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      The Celtics Won’t Have Inexperience to Blame if They Don’t Win This Year

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      Boston has star players, a deep bench and recent N.B.A. finals experience. What the team won’t have, if it loses in the playoffs, will be excuses.Jayson Tatum made no guarantees for the second half of the Boston Celtics’ season but of one thing he was certain. “Have we gotten better from last year?” Tatum told reporters during the N.B.A.’s All-Star Weekend in Salt Lake City. “Yeah, a lot better.”Tatum had every reason to be brimming with confidence. His stock has never been higher — as signified by the reveal of his own signature shoe this week. In the basketball world, this is an indication that Tatum has graduated from N.B.A. star to N.B.A. star. He would go on to win the Most Valuable Player Award in the charade known as the All-Star Game, a cherry on top of the already M.V.P.-caliber season he is having.He is also the best player on the best team in the N.B.A., with the weight of championship expectations on his shoulders and those of his fellow All-Star and teammate Jaylen Brown. This would be an enviable position for most teams. But the pressure is exponentially higher in a city home to a ravenous fan base and a franchise with long history of winning championships.When asked about the Celtics operating as an established power rather than an underdog, Tatum had already consulted the Pro Athlete Cliché Handbook.“No pressure,” Tatum said. “We feel like we’ve been, if not the best, one of the best teams all season. The goal has always been the same: win a championship. So, you know, just do the right things. Don’t skip any steps. Take it one day at a time.”For Boston’s remaining 23 regular-season games and a presumed deep playoff run, the scrutiny will be much higher than that placed on last year’s young, upstart team. The Celtics (42-17) have the burden of having lots of ways to fail and only one way to be considered a success.Joe Mazzulla became the Celtics’ permanent coach last week after having assumed the role on an interim basis.Charles Krupa/Associated Press“Our environment will change,” Celtics Coach Joe Mazzulla said in a news conference. “And so we have to make sure we don’t.”Last week, Mazzulla had the interim tag removed from his title. He had been thrust into the role right before training camp when last year’s coach, Ime Udoka, was suspended for unspecified violations of team policies. The suspension came as a shock since the Celtics were an ascendant franchise coming off a finals run in a league where continuity is at a premium. Almost as surprising was that Brad Stevens, the team’s president of basketball operations and Udoka’s predecessor, handed the keys to Mazzulla, who had been a Celtics assistant for three years but never an N.B.A. head coach.All Mazzulla had to do was lead the Celtics to a championship. No training wheels. No emotional victories. Just victories.His presence created an odd and unusual dynamic. For much of the season, Udoka was still technically slated to come back in 2023-24 regardless of how Mazzulla did. But Mazzulla got the Celtics off to a blistering 18-4 start, quieting questions about whether his lack of experience would hinder an elite team. Eventually, the Celtics rewarded Mazzulla with what might be considered gold in N.B.A. coaching: security.“The East is terrific. Obviously, the West is loaded up,” Stevens said on a conference call last week. “It’s going to be really hard to win.” He added that it would be hard to coach while “looking behind you and looking over your shoulder.”Mazzulla may not be looking over his shoulder anymore, but the Celtics should be because teams are gaining on them. Since the hot start, the team has looked merely above average at 23-13, rather than world beating. They’re now only a half-game ahead of the Milwaukee Bucks (41-17) for the N.B.A.’s best record and the East’s top seed. Mazzulla has been criticized for not calling timeouts at crucial junctures in games. Over the last 15 games, the Celtics have had a below average offense. During the 18-4 stretch to start the season, the Celtics had not just the best offense in the N.B.A., but one of the best offenses in league history. The good news for Boston is that its defense has steadily improved while its offense has declined.The Celtics should receive a boost after the All-Star break, in the great gift of health. The starting lineup that took the team deep in last year’s playoffs — Tatum, Brown, Marcus Smart, Al Horford and Robert Williams III — has played only 29 minutes together this season. That unit is expected to be at full strength for the last stretch of the season.But even with injuries, the team is deep enough to contend. Derrick White, the sixth-year guard, has been a revelation during his first full season in Boston. In eight February games stepping in for the injured Smart, White averaged 21.1 points, 5.0 rebounds and 6.8 assists per game. Malcolm Brogdon, whom the Celtics acquired in an off-season trade with Indiana, has been a reliable contributor and one of the best 3-point shooters in the league. Brogdon and White would likely be starters on most N.B.A. teams. That the Celtics expect to use them as reserves is a luxury. In one of their last games before the All-Star break, the Celtics nearly knocked off the Bucks on the road despite missing almost all of their top players.Derrick White, right, filled in for his injured teammate Marcus Smart, showing the Celtics’ depth.Hiroko Masuike/The New York TimesThe talent is there for the Celtics to win the championship. They are loaded with playmakers, elite shooting and top-notch defenders who can play multiple positions. They can counter Philadelphia’s Joel Embiid and Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo with a steady rotation of mobile forwards, including Horford. Their division-rival Nets imploded at the deadline and traded away their remaining stars, sending Kyrie Irving to Dallas and Kevin Durant to Phoenix.But lots of teams enter the playoffs with talent, as Boston did last year. Now, the Celtics, as Brown noted, should be better prepared for a grueling playoff run after last year’s finals against Golden State, when the team made sloppy, uncharacteristic mistakes and lost the series in six games.“I think this year we got a little bit more experience,” Brown told reporters. “So I think that will carry over into the finals.”Anecdotal evidence suggests continuity and experience are crucial for N.B.A. teams to win championships, and that playoff failures are necessary steppingstones to immortality. Michael Jordan and the 1990s Chicago Bulls suffered through the Bad Boys Pistons teams before starting their reign. Ditto the Miami Heat, who lost deep in previous playoffs before winning their championships in 2006 and 2012. It’s extremely rare for young teams to win championships, though Magic Johnson was a crucial part of the Los Angeles Lakers championship run during his rookie season in 1980 and Tim Duncan led the San Antonio Spurs to a ring in 1999 in his second.Some teams never quite get there, even with experience and talent — like LeBron James’s Cleveland Cavaliers in the late 2000s. The jury is still out on the Phoenix Suns, who lost in the second round last year after coming within two games of winning the 2021 championship.This is the Celtics’ best chance to win a championship since 2008, their last title run. If they don’t raise the trophy this season, or at least make the finals, they won’t be able to say it’s because of a lack of talent or experience. It’ll be something intangible.Being in that place means the franchise must meet lofty ambitions. But it’s better than not having them at all. More

