The Los Angeles Lakers have erected statues for a select few superstars outside of Crypto.com Arena. They include Magic Johnson, Jerry West, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Elgin Baylor, and Shaquille O’Neal. The big question on a lot of people’s minds right now is whether or not current Lakers star LeBron James will ever join them there.
As far as Shaq is concerned, LeBron has earned the right to be recognized amongst the other Lakers legends.
During a chat with Brandon ‘Scoop B’ Robinson of Bally Sports, O’Neal said that he believes that James deserves a statue outside of the arena because he’s done everything he was asked to do while wearing purple and yellow.
LeBron James deserves a statue in front of @cryptocom because he brought a championship to Los Angeles says @SHAQ to @BallySports.
“A lot of people say that don’t count & if you can’t count his then you can’t count Mr. Tim Duncan’s bubble championship. That’s right, I said it!” pic.twitter.com/abDy6uJzwm
— 👑 Brandon “Scoop B” Robinson (@ScoopB) February 19, 2023
“He did win a championship for the Lakers,” said O’Neal. “A lot of people say that don’t count. But if you don’t count his, then you can’t count Tim Duncan’s bubble championship. That’s right, I said it.
“LeBron has won as a Laker, he broke the [all-time scoring] record as a Laker,” O’Neal added. “Would I oppose him having a statue? No, I would not. If they wanna give him a statue, I would be down with that.”
The Tim Duncan championship in question was the one the San Antonio Spurs won after the lockout-shortened 1998-99 season.
Not everyone is going to agree with the idea that James is worthy of a statue as most of his accomplishments have happened elsewhere. Meanwhile, most of those with statues won multiple championships with the Lakers while Elgin Baylor played his entire career with the franchise.
But if he stays in LA for another year or two and is able to get the team back to the playoffs, perhaps that will be just enough to justify getting LeBron in the mix. First things first, they need to put up a Kobe Bryant statue.
