Is there legitimate criticism of LeBron?

[bdonovan]

Very few players have dominated both sides of the court like LeBron has.

No player is without flaws; LeBron at times resorts to hero ball esp. to end quarters and games, instead of relying on his teammates.

Like virtually all top players, he acts to draw fouls (just as Harden throws his neck back or other players yell when fouled).

But I'm curious about those people who are a broken record about how bad LeBron is: calling him a crybaby, soft, completely overrated, having too much power in the NBA, something something about Nike and child labor etc etc.

Do such people have legitimate criticisms? Or are they animated by a kind of emasculation?

You can easily envision a guy living in the suburbs, not much going for him, not in the best of physical shape, thinking he's "masculine". Then he sees some gargantuan guy, 260 lbs of muscle who looks like more of a man than him; get insecure and start puffing himself up by exaggerating the "softness" of a guy who's clearly tougher than him.

Jordan for all his greatness didn't really look like a guy you'd be scared to bump into in an alley.

What do you think? Does insecurity play a role in the LeBron hate?

[ILLsmak]

He has been a crybaby, and he's only good when he is the absolute centerpiece of the team. That's cool cuz he's LeBron, but if he ever got a chance to play with someone as good as him (like he did with Wade in 11,) there would be a bit of a rough patch.

He is very capable at help defense and has done some shit on the ball, too, even vs smalls. He's really done some amazing shit on offense, too. MOST of us were Bron fans before he did that decision shit. It was a tough pill to swallow, but the fact he left THEM and then left ANOTHER TEAM is just crazy. Not because that's not his right, but the whole way he orchestrates these teams and generally underachieves is kinda wack for an all time great.

He's great. Obviously there are criticisms of him. Once he got his jumper and mind right, there aren't more than nitpicky criticisms of his game, but his antics (not talking about flopping) are definitely worth criticizing. He is the new era of insecure star. I mean, MJ was insecure, but it wasn't in the same way. MJ wasn't taking sad mirror selfies.

All n all, dude is a basketball savant and overachieved based on his hype coming in. However, since he's been able to build 3 teams and is a top all time guy, you'd think he would have had more success. That's just being real. I don't think he underachieved wildly, but he did a little, only because of the path he took. Had he just played it out, he could have been set. After the Cs died, the East was wide open. He'd have to face Wade, but Wade is older, got injured, and I trust Bron to get the better players around him.

He's still got a little, which is amazing at his age. He did get brutalized by that french guy tho.

-Smak

[RRR3]

There's legitimate criticism of every player, but LeBron rarely receives it because his haters are deranged and irrational.

[1987_Lakers]

Nobody gives Wilt shit for leaving his teams to join super teams.

Wilt literally left a team off a MVP season to join Jerry West & Elgin Baylor, when do people ever bring that up?

Some of his social media stuff is cringy, but as a player you can't really criticize him (especially after 2016). He's pretty much achieved everything.

[ILLsmak]

Nobody gives Wilt shit for leaving his teams to join super teams.

Wilt literally left a team off a MVP season to join Jerry West & Elgin Baylor, when do people ever bring that up?

Some of his social media stuff is cringy, but as a player you can't really criticize him (especially after 2016). He's pretty much achieved everything.

cuz he was old and became a role player lol. He wasn't getting GOAT credit for that, even tho he was part of a GOAT team.

-Smak

[1987_Lakers]

cuz he was old and became a role player lol. He wasn't getting GOAT credit for that, even tho he was part of a GOAT team.

-Smak

He was coming off an MVP season.

[ILLsmak]

He was coming off an MVP season.

I understand, but he took on a different role. He was still very capable. My point is that it was more of a sacrifice than a resume move. I dunno why he ended up on LA, though. I'm sure there's some story. He got paid.

-Smak

[red1]

was fun rooting for him over his career


he put in a GOAT effort. good for him. :applause:

[ShawkFactory]

He has been a crybaby, and he's only good when he is the absolute centerpiece of the team. That's cool cuz he's LeBron, but if he ever got a chance to play with someone as good as him (like he did with Wade in 11,) there would be a bit of a rough patch.

He is very capable at help defense and has done some shit on the ball, too, even vs smalls. He's really done some amazing shit on offense, too. MOST of us were Bron fans before he did that decision shit. It was a tough pill to swallow, but the fact he left THEM and then left ANOTHER TEAM is just crazy. Not because that's not his right, but the whole way he orchestrates these teams and generally underachieves is kinda wack for an all time great.

