We started talking about LeBron James on Pardon the Interruption 10 years ago, when Tony, Mike, and LeBron were all less bald. Now that LeBron has won a title, the dominant question is how historically great he’ll be. Time will wash out many of his early struggles and much of the early criticism he received. We thought it valuable to look back over what onetime Washington Post publisher Phil Graham called “the first rough draft of history” to see not only how LeBron has changed, but how the appraisals of him have, too.
Our thanks to the staff of Dan Le Batard Is Highly Questionable (all former PTI interns), for pulling, logging, and forming a narrative out of hours of old clips. And to the fine folks at Grantland, who made it flow and look pretty and who have cultivated this audience we hope finds some value in watching it.
Erik Rydholm is the executive producer of PTI.