LeBron James lifted the Los Angeles Lakers past the Denver Nuggets in Game 5 on Saturday night, putting up a 38-16-10 in a clinching win which saw off a really exciting Nuggets team.
It puts James back in the NBA Finals, somewhere he’s gotten very used to appearing over the last decade.
Like, very very used to it.
This is LeBron James’ last decade in the NBA playoffs. (Shouts to Shea Serrano for pointing this out in a tweet, which I’m not embedding here because it’s got bad language and this is a family sports blog, but if you don’t mind a curse word you can go check that out.)
2011: NBA Finals
2012: NBA Finals (won, also named MVP)
2013: NBA Finals (won, also named MVP)
2014: NBA Finals
2015: NBA Finals
2016: NBA Finals (won, also named MVP)
2017: NBA Finals
2018: NBA Finals
2019: Suffered injury on rebuilding Lakers, team missed playoffs
2020: NBA Finals
That stretch goes with three separate teams, multiple different iterations of rosters. Sure, he had complementary stars, but James it the constant here. He just went off, again, dominating Game 5 completely and then nailing a dagger 3-pointer to put the series to bed.
Nine NBA Finals in ten years. Three titles, and he may well win his fourth. Three MVPs. We may never see anything like this again.
