With comparisons between LeBron James and Michael Jordan at an all-time high, the reigning two-time champ gleefully told Sports Illustrated in a cover piece he felt as if he was living out his “MJ moment” when he swished what proved to be the game’s most critical basket in Game 7 of the Miami Heat’s finals win over San Antonio.
Though James trails Jordan in titles, 6-2, and arguably overall fan worship, the two-time Finals MVP doesn’t seem willing to cede much else. “I’m not MJ, I’m LJ,” SI reports he’s long been prone to utter. And just last February during All-Star weekend, James unapologetically told the media “I want to be the greatest of all time.”
And so, just prior to Game 7, SI reports Heat assistant David Fizdale showed James tape of the defense the Spurs were now using to stymie him, a scheme that centered leaving him open somewhere near the free-throw and daring him to shoot. Then coaches reminded the league’s MVP of just how good he’d been all season long from those very dimensions.
“Why would you abandon this thing that’s helped make you what you are?” James remembers asking himself. “Stop second-guessing yourself. Go do it. Make it happen.”
The end result was a 37-point, 11-rebound performance and another Heat title. James took 20 shots outside the paint in Game 7, swishing 9, including five three-pointers. And with just 33 seconds remaining, he morphed into the man he is most often compared with.
“I know it wasn’t the magnitude of MJ hitting that shot in ’98, but I definitely thought about him,” James told SI. “It was an MJ moment,” he said before giving it even more thought and instead uttering “It was an LJ moment.”
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