Metta World Peace was one of the best defenders in the NBA during his prime, and he recently talked about the toughest players he had to guard. Formerly known as Ron Artest, this small forward was drafted in 1999, and he had to guard some of the best players ever to play the game, including Michael Jordan. As a reward for his incredible defense, Artest was named Defensive Player of the Year in 2004.
World Peace was a versatile defender, and he was usually assigned to the best player on the opposing team. One of the players he had to guard a lot was LeBron James, and he had some words of praise for the Cleveland Cavaliers forward.
LeBron James was one of the toughest players World Peace had to guard
Peace named Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and LeBron James the toughest players he guarded, with Jordan being the toughest out of three of them. Even though Jordan was near the end of his career when Metta guarded him, he was still very physical, very strong and extremely tough to guard. Kobe Bryant, who played with Metta World Peace for a few years, was fearless and he would die for the game, according to the 37-year old defender.
When it comes to LeBron James, Metta World Peace wasn't very successful at defense since James is very unselfish. He would always make the right play, and he would make sure his teammates are involved in the game as well.
Metta called James legendary for making the right play whenever it's needed.
LeBron did a great job against World Peace
LeBron James has played 21 games against the former Indiana Pacers superstar, and he's done a great job. James won 13 of those games, and his stats were very good as he averaged 26.9 points, 6.7 rebounds, 6.8 assists, 2.3 steals and 1.1 blocks per game.
He also shot 49.2 percent from the field, which is incredible considering who was his primary defender.
On the other side, LeBron limited World Peace to only 13.0 points per game on 39.8 percent shooting. Even though Metta has never been a great scorer, he could have done a much better job on offense.
