Heading into the season, it was widely assumed that the Los Angeles Lakers would not be a good team. Somehow, they’ve defied expectations and turned into an utter disaster. However, there’s one thing we knew for certain would happen: Kobe Bryant would pass Michael Jordan for third place on the NBA’s all-time scoring list, probably sometime in December. Well, that “sometime” is now, as Kobe is just 31 points away from His Airness. With two games this weekend (at San Antonio tonight, at Minnesota on Sunday), barring injury, Nick Young hogging the ball like he’s never hogged it before, or some unpredictable catastrophe, Kobe will hit 32,293 points and beyond.
Look at that number for a second. Did you know Kobe had scored that many points? Probably not. Sure, you knew he scored a lot, but you never knew exactly how much. Also, did you know that as soon as he passes Jordan he’ll still be 4,635 points behind Karl Malone? Or, 6,094 behind Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? Truth is, the actual numbers don’t matter. The only thing we know is that these guys scored a lot of points. It’s not like home runs in baseball. It’s not 714, 755 and 762 — numbers that are ingrained in the heads of even casual sports fans. A discussion on Ken Griffey Jr.’s career usually centers around the question “how many home runs would he have hit if he hadn’t lost all those games to injury?” In Jordan’s case, does anyone think “how many more points would Jordan have scored if he hadn’t retired twice?” No, the first thought is “how many more rings would Jordan have?”
All-time great NBA players, perhaps more than in any other sport (besides NFL quarterbacks), are judged by championships (or lack of championships) and other non-statistical criteria. Malone is comfortably in second place all-time in scoring, but his legacy is that of a choke artist who picked up a couple cheap MVP awards and couldn’t win the big one. Kareem is the all-time leading scorer and a six-time MVP and champion, yet many people perceive him as just a weirdo with a boring signature shot (that also doubled as the most unguardable weapon in basketball history). Fair or unfair, that is the perception.
In Kobe’s case, he’ll be the guy who modeled his game after Jordan, tried to accomplish everything Jordan ever did (and more), but fell short (way short in MVPs and one short in championships). However, one category he unequivocally will own Jordan in is putting the ball in the basket more than he did. It’s a very impressive accomplishment, to be sure. Unfortunately, it just won’t matter in the grand scheme.
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