LeBron vs. Jordan: Age 34 Seasons

The 2018-2019 NBA Regular Season is coming to a close, marking the end of another historically dominant season by reigning MVP Jonas Jerebko. This season also marks the end of the 34 year old LeBron James’ 16th season in the NBA. It’s quite common for people to compare LeBron James to Michael Jordan, as they are two of the best players in NBA History. While Jordan has twice as many NBA Championships as LeBron, some still have the gall to say that LeBron is superior. One such argument is that LeBron’s longevity is superior to Jordan’s. To analyze this argument, lets compare LeBron’s age 34 season vs. Jordan’s age 34 season.

Welp. It appears that at Age 34, Michael Jordan was better in every single category. However, this is just a quantitative comparison of their seasons, and stats don’t always tell the whole story. Just ask Dennis Rodman:

So let’s qualitatively analyze what the two accomplished in their Age 34 seasons:

Michael Jordan led the Chicago Bulls to a 62-20 regular season finish, and the #1 seed in the Eastern Conference. He was named the regular season MVP. Jordan then led the Bulls to the NBA Championship, where they defeated the Utah Jazz in 6 games. He was named the MVP of the NBA Finals as well. The city of Chicago then built a statue of Michael Jordan.

LeBron James has led the Lakers to a 37 – 44 regular season record. They are the #10 seed in the Western Conference and are nowhere close to being in the playoff conversation. The poor play has prompted Laker’s legend Magic Johnson to step down as President of the organization. LeBron has openly discussed giving his teenage children wine. Rumors have circulated that LeBron is a vicious alcoholic and that the poor example he is setting coupled with his poor decisions to force an addictive substance on his children at such a young age has them emulating his crippling, addictive behavior.

So, it looks like Jordan takes the cake from the qualitative angle as well.

So what’s next for LeBron?

After Jordan’s age 34 season he retired from the NBA. However, after 3 years of retirement he re-entered the league. Interesting enough, pulling himself straight off the couch at the age of 39, he still had a better season than LeBron did at 34.