Look at your avatar and remember the 2004 finals.
Here's a list of players Kobe was outplayed by in a finals:
Austin Croshere
Jalen Rose
Reggie Miller
Rip Hamilton
Chauncey Billups
Ray Allen
Paul Pierce
LOL @ the 2011 Mavs being the softest finals team ever. They're not even the fifth worst finals team in the previous decade. The 2009 Magic, 2007 Cavs, 2006 Mavs, 2002 and 2003 Nets were all easily worse.
The fact is that LeBron's 2011 finals was less bad than his 2012 finals/playoffs were good.
17.8 on .478 shooting
7.2 rebounds
6.8 assists
1.7 steals
0.5 blocks
Finals MVPs (plural) have been won on worse statlines, but it looks bad and gets exploited by you Skip Brainless wannabes because he lost.
Watch this video from the 2:50 mark, Mark Cuban has already exposed you clowns:[if IE]><embed src="
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"LeBron actually played it right more often than not. He made the right pass to the right guy who didn't make the right play. And that's exactly what we wanted."
Could he have taken the Kobe 2004 finals approach and throw a million horrible shots that had no chance of going in? Of course he could, like he was forced to do in the 2007 finals. But in 2011 he had a supporting cast where he tried to pass the ball more. It obviously didn't work out.
On the other hand, LeBron's 2012 playoffs are arguably the best ever, EVER in terms of consistency.
His worst game over the entire playoffs:
22 points (10-22), 7 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, 0 blocks, 4 turnovers
His lowest scoring game over the entire playoffs:
19 points (8-1
, 7 rebounds, 9 assists, 2 steals, 0 blocks, 0 turnovers
And these two games are from the second and first rounds. He had one game where he shot under 43% over the entire playoffs. And keep in mind, his playoffs were pretty long with 23 games. He also became the first player ever with 650 points, 200 rebounds and 100 assists over the playoffs. But keep focusing on the 2011 finals, like 2012 never happened. Whatever makes you sleep better at night. LeBron at 27 has better credentials than Jordan at 27, who still didn't have a ring:
The image is slightly outdated and LeBron's titles should be changed to 1 and finals appearances to 3. Does that mean that he will surpass Jordan when their careers are over? I'm leaning towards no, but in the end, unlike Kobe LeBron is still a different type of player than Jordan so they shouldn't be directly compared.