Michael Jordan played 15 legendary seasons in the NBA; those seasons consisted of quite a few accomplishments. 5 regular season MVP awards, 6 NBA championships and 6 Finals MVP awards just to name a few. Aside from 2-3 injury riddled seasons, Michael Jordan had a reasonably healthy career. While LeBron James on the other hand is in just his 14th NBA season, and has had a significantly healthier career. The longest stretch LeBron James has missed in his career due to injury is 2 weeks.
LeBron will pass Jordan in games played
LeBron James is coming for Michael Jordan in terms of Games Played for their respective careers, an accomplishment he will be looking to pass MJ in the Cavs-Wizards game on March 25th.
In 15 NBA seasons, Michael Jordan played 1,072 career regular season games, 1,039 starts. MJ also played in 179 playoff games, started in all 179. In 14 NBA seasons, LeBron James has played an impressive 1,050 games. While in the playoffs, LeBron has already passed Jordan by appearing in 199 postseason contests. LeBron James has been in the starting lineup in every NBA game he has laced his kicks up to play in, expect for one. A game where he was not injured, nor resting. He decided to substitute himself into the game at the same time as teammate at the time, Anderson Varejao. This was so the crowd could not boo Varejao, for an incident that was relevant at the time.
Doing the math, for Michael Jordan's career, he has played a total of 1,251 games (regular season + playoffs).
LeBron James has played a total of 1,250. Meaning LeBron needs just 1 game to tie, and 2 games to pass Air Jordan in total career games played. The kid from Akron already passed Jordan in total career minutes played, earlier this season. Showing the durability of LeBron to log more minutes than Jordan did, in less performances.
Comparing the stats
It's always interesting to compare stats after two players have played the exact same amount of games. After 1,250 games, LeBron James has 34,054 points, 9,353 rebounds, 8,718 assists, 2,093 steals and 995 blocks. After 1,251 games, Michael Jordan has 38,279 points, 7,824 rebounds, 6,655 assists, 2,890 steals and 1,051 blocks.
The crazy thing is, King James is only 32 years old, has multiple seasons left in the league. And he will pass Jordan in all time games played, already.
