I am not the one to say whether this Dec. 30 will be the last birthday that LeBron James celebrates as an active NBA player.
Only LeBron himself knows if he truly plans to be back for a 24th season in 2026-27 as a 42-year-old.
Actually? Maybe even he doesn’t know yet.
However …
I am quite confident in predicting that LeBron will be an All-Star in February.
Spectrum SportsNet’s Happy Birthday graphic to LeBron James.
Don’t bother pointing out to me that he was somehow mired in ninth place among Western Conference players Monday when the league’s first fan voting returns of the winter were published. All-Star Weekend in 2026 is being held in Los Angeles on Feb. 15. Commissioner Adam Silver will almost certainly invite James to participate as some sort of commissioner’s pick if he doesn’t first get the opportunity to name him as an injury replacement for someone else in the West … with Monday night’s dreadful development for Denver that has sidelined MVP frontrunner Nikola Jokić for at least a month thanks to a nasty-looking knee hyperextension quite possibly having already created that need.
Remember the 2018-19 season when neither Dwyane Wade nor Dirk Nowitzki was playing All-Star basketball and Silver summoned both soon-to-be-retirees to Charlotte to be All-Stars anyway? The only way LeBron doesn’t take part in the NBA’s new USA vs. World All-Star format that excites us very little thanks to its funky three-teams-of-eight format is if A) an injury renders him unable to play or B) he’s the one who declines the inevitable invite.
As for LeBron turning Dirk Years Old …
I enjoyed watching this tweeted retrospective video because it provided my latest reminder about how fortunate I was to be in the building to cover James’ first NBA game at Sacramento all the way back on Oct. 29, 2003.
NBACentral@TheDunkCentral
Happy Birthday to LeBron Raymone James Sr.! 🔥👑
41 and still dominating 🐐
3:07 PM · Dec 30, 2025 · 60K Views
77 Replies · 535 Reposts · 2.05K Likes
A screengrab from the above video that features a much younger (and skinnier) me in the midst of the pregame interview scrum surrounding an 18-year-old LeBron in Sactown.
I realize the following stat probably only fascinates me, but this is my 33rd season of continuous NBA coverage and all but 10 of those have featured James. In truth that number is realistically only nine, because there was plenty of reason to write about him throughout the 2002-03 campaign (which happened to be my first at ESPN) when the world knew he was going No. 1 overall in the 2003 NBA Draft no matter which team won the draft lottery.
That team of course turned out to be James’ home-state Cleveland Cavaliers. I myself was then lucky enough to have a tremendous seat for his highest highs (leading the Cavs out of that infamous 3-1 hole against Golden State in the 2016 Finals) and lowest lows (playing so poorly against the Dirk-led Mavericks in the 2011 Finals) and so many momentous occasions before and after. Since the spring of 2022, I’ve been referring to LeBron as The Longevity GOAT. I’m not sure that’s enough to satisfy James, who would surely prefer your full-on GOAT vote over Michael Jordan and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, but there’s no shame to me in landing second or third on that list.
FanDuel Sports Network Southwest@FanDuelSN_SW
LeBron James is the NBA’s unquestioned Longevity GOAT.
But three of James’ four seasons in LA — on top of that title run in 2020 — have been trying in the extreme.
@TheSteinLine looks at how often life as a Laker has veered off script for @KingJames:
2:47 AM · Mar 28, 2022
2 Replies · 15 Reposts · 88 Likes
It certainly won’t surprise me if James plays at least one more season, but I’m indeed stopping short of predicting that. Can’t help but wonder if the overall demands on his body after a bout with sciatica that forced him to miss the first 14 games of season — including Opening Night for the first time in his career — will give him pause about playing on.
On top of the fact, of course, that it is not remotely clear yet what team is a likely/feasible option to employ him next season if he plays on.
Those, though, are details for another day. Not his birthday.
There are only four NBA games on this Newsletter Tuesday and James hooking up with the Detroit Pistons on NBC is rightfully the schedule standout.
The Longevity GOAT has certainly earned the moment.
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More tremendous memories for Utterly Spoiled Me …
While James is famed for The Decision in July 2010 that took him from Northeast Ohio to South Beach, NBA Twitter won’t soon forget The Indecision: When DeAndre Jordan backed out of a commitment in free agency to sign with the Mavericks in July 2015 to stay with the Clippers.
Prime Video has a new documentary out — directed by my pal Jason Gallagher — that allows us to re-live the whole saga that so captivated the basketball public a decade (and change) ago.
Jason Gallagher@jga41agher
Hello! I directed my first ever documentary. It’s about DeAndre Jordan’s Indecision. What happened on the inside? Did we lose our minds on the outside? And will society ever heal truly itself?
Viral: The Indecision is streaming on Prime Video.
3:33 PM · Dec 23, 2025 · 397K Views
36 Replies · 89 Reposts · 740 Likes
And because Twitter posts can once again be embedded in Substack posts after a ban of more than two years, I can also enclose the tweet — which certainly features prominently in the doc — that truly tipped off a day unlike any other in the Social Media Age of #thisleague:
Marc Stein@TheSteinLine
Story going online now: ESPN sources say Clippers lobbying DeAndre Jordan to reverse his decision to join Dallas and stay in LA with Clips
4:27 PM · Jul 8, 2015
246 Replies · 2.33K Reposts · 959 Likes
Fun times. Great to reconnect with it all. I heartily encourage you to give the show a holiday watch.
PS — Here is a link, in case you missed it, to my Sunday Best around-the-league NBA notes with the latest from Trade Season:
And a link to the latest from The People’s Insider Jake Fischer:
Fires off a few decent Notes (I think) before 2025 came to a close …