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      Red McCombs, Car Salesman Turned Media Mogul, Dies at 95

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      A Texas entrepreneur, he co-founded the media giant Clear Channel, owned pro sports teams and created more than 400 businesses in a variety of industries.Red McCombs, a former Texas used car dealer who became a billionaire entrepreneur by venturing into an array of successful businesses, including the media giant Clear Channel Communications and several professional sports teams, died on Sunday at his home in San Antonio. He was 95.His family announced his death but did not state the cause.Mr. McCombs was a flamboyant wheeler-dealer who created more than 400 businesses across an array of industries, including oil, real estate, cattle, insurance, movies and racehorses, often selling them at a substantial profit. At various times he owned a pro football team, the Minnesota Vikings, and two pro basketball teams, the San Antonio Spurs and Denver Nuggets.But his heart was in the automobile business, where he began as a standout car salesman in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1950. He went on to start his own dealership, and then expanded it into a network that at its peak in 1998 included more than 100 outlets, making it the largest car dealership in Texas and sixth largest in the United States.“I was an entrepreneur before I knew what the word was and certainly before I could spell it,” Mr. McCombs said in a 2006 radio interview. “New deals, new opportunities, new ventures are always a part of my life.”A University of Texas alumnus and a passionate Longhorns football fan, Mr. McCombs parlayed his love of sports into ownership of a minor-league baseball team in Corpus Christi in the 1950s.Then he bought the Dallas Chaparrals of the old American Basketball Association in 1973, relocated the team to San Antonio for the 1973-74 season and changed its name to the Spurs.When the A.B.A. and N.B.A. merged in 1976, he played a key role in having the Spurs included in the merger. He sold the team in 1982 and acquired the Nuggets, only to sell that franchise in 1985 for $19 million, nearly twice what he’d paid for it. He then repurchased the Spurs for $47 million before selling it in 1993 for $75 million (about $157 million in today’s money).In a statement on Monday, the N.B.A. commissioner, Adam Silver, called Mr. McCombs “a driving force in creating the modern N.B.A.”In 1998, Mr. McCombs purchased the N.F.L.’s Minnesota Vikings for $246 million, but grew impatient with futile attempts to build a new stadium for the team in the Minneapolis area. He sold the Vikings for $600 million in 2005.He also played a key role in bringing Formula One racing to Austin by investing in the Circuit of the Americas, the Austin track where the annual U.S. Grand Prix race has been held since 2012.In a statement on Monday, the Dallas Cowboys owner, Jerry Jones, called Mr. McCombs “a true Texas titan across sports, media, business and philanthropy” who had “followed his dreams.”Mr. McCombs’s most lucrative venture was Clear Channel, which he co-founded with Lowry Mays in 1972, when they purchased a local radio station in San Antonio, KEEZ-FM, for $125,000. (Mr. Mays died in September at 87.)The two men continued to acquire radio stations, then television stations and billboards around the country. Aided by the 1996 Federal Telecommunications Act, which allowed media conglomerates to own an unlimited number of stations, they built the company into the world’s largest owner of radio stations; by 2000, Clear Channel owned more than 1,200.The company eventually expanded into event promotion, live music and sports management. Mr. Lowry oversaw the business, but Mr. McCombs was instrumental in seizing opportunities to expand, according to John Hogan, the company’s former chairman and chief executive.