James, who has repeatedly said he’s not a scorer, just passed Michael Jordan as the all-time leading playoff scorer.
Hours before LeBron James scored 35 points on 72 percent shooting to bury the Celtics and pass Michael Jordan as the NBA’s all-time leader in playoff points, The King wanted to make one thing clear: He is not a scorer.
“I’m not a scorer,” he said during shootaround ahead of Cleveland’s Game 5 matchup against Boston. “I don’t want to be labeled as a scorer. I can put the ball in the hoop. I’m a playmaker, I’m a player. Put me on the court, and I’ll find ways to be successful.
This position isn’t a first from James. Rather, it’s a stance he has maintained as he’s carved out his legacy as the best basketball player on the planet and one of the greatest to ever touch a court.
January 2004 —- In an interview with InsideHoops.com during his rookie season, James was asked what his role on that Cleveland Cavaliers team was.
“I'm a leader. I'm the leader of this team, and they look for me at any point in the game, and that's not just scoring-wise, I do other things,” he said.
Christmas 2012 — James had two streaks running concurrently: scoring at least 20 points in each of the season’s first 23 games and not being called for a foul in five straight games. Which one was more important to him?
"The foul thing is more impressive to me," James said, via ESPN’s Tom Haberstroh. "I don't care about scoring as much.
"If I wanted to, I could lead the league in scoring, but that's not my job here. ... My job is to do a lot of everything — rebounding, passing and defending so that takes away from my scoring. I've done (the scoring title) before. I'm capable of doing it, but my game sometimes doesn't allow me to have those big nights."
November 2016 — After passing Dan Issel for No. 10 on the NBA’s all-time scoring list, James again said pouring on points was never a priority.
"Scoring has never been on my list of goals," James said via ESPN’s Brian Windhorst. "Facilitating, getting my guys involved and rebounding, defending, getting blocked shots and things of that nature always ranked above that."
James has never wanted to be known as a scorer. After all, the term tends to come with a negative connotation. Some scorers get lumped together as a group of volume shooters who need to take 18 shots to score 20 points. James took note of that and wanted to steer clear.
“When you talk about scorers, we have a lot of great scorers in our league all-time. Guys who shot a lot of shots, volume shooters, and shot the ball at a high clip,” he said via Fox Sports Ohio. “I’m not one of those guys. I’m a guy who’s always gotten happy and excited by seeing my team successful.”
He couldn’t be any more different from a volume shooter. In fact, James surpassed Jordan’s all-time points mark on 118 fewer shot attempts, according to Basketball-Reference, though he’s shot 175 more free throws at a 74 percent clip.James didn’t want to be “like Mike.” He acknowledged during his postgame press conference on Thursday that Jordan was why he chose No. 23. He looked at the Hall of Famer “as a god” and wanted to be Mike, but he said he didn’t believe he could get there.
That’s where James became less like Mike and more like Magic Johnson. He started focusing on other players, making his teammates better, and leading his team to victory instead of gunning them there.
"He's more like me than he is like Michael," Johnson agreed in a 2007 interview with The New York Times. "He's more into controlling the game than he is dominating it with scoring."
LeBron knows he doesn’t have to score to make an impact.
The other facets of his game — the pinpoint passing, the defensive prowess, the on- and off-court leadership and, most of all, the desire to chase greatness — rub off and elevate his teammates to a different stratosphere. The scoring has just been an added bonus, a bonus that’s paid off with The King cementing his name atop Jordan’s on this playoff list.
Now, James faces his toughest task yet: a powerhouse Golden State Warriors team that reached the NBA Finals without a loss. A team that has two ex-MVPs, a sharpshooter who doubles as a lockdown defender, and one of the most versatile two-way players in basketball history. And a team that runs the game plan of an offensive guru and a defensive genius.
It won’t be easy, but James has been down this road before. He took down the Warriors last year after they posted the best regular-season record in NBA history. But he only averaged 24.8 points through the first four games of that series while Golden State took a 3-1 series lead.
Then, James put up back-to-back 41-point games to tie the series at three apiece before posting a triple-double in Game 7 to steal away a championship.
Putting up points might not be his priority, but repeating as NBA champion is. And if James wants that coveted fourth ring, it may take more scoring than ever before to do it.