LeBron James has become a somewhat polarizing figure in sports these days for whatever reason, and it has seemingly splintered sports fans.
Those who are iron-clad fans of his feel he is the greatest to ever play basketball by far, but he has his haters who claim he is vastly overrated and overhyped. Of course, the objective truth lies somewhere in between.
Buy Lakers TicketsOne difference in the sports landscape between now and the days when Michael Jordan, another prime candidate for greatest of all time, is the advent of social media later in the decade of the 2000s after Jordan had retired.
Rich Paul, James’ close friend and agent, said on the “Gil’s Arena” podcast that James is the first player to deal with the constant cycle of media coverage and opinions from a wide range of pundits (h/t Lakers Daily).
“Mike (Michael Jordan) transcended the game,” said Paul. “When Kobe [Bryant] came, Kobe was a silhouette of Mike. That’s everything, which is great. But LeBron is the first player to have to deal with a 24-7-365 news cycle of sports and opinions from those that’s not even capable or carry the expertise to give a valid opinion. In addition to, ‘No, I’m not gonna really do it how y’all want me to do it, I’m probably gonna do it how I decide to do it.’ We all know that don’t go over well, and so then you have this environment and this sports society that’s created, and so now you have to root against. That’s a whole another thing that Mike never had to deal with, because his hardest critic was probably Peter Vecsey.”
Just as there are cracks in James’ armor to talk about, there were cracks in Jordan’s armor, such as the quality of competition he faced in the playoffs or his reportedly harsh treatment of teammates. One can only wonder how he would’ve been treated by armchair quarterbacks on social media had the medium been fully fledged back in the 1990s.