“He was steadfast in support of the notion that when the telecommunications regulations changed in 1996, we had to move quickly and aggressively, and that those who were slow and hesitant would get left behind,” Mr. Hogan said in an interview for this obituary.Though the company was often criticized for homogenizing radio programming in a way that eliminated much of the local flavor of independent radio stations, the formula was extremely profitable. When Mr. Lowry began to see signs that the internet would disrupt its well-oiled strategy, he and Mr. McCombs sold the company in 2006 for $17.9 billion to a private equity group led by Bain Capital Partners and Thomas H. Lee Partners. As part of the deal, the group agreed to take on more than $8 billion in the company’s debt.The timing was perfect for selling. Clear Channel’s fortunes plunged almost immediately. In 2014, the company split into Clear Channel Outdoor, for the billboard business, and iHeartMedia, for the radio stations and other media properties.Red McCombs, left, arrived in Denver in 1983 after buying the Denver Nuggets basketball team. At right was Carl Scheer, the team’s president and general manager.Duane Howell/The Denver Post, via Getty ImagesBilly Joe McCombs was born in the tiny West Texas town of Spur on Oct. 19, 1927. His father, Willie Nathan McCombs, was a sharecropper and later an auto mechanic. His mother, Gladys McCombs, came from a family of farmers.Billy, whose shock of red hair earned him the lifelong nickname “Red,” showed an entrepreneurial bent as early as age 9, when he began selling bags of peanuts to migrant cotton pickers. He was 15 when his family moved to Corpus Christi, where he became a standout high school football player, eventually winning a scholarship to Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas. He left college to serve in the Army for two years before returning and enrolling at the University of Texas in 1948 on the G.I. Bill.But he dropped out to start a business career. He landed a job at the local Ford dealership in Corpus Christi and realized that he had found his calling. Just 22, he set a goal of selling a car a day and, by his account, managed to accomplish that feat for three years straight.In 1950, he married Charline Hamblin, who died in 2019 at 91. He is survived by their three daughters, Lynda McCombs, Marsha Shields and Connie McNab; eight grandchildren; and 11 great-grandchildren.After selling new cars for several years, Mr. McCombs realized that he could make more money selling used cars, he wrote in his autobiography, “Big Red: Memoirs of a Texas Entrepreneur and Philanthropist” (2010). New cars, he thought, were all alike, but “every used car is unique” and had a story to tell.“People like stories about the things they might be interested in buying,” he wrote.In 1957, at 29, he opened his first new car dealership, in Corpus Christi. But it sold Edsels, a Ford brand that would become synonymous with automotive failure. Though he sold many cars, he said, he knew that the brand would not survive. (The Edsel was discontinued in 1959.)“I was selling it myself and I could see the resistance,” he said. “We had to shoehorn everyone into it, and after I’d sold them to all my friends, I had nowhere to go. It was time to move on.”He moved to San Antonio in 1958 and there befriended Mr. Mays. The two soon began buying up radio stations, ultimately turning Clear Channel Communications into a behemoth. Mr. McCombs knew the power of radio and outdoor advertising from his experience with auto dealerships.He did his own radio and television commercials for 25 years, becoming a Texas celebrity along the way. He struggled for years with alcoholism and nearly died at age 48 after a serious case of hepatitis. He gave up alcohol then, and often spoke candidly about his addiction.In 2000, Mr. McCombs and his wife gave a gift of $50 million to the University of Texas business school — the single largest donation in the school’s history at the time. It was renamed the McCombs School of Business. He and his wife also donated $30 million to the university’s MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.Mr. McCombs was a major donor to Republican politicians, including Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and President Donald J. Trump.Of all of his business achievements, Clear Channel was his most significant, Mr. McCombs declared in his autobiography. “I would never have thought I could ever have had a chance to do something like Clear Channel,” he wrote. “That’s why I don’t really believe in long-term plans. There was no way I could have ever planned Clear Channel.” More

