**When looking at the NBA point statistics LeBron James is third greatest of all time.** - When looking at the [NBA statistics](https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/pts_career.html), LeBron James has scored 35367 points overall. However, this is not the highest number of points. He is topped by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Karl Malone, each scoring 38387 and 36928 respectively. Obviously these are lower than the LeBron James’ overall points. - So when looking at the statistics of points in the NBA league, LeBron James is not the best. Of course there may be other ways to define greatest, however I have purely looked at the statistics.

**It depends on what standards one uses to measure the “greatest of all time”.** * LeBron is undoubtedly an immensely talented basketball player, but labeling any athlete the greatest of all time is always going to be met with some disagreement. If looking at only stats that @Lucy_P has provided, then LeBron is *not* technically the greatest basketball player. * However, if we look at cultural influence, LeBron James has quite a track record. Most recently. he starred in the [2021 Space Jam reboot](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3554046/), along with starting the [I Promise School](https://ipromise.school) in Akron, Ohio, and earning deals with companies such as Nike, Beats, and Samsung. He additionally has [over 50 million twitter followers](https://www.speakrj.com/audit/report/KingJames/twitter), [over 80 million instagram followers](https://www.dunkest.com/en/nba/news/33213/most-followed-nba-players-instagram), and a net worth of around $850 million. He didn’t earn those numbers by *not* playing great basketball and earning himself a hoard of dedicated fans. * LeBron James is a name that a majority of people recognize, even if they are not basketball fans (I don’t watch basketball and I know a weird amount about him). If we measure the greatest basketball player by skill *and* cultural influence, James is certainly [in the running](https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2219388-could-lebron-james-ever-surpass-michael-jordans-cultural-impact) for greatest of all time.