LeBron James Passed Michael Jordan To Become The Greatest Playoff Scorer In NBA History

It’s official: No one in NBA history has scored more points in the postseason than LeBron James. Between his numerous trips to the playoffs with Cleveland and Miami, James has amassed more than 5,987 postseason points in his career. That’s good enough to pass Michael Jordan for No. 1 on the all time list.

LeBron achieved this in the third quarter of Cleveland’s Game 5 matchup in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Boston Celtics. He entered the game needing 28 points to surpass Jordan for the record, and he got that when he knocked down a three to put him at 5,989 career playoff points.

He also got to this mark with some flare. Here was the bucket which put him one point behind Jordan.

LeBron didn’t get to this mark quite as quickly as Jordan did–it took him 212 career postseason games to get the record while MJ got there in 179, which is insane. But it’s still a massive accomplishment for LeBron, whose career has more or less been compared to Jordan’s from the second he came into the NBA.

Barring something insane happening, LeBron is going to get the opportunity to separate his scoring total from everyone else during the NBA Finals. Only four other active players are among the top-25 for playoff scoring: Tony Parker (4,012 points), Dwyane Wade (3,871), Dirk Nowitzki (3,663), and Manu Ginobili (3,009).

Parker and Nowitzki are getting up there, Ginobili may be on the verge of retirement, and Wade has a long way to go to surpass his former teammate. Add in that LeBron is somehow only 32 years old—meaning he’s going to have plenty of opportunities to expand on his all-time mark—and it’s hard to imagine that anyone’s going to catch him any time soon, if ever.