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      N.B.A. Dunk Contest Highlights: It’s Still Fun

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      [embedded content]By the time McClung, who plays for the Philadelphia 76ers’ developmental league affiliate, went for his final dunk, the trophy all but had his name on it. Fans stood and players crowded the court to see his finale.Wearing his high school jersey, McClung finished a spinning reverse dunk and yelled “it’s over” as the crowd cheered. He ended up with perfect scores of 50 on three of four dunks. More

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      Boston Celtics Hire Joe Mazzulla, Cutting Ties With Ime Udoka

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      Mazzulla had been the interim head coach since September after Boston suspended Udoka for the season for violating team policies.The Boston Celtics named Joe Mazzulla as their permanent head coach on Thursday, and they have fired Ime Udoka, according to a person with knowledge of the situation who was not authorized to discuss it publicly.Udoka had been suspended since September for unspecified “violations of team policies.” According to two people with knowledge of the situation who were not authorized to discuss it publicly, Udoka had a relationship with a female subordinate.Mazzulla, 34, who had been an assistant in Boston for the last three years, was named the interim coach in his stead. With him at the helm, the Celtics have not skipped a beat since going to the N.B.A. finals last season. They are entering the All-Star break this weekend with the league’s best record at 42-17.“As he has shown, Joe is a very talented coach and leader,” Brad Stevens, the Celtics’ president of basketball operations, said in a statement. “He has a unique ability to galvanize a room around a mission. We are thankful for the work he has done to help get us to this point, and excited that he has agreed to lead us into the future.”The Celtics said in a statement that they had agreed to a contract extension with Mazzulla, but they did not disclose the terms of the deal.Udoka had been a highly respected assistant for nearly a decade before the Celtics hired him in 2021. He led last year’s team to a 51-31 record and a surprise trip to the N.B.A. finals, where Boston lost to Golden State in six games.But just days before training camp began this season, the Celtics suspended Udoka with the vague explanation of team policy violations, leading to an avalanche of social media speculation about the team’s female staff members as rumors swirled.“I want to apologize to our players, fans, the entire Celtics organization and my family for letting them down,” Udoka said in a statement after the suspension was announced.Mazzulla, a former college basketball player at West Virginia University, was handed the reins. The Celtics began the season 18-4 and have been among the best teams in the N.B.A. on both ends of the floor. More

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      NBA Trade Deadline 2023: Suns Get Durant as Power Shifts to the West

