Gary Payton: Tough Battle vs. LeBron and the Cavaliers (2004, 30 points)

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Gary Payton scored 30 points on an efficient 12-20 shooting and dished out 6 assists. Some rare highlight from Payton's lone season with the Lakers. Payton not only took it to the rim with LeBron guarding him, he also hounded LeBron on the defensive end. Gary Payton's defense forced James into some long scoring droughts in the game. Shaquille O'Neal had a game high 37 points, and the Lakers won the game in OT without Kobe Bryant.
Gary Payton scored 12 points in the 1st quarter, and ran the offense in overtime as the Lakers jumped out front and never looked back in OT. 23 of his 30 points are shown due to espn classic cutting out some parts of the game.
Another Father's Day Upload showcasing my Dad's favorite player...the one and only glove.

[@Theterminato2013]

No point guard has ever guard and played defense on Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, and Lebron James as well as Gary Payton did. Gary Payton, the best all around defensive point guard in nba history.

[@melvinpowelljr.3368]

Classic!....🏀 The Glove was way more than all talk Wow!

[@dagameplayer]

96 Sonics would definitely beat any Lebron team. Peyton and Kemp take turns guarding Lebron while they also get their points, and also have multiple 3 point shooters in Detlef, Hawkins and Perkins to kick it out to. It would be just like when the Spurs and Warriors killed his team with those 3's.

[@PhilPeeVa]

That 70 win Warrior team was bogus

[@TheAstuteGoy]

Phil Pegram better than any team MJ ever faced in the finals LMAOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[@dagameplayer]

@@TheAstuteGoy all that laughing your ass off doesn't make any of your argument fact, but it makes you look like a clown. Payton always guarded the teams best player, so like he did in this video in 2004, he would guard Lebron with the 96 team as well. You arrogant Warrior fans are a trip acting like they and Lebron can run over everyone in history just because of some 70 win record against teams of their own era.

[@jahleelx9270]

@UCF5SKiHJKdD4ATdCNwWZojQ bro you're an idiot if u think Gary Payton can guard prime lebron. This is 18 year old lebron and he dropped 32.

[@tooBlessed847]

.........LOL!!! I forgot how HILARIOUS Bill Walton used to be in commentating that man literally said the Payton was "TOURCHING" LeBron James@1:22 ............LOL!!

[@tooBlessed847]

.............and you could tell by the body language of Payton that he was torching the competition because he would run back hunched over......like he was sneaking around or something.....just clowning......lol!!

[@chrisburns8562]

He was lol 😂

[@gerdhg01]

all i seen was GP swat lebron at 2:09 and that was enough for me lol

[@user-ks8kn4hx8q]

2:09-2:10 Gary Payton had a chasedown on LeBron??!! 😮

[@junney1]

gary payton wow what a movement he has

[@Armando316]

Gary Payton SCHOOLED Lebron James.

[@TheStatisfiedOne]

yeah he did schooled a 18 year old lebron and he still had 32 this game, wouldve been interesting to do it on 27 year old lebron

[@stupidnamewaster]

Yes he did, that's what great veteran players always do to rookies. Lebron still had a pretty good game for a rookie.

[@royceg3375]

Witch is why it's almost more impressive payton did this. He wasn't even close to his prime when he was in LA.

[@kalealennis3515]

+Agent of Chaos just like Gary Payton on mj

[@AgentJ2007]

Payton wasn't even close to his prime. He's 35 years old at this stage.

[@xxpunjabxx9892292]

My favorite player schooling lebron, Great upload KarlMolowned32

[@tooBlessed847]

The Lakers we're ridiculous deep.......I didn't know that they had Horace Grant in the ball club in that 03-04 season; I mean that was Malone's replacement from the bench??!! Had Payton continued this level of play through out or at least in the playoffs there should of been no reason why they had lost not even more than two game in the entire playoffs of 04 including the Finals.

[@pman8478]

By the finals sadly Phil wasn't giving payton any post ups or even pick and roll stuff which are how he was doing so well here. Hes a great coach but I think that year he didnt do a great job with their offense, instead of letting them play the way they had he ran the offense through a 40 year old karl malone and tried to force Gary into Derek Fishers role.

[@jaymoney6233]

If GP wasn't in the triangle and could play his traditional style of ball...he puts up 20 ppg that year and probably wins a ring

[@ilfusarrista1943]

Facts, i always thought that, i thought i was the only one who realized it. It was that ridicolous triangle offense that ruined those Lakers. You have 4 stars, you cannot play the triangle offense! When they were running and gunning at the start of the season they were blowing out every team and all the 4 stars were scoring between 17-20 ppg, with GP running the show

[@AllPureSkill]

Those oldschool LeBron dunks gotdamn

[@KM-mq1nv]

Best video ever.

[@TheStatisfiedOne]

a 18 year old lebron still had 32 points this game

[@TheSands83]

18? He turned 20 a few weeks later

[@lxvar5026]

19*

[@DaRealNaga]

I forgot all about this game, Payton handed it to lebron.

[@chitownkidd33]

Can you upload Lebron's FG from this game?

[@guanswims]

Dad's favorite player is Chauncey haha

[@pj100003]

My dad's favorite player is Larry Bird lol.
Mine is LeBron.