Likely to Surpass Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in Elite Quest, 2x Champ’s 1 Desire Fuels Prospect of Spot in NBA List

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was one of the first to develop a move and perfect it so that it was almost impossible for the opposition to stop him. Kareem had his sky hook. This led to him becoming the scoring leader in the NBA in 1984. Following his 20-year career, he has scored 38,387 points. He had pushed the scoring limits so far ahead by the time he retired in 1989. The record he set stood still until 2023. For 34 years, no one came close until LeBron James broke the record earlier this year, in February.

Over the years, there have been many players in the NBA who have displayed exceptional scoring prowess. But is there someone in the NBA who can realistically break this record?

Who in the NBA can catch up to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar?

Currently, there are a few youngsters in the NBA who have the scoring averages to catch up to this record. Players like Luka Doncic and Jayson Tatum are at the top of that list. The only thing that stands between them is having durability and longevity, like LeBron and Kareem, to be on top of your game for almost two decades.

But a 35-year-old who has a chance of breaking this record and is currently 12th on the all-time scoring list is Kevin Durant. He still has a long way to go before catching Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. But is it realistic for him to go for it?

Durant currently has 26,949 points in 988 games. He is 11,440 points away from catching Kareem. With a scoring average of 27.3 that he has had for his whole life, he would need to play another 419 games to break the record. This means he has to play until the age of 40 to do so.

This also means he would tie Vince Carter’s playing career record of 22 seasons. But Durant recently revealed in an interview with the Ringer that he wants to keep playing until he cannot play. With words like that, there is always a possibility that Durant just might be the next person to break the record.

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Kevin Durant will make a huge jump this season

Durant needs another three seasons of injury-free games to surpass Michael Jordan. But this season, with his scoring average, Durant should be able to rank up a few spots and get to the 8th position, overtaking Shaquille O’Neal, who has 28596. He would need to play around 60 games to reach that mark.

Kevin Durant has the skills to do it. Even though he had an Achilles injury and missed an entire year, Durant has returned like he has not lost a step. There has been no decrease in his scoring averages, but instead, his true shooting percentage went up after the injury.

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Do you think Durant can reach Kareem’s record? Let us know in the comments!