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      No move was bigger than Phoenix Suns’ agreement to trade for Kevin Durant. But the Lakers and Mavericks look stronger after deals of their own.It was supposed to be a quiet dinner with friends and family, who were there to celebrate Mat Ishbia’s big win — officially taking over as the controlling owner of the Phoenix Suns and Mercury.But Ishbia had his sights set on another win.An energetic 43-year-old billionaire in the mortgage industry, Ishbia kept ducking out of the room to take phone calls Wednesday evening as he and James Jones, the Suns’ president of basketball operations and general manager, worked together to make a deal for one of the greatest scorers in N.B.A. history: Kevin Durant.On his first full day on the job, Ishbia agreed to trade with the Nets for Durant, adding him to a competitive Suns lineup that already has the star guards Devin Booker and Chris Paul.In doing so, he had delivered the biggest splash in a season full of them, and he’d done so during a critical moment: the frenzied days before the N.B.A.’s trading deadline, which may have shifted the power in the league to the Western Conference.The Lakers got rid of their ill-fitting and expensive guard, Russell Westbrook. The Dallas Mavericks acquired the disgruntled but dynamic Kyrie Irving from the Nets to pair him with Luka Doncic, the star 23-year-old guard. Around the league, smaller deals tinkered with rosters and reset timelines, but no team changed as much as the Suns. Now, they are a championship contender and a potent threat to everyone else, including elite teams like the Boston Celtics, Milwaukee Bucks, Memphis Grizzlies and Denver Nuggets.It had been difficult to know what to make of the West for much of this season. While the East has two teams at the top that have proved that they can win in the playoffs — Boston and Milwaukee — the West has been a jumble of aging stars and unproven youth.Heading into Thursday, only three games separated fourth-place Dallas from 11th-place Utah. No team is dominating, not even the Nuggets, who have led the conference since Dec. 20 but have developed a reputation for stumbling in the playoffs.The Grizzlies have been firmly in second place since Jan. 1, but they are also an unproven team in the postseason. They earned the No. 2 seed in the West last year, but were challenged by the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round before losing to the Golden State Warriors, the eventual champion, in the second round.A few days before Christmas, the Grizzlies’ star guard Ja Morant was interviewed by ESPN’s Malika Andrews. She asked him what teams he would have to go through to win a championship.“Celtics,” Morant said, without hesitation.“No one in the West?” Andrews said.“Nah,” Morant said, shaking his head and smiling mischievously. “I’m fine in the West.”On Christmas, the Grizzlies faced Golden State, then struggling in 11th place. Golden State didn’t have its best player, Stephen Curry, but taunted the young and braggadocious Grizzlies team on the way to a 123-109 victory.The Warriors have had a confusing season as well. Their stars — Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green — are older. The team has had injury issues, most notably to Curry and the starting forward Andrew Wiggins. But every once in a while Golden State notches a signature win, like its Christmas game, that reminds everyone why this team has won four championships in the past 10 years.And now Morant’s team has more competition to worry about.After news of the Durant trade broke Thursday, New Orleans Pelicans shooting guard CJ McCollum recalled Morant’s oft-memed words.“This all because @JaMorant said he was good in the West,” McCollum posted on Twitter, adding at the end three emojis of laughter with tears.The Los Angeles Lakers traded Russell Westbrook to the Utah Jazz as part of a three-team deal on Thursday.Frank Franklin Ii/Associated PressHours before the Durant trade surfaced, the Lakers agreed to trade Westbrook to the Jazz in a three-team trade that included a package of draft picks and players headlined by Minnesota’s D’Angelo Russell. The Lakers are in 13th place in the West but just four games away from a secure spot in the playoffs above the play-in tournament positions.With LeBron James and Anthony Davis on the Lakers’ roster, it stood to reason that a few tweaks could dramatically change their fortunes. Russell, whom the Lakers drafted No. 2 overall in 2015 but traded two seasons later, is a much better 3-point shooter than Westbrook and should help on offense. Two other players the Lakers received in the Westbrook trade — Malik Beasley and Jarred Vanderbilt — should help the team, too.The addition of Durant, one of the best to ever to play the game, could make the West a lot less open.On Wednesday, Ishbia woke up at 5 a.m. in his Detroit-area home and flew to Phoenix with his wife, three children, parents and some close friends.After meeting with some team employees, he walked onto a stage at the Suns’ arena, the Footprint Center, for his introductory news conference. He eschewed the lectern, using it only to hold a bottle of water he sipped from during questions. He paced the stage with the energy of a start-up founder giving a keynote address, using his hands to emphasize his rapidly delivered words.“I’m not going to be sitting here counting the dollars,” Ishbia said when asked if he would be willing to pay the league’s luxury tax penalties to exceed the salary cap, adding, “Money follows success, not the other way around.”He spent the afternoon at the team’s practice facility strategizing with Jones. Later, after the dinner with his family and friends, Ishbia stayed up all night working on the details of the Durant deal.Durant, 34, improves the team immediately, and dramatically. He has been out with a knee injury since Jan. 12, but his health is the only thing that has slowed him lately.He comes to a Phoenix team searching for a steady postseason identity.The past two seasons have ended with different kinds of heartbreak for the Suns. They lost to the Bucks in the finals two years ago, with Paul working through injuries. Then last year, despite setting a franchise regular-season wins record, they ended their season with an embarrassing blowout loss to the Mavericks in Game 7 of the Western Conference semifinals.If all goes as planned, the West will now go through Phoenix. More

