LeBron James, by all accounts, is having the best Year 17 season that the NBA has ever seen through the first 24 games of the 2019-20 season. While he is leading the league in assists for the first time in his career while being part of one of the NBA’s best defenses for the first time in a while, and scoring 26 points per game, a new metric released on Wednesday measures him as the most impactful player in the league today.
ESPN released its first Real Plus-Minus estimates for the 2019-20 season and LeBron James was comically ahead of everyone else in the league, with a rating nearly three points higher than the two reigning MVPs, James Harden of the Houston Rockets and Giannis Antetokounmpo of the Milwaukee Bucks.
Obviously, one number is not everything but it’s still a pretty remarkable statement on the player that James still is to this day. Conversely, Anthony Davis rated out 10th among power forwards in Real Plus-Minutes, something James and the Lakers would obviously dispute if someone were to suggest there were eight power forwards better than The Brow.
Still, James has been incredible this season. And another reason the rating is so high could be how James has been able to play arguably his purest style of basketball, facilitating and leading the Lakers to one of the best offenses in the league despite the fact they’re not a heavily pick-and-roll dependant team, which has become the league-wide norm.
After many questioned whether James could get back to the heights he displayed throughout his career after suffering an injury last year that ended his streak of eight straight trips to the NBA Finals, he’s proven once again that he can perform at a level higher than most had assumed was attainable.