Steve Kerr Says LeBron James Has ‘Mastered’ The Game Of Basketball

Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr had high praise for Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James, the leading scorer in NBA history. 

Kerr, who coached Team USA to a gold medal, said after the Olympics that LeBron has “mastered” the game of basketball. 

“What a blessing to coach him finally after all these years of coaching against him and trying to figure out how to beat him,” Kerr said. “And to watch him up close — I’ve said this these past few weeks — just to see his approach, to see his professionalism, how coachable he is. And then of course just how gifted he is at everything. Every part of the game he seems to have mastered. And I’m thrilled to have been able to coach him the last six weeks and I’m a LeBron fan for life.”

LeBron won the Olympic MVP Award after leading Team USA to the gold medal. The King averaged 14.2 points, 6.8 rebounds, 8.5 assists and 1.3 steals in six tournament games. 

A future Hall of Famer, LeBron joined Kevin Durant (2020) and Manu Ginobili (2004) as the lone NBA players to be named Olympic MVP.

“It’s an honor,” LeBron said, via Marc J. Spears of Andscape. “I don’t know who the voting committee, or whatever the case may be, but super-humbled that they even voted for me,” James said. “But it came with us winning gold and that’s what’s more important for me. It’s pretty cool.

“It’s really a global game. Everybody in the world loves the game. You see obviously the last two games with us vs. Serbia, us vs. France. But seeing the competitive teams like Puerto Rico, South Sudan, making a push, Australia’s still pretty good, and so many more teams are going to continue to get better and better. Germany won the [FIBA] World Cup last year. It’s a basketball world and everybody loves the game. We just hope we continue to inspire people all over the world and we have great moments right here.”

LeBron is a four-time MVP, a four-time Finals MVP and a four-time champion. He has career averages of 27.1 points, 7.5 rebounds, 7.4 assists, 1.5 steals and 0.7 blocks with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Miami Heat and Los Angeles Lakers.

LeBron is the only player in NBA history to rank top five all-time in points and assists, the only player to win three Finals MVPs with three different teams, the only player with 30,000 points, 10,000 rebounds and 10,000 career assists and the only player to score 40,000 points.