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      How LeBron James Scored a Record-Breaking 38,390 Points

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      No one thought LeBron James would overtake Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to become the N.B.A.’s career scoring leader when he came to the league as an 18-year-old. It didn’t seem like anyone could. The top 250 scorers in N.B.A. history Line chart showing career points for the top 250 scorers in N.B.A. history. The line for LeBron […] More

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      Lakers Agree to Trade Russell Westbrook in a Three-Team Deal

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      Westbrook, a nine-time All-Star, would head to Utah after not fitting smoothly with LeBron James and Anthony Davis. Minnesota’s D’Angelo Russell will return to the Lakers, who drafted him in 2015.The Los Angeles Lakers have agreed to trade guard Russell Westbrook to the Utah Jazz as part of a three-team deal, according to three people familiar with the trade who were not authorized to speak about it publicly.As part of the exchange, the Lakers will receive Minnesota Timberwolves guard D’Angelo Russell, whom they drafted No. 2 overall in 2015 then traded away after just two seasons.The agreement was first reported by ESPN.The deal will end Westbrook’s tumultuous, and brief, tenure with the Lakers. The Washington Wizards traded Westbrook to the Lakers before the 2021-22 season, giving the Lakers high hopes that he would be part of a so-called superteam with LeBron James and Anthony Davis. To acquire Westbrook, the Lakers traded multiple players who were crucial to their championship run in 2020. It didn’t pan out.Westbrook, a nine-time All-Star and the 2017 most valuable player, is versatile and athletic at his best, easily able to fill up box scores. But in Los Angeles, Westbrook struggled to adjust to coming off the bench and not being the primary ballhandler. That, along with his below-average perimeter shooting, sunk the chances of him fitting with James and Davis.The Lakers (25-30) are out of the playoff picture in the Western Conference, despite their championship aspirations. Westbrook averaged 16.2 points, 6.1 rebounds and 7.7 assists per game off the bench for the Lakers this season.The Westbrook trade will also send to the Jazz forward Juan Toscano-Anderson, center Damian Jones and a first-round pick in the 2027 draft. The Jazz will mark Westbrook’s fifth team in five years, an unusual level of movement for a former M.V.P. still relatively close to his prime.The Jazz will send Malik Beasley and Jarred Vanderbilt to the Lakers, and they will trade Mike Conley and Nickeil Alexander-Walker to Minnesota.Russell, 26, who had been with Minnesota since the 2019-20 season, has had an up-and-down career. The Lakers traded him to the Nets in 2017, before his third season. He earned an All-Star selection with the Nets in 2019 but was sent to Golden State that summer as part of a sign-and-trade deal for Kevin Durant. Only months into the 2019-20 season, Golden State traded him to the Timberwolves, where he played alongside his close friend Karl-Anthony Towns. The potential was high for yet another dynamic star pairing in the N.B.A.But Minnesota, like the Lakers, has languished in the standings — battling for a playoff spot when the expectations were to be near the top of the West, especially after acquiring center Rudy Gobert, one of the best defensive players in the league, in a summer trade with Utah.Even so, Russell averaged 17.9 points and 6.2 assists per game for Minnesota this season, one of the best of his career. Crucially for the Lakers, he will provide another shooter as they attempt to salvage their season: He is shooting 39.1 percent from deep this season. For his career, he’s at 36 percent from 3-point range.The Lakers will add multiple role players as well. Beasley averaged 13.4 points per game for the Jazz this year and shot 35.9 percent from beyond the 3-point arc. Vanderbilt averaged 8.3 points and 7.9 rebounds per game on 55.6 percent shooting from the field, mostly off the bench.Russell’s replacement in Minnesota would be Conley, who started 42 games at point guard for the surprisingly resilient Jazz this season. Conley, a 2021 All-Star, averaged a career-high 7.7 assists for the Jazz, but his scoring numbers have dipped to 10.7 points per game, his lowest output since his second season in the league. He is a more traditional point guard than Russell and may fit better next to Anthony Edwards, the third-year guard who has emerged as a franchise player for the Timberwolves. More

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      The Story of LeBron James’s 38,390 Points

