The crew at Gil's Arena weighed in on Golden State Warriors head coach Steve Kerr's recent suggestion to shorten the NBA season by 10 games to help prevent player injuries. According to Gilbert Arenas , injuries shouldn't be a reason, since most injuries players suffer today are non-contact, so they're not related to playing games.
In another discussion point on the topic, Arenas argued that if the NBA shortens its regular season by 10 games, breaking many all-time records would be very difficult, if not impossible, because players would have to stay in the league longer to do so.
"If you're talking about taking away 10 fewer games, then history is frozen," he added . Someone with 10 fewer games has to catch LeBron in scoring? If they did that, LeBron James and Kareem's record would never be broken. You can't do it. Both those guys played for 20 years. That means you have to play for at least 25 years. Breaking any record is gonna be much harder."
Gil used the NBA's all-time scoring list as an example. He mentioned that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar set the record by playing up to age 42 and completing 20 NBA seasons. That record stood for almost four decades before LeBron James shattered it in 2023, also in his 20th NBA season at 38.
But while Kareem retired after Year 20, LeBron has continued to play. Now in his 23rd season and the league's oldest player, the 41-year-old James has padded his career points total to over 43,000.
With Bron still averaging an unbelievable 21.3 points per game at this stage of his career, Arenas says that it's very difficult to match LBJ's longevity and consistency. Now what more for 10 fewer games per season?
"Think about LeBron. He's 20 years old, and he was dominant from the beginning. So you're saying someone with 10 fewer games has to catch LeBron in scoring? He has to play what, 29 or 30 years? You can't play 29- 30 years. No, you can't," Gil added.
The closest to catching LeBron at the top of the NBA scoring mountain is Kevin Durant , who is 38 years old and in No.8 on the top all-time scorers leaderboard. But with KD close to 11,000 points behind, he would have to play five-plus seasons more without missing a single regular-season game to catch LBJ.
Durant isn't even thinking about overtaking Kareem at No.2.
"268 games to catch Kareem? What's the average?" Durant remarked . "Goddamn, I don't know if I can get 25 a game for 270 more games… I never want to say never, but those dudes set the bar so high."
"I think just about the top three or four, you need to play 20 years in the league and still be at that level for 15 to 20 years. If I end up there, it's cool. If not, I just want to be around and be in the league," he added.
During that same interview, KD said that LeBron's record is impossible to break. For one of the league's greatest scorers of all time to say that just proves Gil's point.
This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Mar 17, 2026, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
