentum and playoff offense.
This is a trickier set: Russell and Davis run a quick two-man play, drawing the Trail Blazers’ attention away from James, who is positioning himself to curl behind Davis’ screen into an open 3-pointer at the top of the arc. James defender Jerami Grant is a step back and goes under the block. I explode.
Opposing defenses have historically lowered their defenders off the ball to charge the paint against the Lakers in the James-Davis era. When the Lakers run pick-and-rolls with Russell or Reaves as the ballhandler, they often position James on the opposite wing, one pass away, where he is ready to catch and shoot, catch and drive, or fake pump and drive . .
This is an easy look for James, who shoots 44.4% on catch-and-shoot 3s.
This should have been the season where James took a step back and handed the bulk of the offense over to Davis, Reaves, and Russell. But while James’ usage rate has declined (from 33.3% last season to 30.2% this season), the Lakers are as reliant on James as ever. That’s 23.8 points per 100 possessions better with him on the court than on the bench, a gigantic figure. They’re definitely worse off without him on both ends, which means Los Angeles’ continued problems figuring out how to survive when he’s off the field.
“He doesn’t even look like he’s 38,” Davis said.
It doesn’t look like James is 38 due to his production, but he’s actually five weeks away from turning 39. He’s missed time due to significant injuries in four of his five seasons in Los Angeles, and his long-term health term remains extremely important to the Lakers’ championship aspirations.
The Lakers’ plan to keep James on a minutes restriction of around 28-30 minutes per game lasted all of a game. James’ extraordinary play and the Lakers’ struggles early in the season led him to play more than 30 minutes in 10 of his 13 games. Moving forward, the Lakers will have to strategically find rest areas for James – in the form of fewer minutes or fewer games – as they did on Nov. 12 when they sat James on the court. their 116-110 win over the Blazers.
“The way he takes care of himself at every level, it relieves some of that stress and some of that worry,” Ham said before that game. “The biggest thing is to be smart with his stretches. The overall minutes will depend on the nature of the game. The way we play it, the increments we play it at, that’s the thing you have to be aware of. And also what you do on the days you don’t play. … That helps us – when he is able to meet us halfway in that regard.”
In the grand scheme of things, the Lakers’ performance did not match their 8-6 record. As of Tuesday morning, they’re just 22nd in the net rankings, a mark more indicative of a play-in or low-ball lottery team than a contender. They struggled to shoot the ball, match their opponents’ energy in the first quarter, take care of the ball and protect the defensive glass. Rotation is unstable. The key pieces are left out.
But most of the time it didn’t matter because the Lakers have James on their side, the greatest player of his generation – and perhaps the greatest of all time.
Whether it’s simply a strong shot, a newfound efficiency through spacing the offense, another level of mastery, or some combination of the three, James inexplicably continues to defy the aging process and carry the Lakers on his broad shoulders , with no sign of slowing down as it approaches 39.
“I’m just trying to get over the line,” James said. “See how far I can take this thing. It’s me against “Father Time.”
(Top photo: Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images)