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      Stephen Curry’s favorite memory of playing against LeBron James isn’t from any of the three championships he won with the Golden State Warriors against James’s teams. It was from his 2009-10 rookie season, when James was in his seventh year with the Cleveland Cavaliers.They first met when James attended one of Curry’s college games for Davidson. The night before their first N.B.A. clash, in Cleveland, James hosted Curry at his home.“For me, as a rookie, it was a whirlwind of excitement,” Curry said. He added: “The fact that he’s as big as he is, as strong as he is, as skilled as he is, there’s never a time he can’t get a shot off.”James scored 31 points, most coming from near the rim or at the free-throw line. He hit just one 3-pointer.More than a decade later, James’s game looks different, though he can still dunk as if the rim insulted his honor. The N.B.A. has evolved rapidly since James entered the league in 2003, and his ability to change with it helped him break Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s seemingly unbreakable career scoring record of 38,387 points on Tuesday. James has 38,390 points now.“Nobody could imagine somebody doing it,” said Drew Gooden, who played hundreds of games alongside James in Cleveland. He added: “If you would have said or told somebody in 2003 when LeBron James got drafted when he was 18 years old that he was going to break Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s scoring record, they would have looked at you like you were crazy.”Drew Gooden (90) played with LeBron James in Cleveland from 2004 to 2008. He cited James’s strict diet as one of his secrets to staying in the game for 20 seasons.Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE, via Getty ImagesN.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver, in an email, called the record “one of the most hallowed” in all sports. Of James, he said, “His extraordinary athleticism, power and speed leave you in awe.”Over the past 20 years, James’s ascent to the top of the scoring list has impressed Hall of Fame players as he made a definitive case to join their ranks and perhaps be considered the best among them. His shots have felled the toughest competitors, yet made them fans as he blocked them from fulfilling their sports dreams. His teammates have amassed stories of the joys of playing with him — and the pain of being on the other side.At 38, James is one of the N.B.A.’s oldest players. He’s also still one of its best.“It’s not like he’s holding on for dear life just to get the award,” Curry said. “He’s still playing at a high level. So it’s pretty damn impressive.”‘Scored baskets in every way possible’Abdul-Jabbar, 75, played in the N.B.A. from 1969 to 1989 after starring for three seasons at U.C.L.A. When he broke Wilt Chamberlain’s career scoring record in April 1984, he did so with his patented, and nearly unstoppable, shot: the sky hook.James hasn’t cultivated that kind of signature.“Now, is there a shot that you know that he got that would make you say LeBron James? No,” said George Gervin, 70, a Hall of Fame player who won four scoring titles and is known for his finger roll.Instead, Gervin said, James’s “greatest attribute will be his ability to be consistent.”James, shown here in the 2007 Eastern Conference semifinals, has developed his 3-point shooting over time. Early in his career, he focused on dunks and short-range shots.Suzy Allman for The New York TimesJames has methodically developed his game all over the floor, borrowing from the greats. During any given game, he might shoot the fadeaway from the post perfected by Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, go for a logo 3-pointer like Curry or do the “Dream Shake” he was taught by its namesake, Hakeem Olajuwon.“LeBron has scored baskets in every way possible,” Philadelphia 76ers Coach Doc Rivers said.Rivers, who has also coached the Orlando Magic, Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Clippers, said he recently ran into James in Los Angeles and joked, “I think you scored at least 10,000 of those points against one of my teams.”He said James responded, “‘Those Celtics points were the hardest damn points that I’ve ever had to score.’”Defenders became “more fearful” as James expanded his game, Rivers said.“When LeBron first started, you wanted to take away his right hand. His drive. His attacks to the basket,” Rivers said. “You actually would sag off and give him shots. Then he started going both ways with the ball, which made it more difficult to guard. Then he got the in-between game.”The Miami Heat’s Bam Adebayo, one of the league’s best defenders, said James was “like a computer.”“He’s calculating everything that is going on at a rapid speed,” Adebayo said. “So it would be like you typing normally and you got somebody on, like, Excel saying it to the computer and the computer is just reading what they’re saying and just typing it.”Bam Adebayo of the Miami Heat, right, described James as a “computer” because of how quickly he can outsmart opponents on the court.Kim Klement/USA Today Sports, via ReutersJames is known for his savvy, but also for his strength.