He's great. Obviously there are criticisms of him. Once he got his jumper and mind right, there aren't more than nitpicky criticisms of his game, but his antics (not talking about flopping) are definitely worth criticizing. He is the new era of insecure star. I mean, MJ was insecure, but it wasn't in the same way. MJ wasn't taking sad mirror selfies.

All n all, dude is a basketball savant and overachieved based on his hype coming in. However, since he's been able to build 3 teams and is a top all time guy, you'd think he would have had more success. That's just being real. I don't think he underachieved wildly, but he did a little, only because of the path he took. Had he just played it out, he could have been set. After the Cs died, the East was wide open. He'd have to face Wade, but Wade is older, got injured, and I trust Bron to get the better players around him.

He's still got a little, which is amazing at his age. He did get brutalized by that french guy tho.

-Smak

Pretty good take. Most of Lebrons criticisms are valid because he’s an annoying personality and media-wise threatened the Kobe or…god forbid Jordan fans.

But if you strip away all the bullshit with the narratives on both ends he’s a real baller. Hes more similar to Tim Duncan as player than people care to talk about in that he does so many little things correctly. And obviously his athleticism makes those little things seem larger but he’s a very sound player.

Sucks that his douchery and the Kobe/Jordan fandom can’t have him be universally appreciated as the great player that he is.

[RRR3]

I never get how LeBron being cringy is supposedly worse than MJ being a literal psychopath. People have really weird priorities. There's a reason the vast majority of LeBron's teammates love him and many of MJ's teammates still hate him to this day. MJ might be the GOAT, but he has zero case over LeBron as a human being. And while LeBron does a lot of ****ed up shit from my leftist perspective (billionaires rely on exploitation to make their fortunes, he's an arch-capitalist, etc.), MJ is very much equally guilty of that. To be honest, a very high amount of people would be guilty of that if they were given those kind of resources, money is very corrupting. There are those who can still remain altruistic with large amounts of money, but they are rare. And if you have billions you're not altruistic.

[ILLsmak]

I never get how LeBron being cringy is supposedly worse than MJ being a literal psychopath. People have really weird priorities. There's a reason the vast majority of LeBron's teammates love him and many of MJ's teammates still hate him to this day. MJ might be the GOAT, but he has zero case over LeBron as a human being. And while LeBron does a lot of ****ed up shit from my leftist perspective (billionaires rely on exploitation to make their fortunes, he's an arch-capitalist, etc.), but MJ is very much equally guilty of that.


It's not, same with Kobe's baggage. It's just an aside. I got tired of MJ BS, too. I was one of those dudes who was like actually, MJ isn't the GOAT!

KD's done some real cringe shit, too. It's just the cringe generation. The 80-90s was prob the psychopath generation, the whole, y'know, dig out their beating heart era.

But I really do have an issue with how Bron has thrown people under the bus and dumped teams he built himself. That's the most MJ-like thing. It's like Danny Ainge level savage. Sorry dwayne ur washed! The cringey stuff is just giggles.

-Smak

[SATAN]

LeBron is legitimately one of the best things to ever happen to basketball or the NBA for that matter. All the stupid takes from MJ or Kobe stans, whom most are just casuals, are irrelevant. They know he's great but they have literally let their minds go on this shit. Reminds me of the way I was as a youngin, shit attitude and looking for things to dislike rather than being more appreciative. Even the guys that are just trolling...They aren't funny. It just comes across very ignorant alot of the time.

LeBron fans seem far less hateful towards other players. Nobody hates MJ or Kobe. The fanbase of those 2 players is full of spiteful pricks though. I couldn't even imagine paying so much attention to anything that fills me with actual rage. Half of them don't or barely watch games and get all their bs from social media like the sheep they are. These people are not to be taken seriously...Most living in the past or much more clueless about the game than they realize. It's actually pretty shocking witnessing some of the utter toxic bs coming from those 2 fan bases. We have to breath the same air and share the world with these retards...

I would consider myself a LeBron fan and say some criticism is warranted. He has had a few low moments, particularly when he was younger. No player is perfect. The things he says and the way he has flexed his power over the years doesn't bother me since he's obvious not actually a bad person. He wanted to max out and seeing the whole development of an all time great player's 20+ year career has been/is pretty amazing.

