Scottie Pippen Tells Stephen A. Smith LeBron James Won NBA Title Without Help

Marcio Jose Sanchez/Associated Press

Chicago Bulls legend Scottie Pippen expressed a controversial opinion regarding LeBron James on Friday.

Pippen took to Twitter and tweeted to ESPN First Take host Stephen A. Smith that LeBron “won a championship without any help.”

Smith emphatically shot down Pippen’s notion in response:

Pippen’s tweet came after a debate Smith and Max Kellerman had on First Take regarding whether Brooklyn Nets star Kevin Durant should have fired back at Pippen after Pippen expressed his belief that LeBron is better at elevating his teammates than KD:

James has four NBA titles to his credit, winning two with the Miami Heat, one with the Cleveland Cavaliers and one with the Los Angeles Lakers.

While LeBron was the driving force behind all of those title teams, he had one or more stars alongside him on each of those teams as well.

James is credited with starting the “superteam” trend, as he left the Cavs to sign with the Heat in 2010. LeBron joined forces with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh, and together they reached four consecutive NBA Finals, winning championships in 2012 and 2013.

Bosh was recently elected to the Hall of Fame, and D-Wade is a surefire Hall of Famer as well, meaning James had no shortage of on-court support in South Beach.

James left Miami and re-signed with the Cavaliers in 2014, and he proceeded to go to four more NBA Finals in a row.

LeBron led the Cavs to their first and only NBA championship in 2016 while flanked by a pair of All-Stars in Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love.

Irving especially came up huge during the 2016 playoffs, averaging 27.1 points per game in the Finals, including a 41-point game in Game 5 with the Cavaliers trailing the series 3-1 and hitting the game-winning shot in Game 7.

LeBron’s fourth NBA championship came last season with the Lakers, as he and Anthony Davis carried L.A. through the playoffs.

It can be argued that James had less collective help last year than on any of his other title teams, but AD was essentially his equal in averaging 27.7 points, 9.7 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 1.4 blocks per game during the playoffs.

There is no denying that James is an all-time great who could go down as the best ever with a couple more championships, but the numbers suggest it isn’t accurate to say he won any titles without help from other superstar players.