Derek Fisher has pushed back hard after LeBron James was left out of a top-10 list of the greatest Lakers of all time.
The five-time champion was a guest on The Joint Venture Show alongside Craig Carton and Lil Wayne.
Carton ranked Fisher 10th but left James out of his top 10.
When asked why, Carton said: ‘Overall, it’s fair. I just LeBron’s been here eight years, bro. Like he’s without a championship.’
Fisher was not having it.
Photo by Luke Hales/Getty ImagesDerek Fisher pushes back after LeBron James is left outside Lakers top 10‘No, he won the championship in 2020,’ Fisher responded.
He then went through the league’s recent champions to make his point. Steph Curry is the only player with two titles in the last eight seasons as the face of a team. Jokic has one, Kawhi
Leonard has one, Giannis Antetokounmpo has one and SGA has one in Oklahoma City.
‘So why are we acting like LeBron hasn’t done something?’ Fisher asked. ‘Because he has one title in the last eight years, just like everybody else on that list I just said, except for Steph Curry.’
The 2020 title is where the debate always gets complicated. It was won inside the Orlando bubble after a four-month shutdown, with no fans and no home-court advantage. That has never sat right with some, and Daryl Morey said in 2025 that people around the league privately believed the championship would always carry an asterisk.
The numbers tell a different story, though. The Lakers were the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference, went 16-5 through the postseason and never lost consecutive playoff games. They beat Portland, Houston and Denver 4-1 before taking the Finals 4-2 against Miami.
Photo by Sean M. Haffey/Getty ImagesJames averaged 29.8 points, 11.8 rebounds and 8.5 assists in that series while shooting 59.1% from the field. He was a unanimous Finals MVP, and it was his first title with the Lakers after walking into a franchise that had missed the playoffs for six straight seasons.
Fisher’s point comes down to consistency. One title is enough to define the recent legacies of Jokic, Giannis, Kawhi and Gilgeous-Alexander. The same standard should apply to LeBron, then.
That ring is part of the record with everything it took to win it.
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