His haters are absolute morons. There's only so many times you can try to move the goal posts. LeBron is great at basketball and seems like a pretty decent dude who had and has big aspirations. It is what it is.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAEiIdQwX50

Edit again: And yes I believe the insecurity question is 100% a thing for many of them. We have already discussed things like this, the total lack of self awareness etc etc...

[ImKobe]

There's legitimate criticism of every player, but LeBron rarely receives it because his haters are deranged and irrational.

Rarely? People have made fun of his traveling & lack of footwork and his mediocre FT shooting for years, and that's before the Kobe or MJ vs Lebron shit.

Because he's ur idol tho he doesn't have any flaws and is the most perfect player ever created, right?

He's the master of overall efficiency because he can fill any stat up and he's good at adapting his game from pass-first to score-first when needed, but he obviously has some flaws in his skillset compared to some other ATGs as far as scoring goes, but it doesn't matter when he's able to assert his athleticism.

At his peak he had a very mediocre/streaky jump shot and that's what to me held him back from really being the GOAT in terms of peak play. He developed into a solid volume 3PT shooter but that's after he fell off athletically.

[bdonovan]

Some good commentary on this thread, summarizing the pros and cons. I hadn't thought of the fact that his detractors are often fans of another all-time great like Kobe and Jordan, perhaps eager to critique someone who threatens the reputation of their favorite as GOAT. That happens in other sports as well, such as tennis (where Federer fans and Nadal fans now dump on Djokovic).

Will be interesting to see how his reputation changes once he retires; usually perceptions improve.

[tontoz]

Midrange shooting and foul shooting. He's had random years shooting decently from midrange but overall has been pretty bad, well below 40% for hs career. His foul shooting has gotten a little better as he's aged but he's never had a season over 80%.

[StrongLurk]

It will always be free throw shooting to me. I don't expect him to be 90%, but he should be better than 73% or whatever his career average is. 73% is actually pretty poor considering Lebron's abilities and volume on free throws. It might not seem like a huge deal, but Lebron shooting 80-83% from FT would be a sizeable boost to his offensive impact. It's such a fundamental/basic thing, I was easily shooting 80-85% at free throws as a damn teenager.

[dankok8]

His meltdown in the 2011 Finals. He played really poorly and left a championship on the table. It hurts him a lot in GOAT discussions. He's had a few more bad series but none were as bad plus you can kind of make excuses for them (too young, bad teammates, elbow injured etc.). For 2011, you really can't say anything to defend him.

[RRR3]

It will always be free throw shooting to me. I don't expect him to be 90%, but he should be better than 73% or whatever his career average is. 73% is actually pretty poor considering Lebron's abilities and volume on free throws. It might not seem like a huge deal, but Lebron shooting 80-83% from FT would be a sizeable boost to his offensive impact. It's such a fundamental/basic thing, I was easily shooting 80-85% at free throws as a damn teenager.
But he's a great shooter period, why "should" he be better? Because you say so? Generally the guys shooting a high FT% are good shooters.

[Manny98]

He's the closest thing to perfection

[Real Men Wear Green]

In terms of skills and abilities there are a few things he didn't have for parts of his career but nothing that he was not very good at at some point in his career. And you certainly can't say he makes bad deciding on the court. The only thing I would say is just that I would be a bigger fan if he was more motivated to beat his peers (Wade, AD) instead of having a focus that's just on winning regardless of how it gets done. But that's certainly not some kind of major flaw and he has the right to pick his team as a free agent.

[Phoenix]

This is probably a weird criticism, actually not so much, but I do think its gonna be a problem moreso for the league: he's hung around too long as a relevant player. The fact that he's still arguably the leagues face and marquee name, closing in on 40, hasn't allowed anyone else to come in( MJ replaced Magic/Bird, Kobe replaced MJ, Lebron replaced Kobe etc) to replace him in the same way. He's kind of the last megastar that people tune in to love or hate. Nobody else coming up now I don't think will create two opposing love/hate camps like him. In fact, the NBA doesn't realize how good they had it with Kobe and Lebron.

I do think some of his team-ups robbed us of some great series. Somehow we never got a Lebron-Wade series and joining in 2010 killed any hope of that. That matchup in the mid 2000s was epic.

