I dunno. From what I've seen of the guy, he's kind of awkward. His handle is fair at best, and the same could be said about his jumper. He's a very good leaper in the open court, but in traffic he seems to have trouble elevating above the rest of the defense. Has anybody else noticed this? If he gets his two steps in stride, he'll jump over anybody, but when he's dribbling down the lane and goes in the air, he usually has to contort his body, shoot a bad shot, and then go get the rebound and put it in.
He's certainly not half as good a scorer as TMac, Kobe, Marbury, Garnett, Carter, Pierce, or those guys. Not that he can't put up 20+ point games, but I don't see him doing that on a consistent basis until he develops a more versatile repetoire of shots. Right now, he is okay scoring going to the basket, is usually out of control going away from it, and his midrange game leaves much to be desired. I'd say he has about the scoring prowess of a more shot-conscious Jason Kidd. He's not a great shooter but can make shots, not overly creative off the dribble but can get to the hoop, and not great with the fadeaway jumper, but he will knock it down with a consistency that instills at least relative confidence in his fans.
He's more physically developed than Kobe or TMac were at 18, but I'm not sure he's any better. I never really cared about those two when they were younger because 1) they were on the Lakers and Raptors, 2) everybody seemed to say they were overrated (although, when everybody says they're overrated, they're not really rated that high afterall), and 3) they never got a lot of minutes. Anyway, it's hard to compare the players with Lebron because Lebron has known for about 2 years now that he was going to go to the NBA and be expected to carry whatever team he was on, and for some weird reason his physical maturation process seemed to suggest that this was alright. Just because Kobe Bryant didn't quite mature into an NBA body until he was 21 doesn't make him any less good. Maybe he'll be able to play until he's 2 years older than Lebron.
Ever see the movie "Jack" with Robin Williams? At this rate, my bet is that Lebron will have to retire by the time he's 27. I already see a patch of gray hair in that little goatie thing he has seemingly spay-painted on his chin.
