The arena buzzed with anticipation on Thursday night as LeBron James once again surpassed Los Angeles Lakers legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the history books. 

James hit a turnaround fadeaway jumper on the baseline to achieve the feat.

The Lakers entered the game as the No. 6 seed in the NBA’s Western Conference standings. And they stayed in the same place in the standings after Thursday’s loss in Denver, falling 1 ½ games behind the No. 5 Nuggets.

James entered the night just three field goals away from passing Kareem for the most made shots in NBA history–15,837, a number that a few decades ago felt untouchable.

“At the end of the day, just to be able to link my name to being mentioned with some of the greatest to ever play this game has always been humbling and a pretty cool thing,” James said. “I grew up watching, reading [about], idolizing a lot of the greats and if I ever was able to be part of the NBA, I wanted to put myself in position that I can be named with some of the greats by doing something right. So, it’s pretty cool.”

It was appropriate that James set the record on a fadeaway, a shot that he mastered during the back half of his career.

“It’s one of my patented shots,” James said. “It’s something I’ve worked on throughout my career. So, to be able to have that ability to make that shot is pretty cool.”

James started working on the fadeaway more after losing to the Mavericks in the 2011 NBA Finals during his first season with the Heat.

“Losing in the Finals to Dallas and playing like s—,” James said. “That was the whole everything. Everything in the post, going to see Hakeem [Olajuwon], put in that work and then throughout that whole season and everything, it was just to continue to dial in on that throughout the rest of my career.”

By now, LeBron has turned basketball longevity into something closer to performance art. In his 23rd season, the man still moves through games like a player half his age. His body might carry 41 years of life, but his mind still reads defenses like a book. 

Every three-pointer, every pull-up jumper, every glide through the lane for a thundering dunk feels like another brushstroke on the largest statistical mural the sport has ever seen.

“I’m a big Bruce Springsteen fan,” said Lakers head coach J.J. Redick before the game, comparing ‘The Boss’ to LeBron. “You can see the evolution of him as a singer/songwriter…you get to the end of his career and you’re like holy s—, this guy’s greatest hits are like insane and LeBron’s greatest hits are too. He just keeps adding to them. He just plays and plays, and he’s got a hell of a catalog.”

James is already the greatest scorer in NBA history—holding the all-time points record with 43,111—he has built his legacy not on a single unstoppable move like Kareem’s skyhook or Michael Jordan’s fadeaway, but on sheer, relentless versatility and durability. 

Critics spent years waiting for the decline. Waiting for the body to betray him. Waiting for Father Time to finally catch the man who has spent two decades outrunning him.

He’s still waiting.

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James now owns more than 30 NBA records, leads the league’s history in field-goal attempts (over 31,000), and is somehow still productive enough to earn his 22nd All-Star selection while averaging 21.6 points, 7.0 assists, and 5.6 rebounds in his 23rd season.

James is in the final year of his contract with the Lakers and could retire at the end of the season or he could return for one last run with another team. 

For now, though, the spotlight remained firmly fixed on history.

An NBA crowd that has seen Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, and Kareem himself rise into basketball immortality watched another chapter unfold. The Nuggets were simply the latest witness, their presence little more than background scenery on a night all about legacy.