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-Charlie

His Royal Flyness

In 2025 most people have probably heard of someone being labeled as the GOAT. Of course, we’re not talking about horned animals with a strong beard game here. GOAT is the (convenient) acronym for ‘Greatest of All Time.’

Today this title is used to refer to our favorite players and even bestowed as a way to express gratitude, especially when somebody saves you in a pinch. 

Despite the casual usage of the term today, the reason we all understand its meaning is because of the dominance of one Michael Jeffrey Jordan. In a physical, hyper-talented era of basketball Michael Jordan flew high above the rest. During his historic reign Michael Jordan was:

• 6x NBA champion (with a perfect record in the Finals).

• 5x Most Valuable Player.

• 10x Scoring Champion.

• 14x NBA All-Star.

• 10x All NBA First-Team.

• Averaged 30.1 regular season points per game (ppg).

• Named Defensive Player of the Year (DPOY) and 9x All-Defensive First Team.

This was the greatness that nearly inspired my father to name me Michael Jordan Stevenson following a clutch Bulls win for their sixth championship in 1998. Thank God those contractions were a false alarm and my dad had time to see reason. Respectfully, Mike. That’s a hard name for anyone to live up to. It’s even harder when you’re closer to 5’6 than 6’6 and couldn’t dunk a tennis ball from the free throw line.

These accolades are hard to comprehend in today’s era of basketball where 3-point shooting is increasingly prominent and players putting up 40+ points in a single game has become a regular occurrence. MJ was really like that. 

Many people thought Michael Jordan’s accomplishments firmly cemented his name as the greatest basketball player of all time. Then the Cleveland Cavaliers drafted a kid from Akron first overall in the 2003 NBA Draft.

King James Version

LeBron James. This high school basketball phenom entered the league in 2003 and at 40 years-old, in his 22nd season, continues to elevate the game of basketball to new heights. Some highlights from LeBron’s active career include:

• NBA All-Time Leading Scorer

• Only player to achieve a career triple-double (40,000+ Points; 10,000+ Rebounds; 10,000+ Assists)

• 4x NBA Champion

• 4x Most Valuable Player

• 20x NBA All-Star

• 13x All-NBA First Team

• Average 27.0 ppg

Those are the stats of a very good basketball player. Perhaps the best ever. 

And to be clear, LeBron has been at it so long that a baby born on the day he was drafted could graduate from college before his current NBA season ends.The odds of this happening are good if the Lakers can get enough help for LeBron and AD…insanity.

GOAT, My Goodness!

Too many of you are in your feelings because you think I just took a shot at your favorite player. You probably took a side, or maybe you already had. In the process you minimized the person’s greatness or added asterisks to it in order to defend your position. This is the problem.

The most common usage of GOAT is a title reserved for one person. THE Greatest of All Time. We’ve taken the zero-sum aspect of sports too far. For someone to win this fight, the other one has to lose.

This is especially challenging when greatness is such a subjective metric. It’s unlikely the sports world will come to terms on an objective standard, much less agree on who stands above the rest. How do you measure it? Championships? Individual accolades? Points? In a career or compared to peers? 

Bill Russell has the most championships. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar won the most MVPs. LeBron James has the most points and is still adding to his career total. Michael Jordan scored more points than any of his peers in the NBA a record 10 times.

Whose legacy should be pushed aside here? 

Zero-sum GOAT conversations make it impossible to truly appreciate the greatness we’re witnessing in the moment. For example, Patrick Mahomes is in his 7th year as a starting NFL quarterback and has already passed Joe Montana to hold the record for second-most playoff wins in NFL history. 

Let that sink in. Joe Montana, a first-ballot Hall of Fame quarterback, played in the NFL for 16 seasons. It’s taken Patrick Mahomes less than half the time to be better in the playoffs (and possibly tie him for Super Bowl wins). However, because of zero-sum GOAT conversations and comparisons to Tom Brady, the greatness of Patrick Mahomes is unfairly diminished. When speaking about Patrick Mahomes, commentators will usually say something like “Patrick is great BUT he has to get 4 more rings to be the GOAT. He doesn’t have Tom’s longevity.”

Comments like this ignore the consistency and efficiency of Mahomes that have already made him one of the greatest to ever play the game relatively early on in his career.

Life would be simpler if we could all just accept the proof our eyes are seeing. There has not been a quarterback like Patrick Mahomes. Why wait to acknowledge the uniqueness of his athleticism or nauseating ability to win consistently in gotta-have-it situations until after Mahomes retires? 

We’re witnessing greatness now. Not only is life more fun in the present, but waiting until it’s all over means you’re choosing to be the old head who’s stuck in the past. Everyone says they don’t want to be that dude sitting in the corner of the barbershop yelling about how “the league” has gotten soft and yet...

So where do we go from here? 

Emperors and Mountains

A better way forward is to treat GOATs like Roman emperors, Caesar. 

• We acknowledge their undeniable dominance in their era.

• Record the critical details and unique stats.

• In posterity we discuss both the merits and shortcomings of their legacy.

GOAT could bestow membership as one in a class of people who are revered for reaching the pinnacle of excellence in their respective fields. As with the Romans, there would only be one GOAT at a time, with rare exceptions. And no Caesar was more or less Caesar because of others before or after him. The same would be true for GOATs. Only one playing in the league at a time. This was my fix until I heard Kevin Durant on the subject. 

Sitting down to reflect with LeBron James and Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant said he views greatness like Mountains.

• Greatness takes time to establish.

• Once it’s achieved, true greatness is nearly impossible to erase.

• The existence of one person’s greatness doesn’t diminish or threaten the existence of someone else’s.

• Just because you can’t appreciate the potential of someone’s greatness, doesn’t mean it’s not there. 

This is major game from the Slim Reaper. And I think it’s the right approach. I like the mountain analogy because of the emphasis on independence. Greatness is self-assured and unhindered by the existence of others. In fact, others pushing against it causes greatness to rise to even higher heights. I think we should go with this framing on GOATs since it’s coming from the #8 all-time leading scorer in the NBA. It takes one to know one, right?

This means the question we ask shouldn’t be ‘Who is the GOAT?’ but instead ‘Who is your GOAT?’

Assuming there was some logic put into the response, there’s not really a wrong answer. Your GOAT could be: Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Serena Williams, Billie Jean King, Simone Biles, Michael Jackson, or even Beyoncé.

The possibilities are endless in this brave new world. Let’s agree to stop being the folks yelling stats at each other and having the same, tired debate for the umpteenth time. It’s OK to have different answers.

So…who is my GOAT? Isn’t it obv1ou5?