We're Not Afraid Of You Anymore

Three nights ago, the Los Angeles Lakers lost a nail-biter to the Dallas Mavericks. This certainly isn't news, the Lakers have dropped 34 games so far this season and things have never been more pessimistic. That said, this one felt different. The Mavs went up big early, seeming like we were in for yet another Lakers beatdown on national TV.

Almost without warning, LeBron James completely flipped the script, sinking four DEEP triples and initiating fastbreaks as good as we’ve ever seen a player do it. For a few minutes, we entered an alternate reality where everything worked out for LA. LeBron was doing LeBron things, Westbrook was pushing the pace, and roleplayers were making the shots they should always make. Even Carmelo looked like his old self for a bit (his old self in the OKC era, let’s not get crazy). 

I couldn’t believe my eyes, the Lakers really looked like a good team. They erased the Mavs’ massive lead to go up by six in the late 4th quarter. This played out like the LeBron games of old, giving teams a fighting chance in the first half only to turn it on and destroy them as soon as he decided to. It seemed like this was yet another one of those nights. “LeBron James is inevitable.” I thought to myself. For 18 and a half years, I was right. What happened next proved me wrong.

In the closing minutes of the game, Luka Doncic decimated the Lakers with an eerie surgical precision. Worse than that, all three of his crunch time buckets were scored on LeBron. 

I know what you’re thinking. “So what? All great players get scored on.” You’d be correct, everyone in NBA history has had points scored on them. These points were different. Not only was Luka easily getting to his spots, he was specifically targeting LeBron to exploit. 

It wasn’t just that Luka wanted to score on LeBron, it was the fact that he knew he could. That hasn’t happened before. Luka looked LeBron dead in the eye and won the game in front of him. Nobody looks LeBron in the eye.

This isn’t an indictment of LeBron. He’s been outstanding this season and his longevity is perhaps the single greatest accomplishment. We all know the team around him is subpar at best and he’s done about as much as one player could do to drag them out of it.

Regardless, it’s failed. The Lakers suck. We’ve never seen LeBron get beaten up like this in a season before. Outside of his rookie year, this is just the second time LeBron hasn’t had immediate success in the regular season. The first being in his Los Angeles debut in 2018-19. 

That season is a weird one to analyze in retrospect. The roster wasn’t equipped to throw LeBron into the equation and they struggled because of it. LeBron knew this, and shut it down early, only playing 55 games. A year later, he won the title. That kind of quick turnaround was able to maintain LeBron’s reputation as somewhat of an inevitability. We were able to easily write off the previous season because it was just as easy for him to come back and dominate the league with a revamped roster. 

Those times have now passed. For the very first time in 20 years of LeBron James being in our life, he is vulnerable. 

This isn’t the first time we’ve thought he was vulnerable, teams have been trying to test the boundaries for years. In 2018, LeBron and his lowly surrounding cast of Cavaliers traveled to Boston for a dramatic Game 7. Winner goes to the Finals. About halfway through the game, then-rookie Jayson Tatum exploded to the rim, dunked over LeBron, and proceeded to taunt the King by chest-bumping into him with a nasty snarl on his face. A few plays later, Tatum splashed a deep three that sent the home crowd into a frenzy.

They were up on LeBron, and he had no one to lean on for support. A Finals appearance seemed close. What followed was perhaps the single most intimidating performance by an athlete ever. 

It would feel like a disservice to the moment to try and describe it with words. I’ll link the final two minut

s of Game 7 here. LeBron turns into a full horror movie slasher. Completely unstoppable. It felt like there was no force in the universe that could’ve possibly stopped him, almost like it was useless to even try. He was a real-life super villain dragging his team to the Finals while physically being dragged down from the shoulders by Marcus Morris. 

That game and the entire playoff run that preceded it are arguably the most outstanding stretch of basketball any player has ever played, but those days are now over.

LeBron’s time as a productive NBA player is still alive and well, but his overpowering and almost WWE-esque aura is now gone. It’s no fault of his own, but last year’s loss to Phoenix in round one plus with this year’s disappointing Lakers squad have combined to make The King appear vulnerable. Not weak, but vulnerable. What Luka did to LeBron couldn’t have happened in any year but this one. 

We aren’t afraid of LeBron anymore. 

It’s hard to keep being the Boogeyman once the Boogeyman gets beat. 

LeBron got beat, though it doesn’t mean he can’t change and win again.

But we’re not afraid of him anymore, and that’s something he can never change.