[j3lademaster]

Of course you can make legitimate criticisms for Lebron. You can for anyone, but Lebron and Jokic are as close to perfect as it gets.

[gengiskhan]

He's the closest thing to perfection

2007 Finals

2011 Finals

2014 Finals

2015 Finals

2017 Finals

2018 Finals

2004 Olympics

2006 FIBA Finals

.................................................t he list is Endless!

effing guy literally needed Kobe in 2008 to learn to win Finals.

and its not like he wasn't given Shaq as teammate before this.

[RRR3]

This is probably a weird criticism, actually not so much, but I do think its gonna be a problem moreso for the league: he's hung around too long as a relevant player. The fact that he's still arguably the leagues face and marquee name, closing in on 40, hasn't allowed anyone else to come in( MJ replaced Magic/Bird, Kobe replaced MJ, Lebron replaced Kobe etc) to replace him in the same way. He's kind of the last megastar that people tune in to love or hate. Nobody else coming up now I don't think will create two opposing love/hate camps like him. In fact, the NBA doesn't realize how good they had it with Kobe and Lebron.

I do think some of his team-ups robbed us of some great series. Somehow we never got a Lebron-Wade series and joining in 2010 killed any hope of that. That matchup in the mid 2000s was epic.
LeBron and scrubs vs. Wade and scrubs for the right to get blasted by an actually deep team isn't that compelling.

[Axe]

We used to have a homosexual mongoloid here who literally hated him so much for supposedly 'trademarking taco tuesday'. Is it legit? Very unlikely.

Now if there's something that should be criticized about him seriously, it's the fact that he's so obsessed about becoming the best or greatest player in the sport. And then when he's had shortcomings, there'd be tons of excuses or somebody else to blame. Which can become the main reason why his haters make fun of him so much. Maybe just let your game do all the talking for you or let it come to you instead of demanding it.

Like what i've said before, if he can also comfortably hold himself accountable at times and admit how he's wrong then more people would respect him. But in terms of his basketball ability on the floor, he's perfectly an all-around player.

[Phoenix]

LeBron and scrubs vs. Wade and scrubs for the right to get blasted by an actually deep team isn't that compelling.

Disagree. That's a money match up regardless

[RRR3]

Disagree. That's a money match up regardless
It would be entertaining but who desperately wants to see players of that caliber with crap supporting casts? If they had met in 09 it would have been Mo Williams/Delonte West/LBJ/Varejao/old Big Z versus rookie Mario Chalmers/Wade/rookie Michael Beasley/Haslem/the corpse of Jermaine O'Neal...besides LeBron and Wade who would you be excited to see in that series? Those are lottery rosters if you remove LBJ and Wade from them. Basically the modern equivalent would have been a series between Giannis's current Bucks without Dame and Middleton vs. SGA if his supporting cast were the Hornets without LaMelo.

[Phoenix]

It would be entertaining but who desperately wants to see players of that caliber with crap supporting casts? If they had met in 09 it would have been Mo Williams/Delonte West/LBJ/Varejao/old Big Z versus rookie Mario Chalmers/Wade/rookie Michael Beasley/Haslem/the corpse of Jermaine O'Neal...besides LeBron and Wade who would you be excited to see in that series? Those are lottery rosters if you remove LBJ and Wade from them. Basically the modern equivalent would have been a series between Giannis's current Bucks without Dame and Middleton vs. SGA if his supporting cast were the Hornets without LaMelo.

In most cases you're tuning in for a specific match up. I personally wouldn't care about their rosters, it would have been 2 of the top 3 players going at it. We were robber of that match up.

[ELITEpower23]

Legitimate? Maybe. But you could do that with any player, really.

LeBron crushed all the fanboy hearts of Kobe and Jordan and that's why he gets such harsh backlash. He crushed these dude childhood hero's and they cant cope with it normally.

Maybe, M-a-y-b-e one day I'll know what that feels like if someone like Wemby gets 9 MVPs and scores 8,000 playoff points with the most game winners, MVP win shares, PER over 30.0, 11 Finals appearances, etc. I kinda doubt it though so I can't relate to these butt hurt fans.

[iamgine]

Of course. In his younger days his shooting was not that good. He didn't play well in the 2011 finals.

[gbaLL]

my $tyle = 55