MIAMI — After playing Wednesday in Houston, flying through the night, not checking in to his Miami hotel until around 5 a.m. and receiving treatment on his arthritic left foot throughout the day, LeBron James suited up for the Los Angeles Lakers’ 134-126 win against the Miami Heat on Thursday night and made history against his former team.
Thursday was the 1,611th game of James’ career, tying Hall of Famer Robert Parish for the all-time games-played mark.
For Parish, seeing the lengths the 41-year-old James goes to in playing in his 23rd season, puts him at peace with someone else holding his record.
“If anyone is deserving of breaking the iron man record, I would say LeBron James is,” Parish told ESPN during a phone call Thursday. “Because he takes such good care of himself. … His approach to fitness and what he puts into his body reflects, or mirrors, how I felt about my fitness and what I ate, how I took care of myself. And so, it’s a testament to not only my longevity, but LeBron’s longevity.”
Parish, who set the record on April 9, 1996, by passing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s mark of 1,560 games and added to it before retiring in 1997, figured someone would pass him at some point.
“Oh, no, no,” Parish said when asked whether he thought his record, which stood for nearly 30 years, was unbreakable. “I thought the record would be broken eventually.”
As James was approaching the mark last week, he was asked about the pending milestone.
“It’s not something I set out to do,” James said. “The one thing that I’ve always had in my mind is that you can’t be a leader and you can’t practice what you preach if you’re not available to your teammates. And I’ve always kind of just prided myself on trying to be as available as possible in my career to my teammates, going out on the floor every night and keeping my body intact.”
James was coming off one of his finest games all season, with 30 points on 13-for-14 shooting — including six dunks — in Wednesday’s 124-116 win over the Houston Rockets. Against the Heat, he had 19 points on 8-of-12 shooting, 15 rebounds and 10 assists as the Lakers stretched their winning streak to a season-best eight games.
Parish averaged 3.7 points and 2.1 rebounds as a 43-year-old in his final season with the Chicago Bulls in 1996-97. James entered Thursday averaging 21.4 points, 6.8 assists and 5.6 rebounds this season for the Lakers.
“He’s playing at an All-Star level still,” Parish said, “which is equally impressive.”
James reciprocated his appreciation for Parish.
“Shout out Chief, man,” James said after the Miami game, using Parish’s nickname. “I’ve been seeing some of the things that he’s been saying about me, and there’s not a lot of those OGs that talk like that to the generation after them, and also about me personally, so shout out to Chief. He’s super cool. He’s dope. I like him.”
James also used the occasion to address some of the public criticism he received at the beginning of the Lakers’ winning streak, when L.A. was starting to play well while he was sidelined with foot, elbow and hip injuries.
“It sells papers a lot easier — and clippings and podcasts — if you say, ‘LeBron, the team is better off without him,'” James said. “A lot of people will try to, like, view it. So, I get it. … But they’re absolutely wrong.”
Lakers coach JJ Redick credits James’ “competitive stamina” as the reason he continues to be so impactful more than two decades into his pro career.
“His ability to put so much focus and intent into his day — that’s how you last, that’s how you improve, that’s how you stay healthy and are available to play in that amount of games,” Redick said before Thursday’s game.
Redick then paraphrased Heat president Pat Riley’s mantra as the mentality James brings.
“Whatever the quote is, ‘Make sure you make the main thing the main thing,’ and he’s made basketball the main thing for a long time,” Redick said.
With James adding another accomplishment to a résumé that already features the most points scored in league history, the most All-Star appearances, four championships, four Finals MVPs and four regular-season MVPs, Parish — who was teammates with Larry Bird and Michael Jordan — was asked where James belongs among the greats.
“Oh, they got to make room for LeBron,” Parish told ESPN. “LeBron is an all-time great. They got to pull up an extra chair and tell some guys to slide over.”