“His area of attack is at the top of the floor,” said Mike Brown, who coached James for five seasons in Cleveland. “Everybody knows it, but nobody can stop it.”Diana Taurasi, who holds the W.N.B.A.’s career scoring record, said James was “probably still the most dangerous man in transition.”Gooden said he “took it for granted” that he had played with James. That is, until 2008, when Cleveland traded Gooden to Chicago and he tried to make the Cavaliers regret it the first time he faced off with James.“I jumped right in LeBron’s way, and it was like a freight train hit me,” Gooden said. “He came across with two elbows. All his elbows went across my face. Basically, he got an and-one. And I came out of the smoke with a bloody, busted lip. And I was like, ‘Wow, that’s what everybody’s been having to deal with.’”More passer than scorer?James’s points are often an afterthought to his skill as a passer.“He never set out to be a scoring leader,” Golden State forward Draymond Green said. “He’s never been viewed as a scorer. I think that’s more impressive than anything.”James passed Magic Johnson for sixth on the career assists list in December and passed Mark Jackson and Steve Nash to become fourth in January.Jeff Green, who was James’s Cavaliers teammate in 2017-18, said James’s passing “allowed me to get a lot of buckets.”James has led the league in assists only once, in the 2019-20 season. But Erik Spoelstra, who coached James to two championships with the Heat, said he believed that James could have done it any time he wanted to.James has said he thinks of himself as a passer more than a scorer. He rose to No. 4 on the career assists list in January.Barton Silverman/The New York Times“The skill that I thought was most fascinating with him, with his size and skill and his vision, is his passing,” Spoelstra said.Some think the most momentous play of James’s career wasn’t even on offense.Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, said: “In terms of memorable, it’s not points he has scored. It’s his chase-down block of Andre in the finals.”Late in Game 7 of the 2016 N.B.A. finals against Golden State, James, then with Cleveland, flashed the length of the court to block a crucial shot by Andre Iguodala, helping the Cavaliers complete an improbable championship run.“I never got mad about that,” Iguodala said. “Like, people think it hurts me when they say, ‘You got blocked by LeBron.’ That was an amazing play. Even in real time, I was like, ‘Geez, bro, that was incredible.’ ”‘A grown man playing among kids’During James’s rookie year, he averaged fewer than three 3-point attempts a game. Last season, he averaged eight a game — a reflection of the N.B.A.’s shift to emphasize 3-point shooting and his willingness to go with the tide. It’s also a reflection of graceful aging to preserve his legs.Abdul-Jabbar rarely missed games because of injury and James largely had not either, until recent seasons with the Lakers. James is known for a diligent diet and exercise regimen that has allowed him to stretch his career and remain dominant past the typical N.B.A. retirement age.“The reward for doing that is he’s a grown man playing among kids now,” Gooden said.As James’s game has drifted toward the perimeter, his drives to the basket — and the foul shots they often draw — have become less common. Instead, he’s become a better shooter, with more of his points coming from 3-point range.Still, Silver said he had always been struck by “the sheer force of his dunks.”In 2012, when James was with the Heat, he jumped over the 5-foot-11 John Lucas III for a dunk against Chicago.“It happened so fast that I didn’t know he actually jumped over me until it was on the Jumbotron and we called the timeout and the crowd was going crazy,” said Lucas, who was an assistant coach on James’s Lakers team last season. “My phone was blowing up at halftime.”James dunked over the head of Chicago Bulls guard John Lucas III in 2012.Wilfredo Lee/Associated PressLucas even has a picture of himself getting dunked on hanging in his house.“That picture is going to be in the Hall of Fame,” Lucas said. “I have a great sense of humor.”Malik Monk, who played with James on the Lakers last season, said he often teased Lucas about the dunk. “He said he wanted to punch him,” Monk said.James has spent a career making once-in-a-lifetime athleticism look casual, which is why his career-best 61-point performance against the Charlotte Hornets in 2014 seemingly blends in with last season’s 56-point explosion against Curry and Golden State, not to mention his scoring at least 40 points against every N.B.A. team.But James’s greatness is far from casual. He has been a symbol of consistent dominance for decades — just as Abdul-Jabbar was. When James entered the league straight from high school, he did so with unprecedented hype. He had already been on the cover of Sports Illustrated. His high school games were on national television.As Rivers put it: “LeBron is one of the few people in the history of sports to overachieve from a position that was impossible to overachieve.”Decades later, perhaps the most remarkable fact about James’s career is that his scoring at age 38 is at least as good as it’s ever been — meaning the story of his offensive prowess has not been fully written. More