The Los Angeles Lakers believed that their relationship with the Denver Nuggets would be different this season after losing to them handily in the Western Conference Finals the previous year. However, it seems they’re embracing reality after the Nuggets won convincingly again on Saturday night, ruining the game where LeBron James became the first player in NBA history to collect 40,000 points.

When Nikola Jokić and his Nuggets are this good, nobody in the NBA can stop them.

Following Jokić’s impressive performance of 35 points, 10 rebounds, and seven assists in Denver’s eighth straight victory (!) against Los Angeles, James expressed his undying admiration for the big man’s supremacy without holding back. He went one further, conceding Jokić’s all-time transcendence as defeated:

LeBron on if Nikola Jokic had a response as of yet: “No. None exist.”

I get the impression that this comment goes beyond what Jokić and the Nuggets have done to James’ Lakers in the previous 18 months. While they aim for back-to-back championships, James seems to be acknowledging that the current champs have been the league’s undeniable elite. Jokić is leading the charge, and the importance of his particularly inspiring communication to his teammates around two weeks ago is beginning to accumulate.

Since the All-Star break, the Nuggets have been dominating everyone with a six-game winning run. They may аrgue that they have been coasting for the majority of the season, while young teams like the Oklahoma City Thunder and Minnesota Timberwolves compete at the top of the West rankings. They are once again within striking distance of the top seed after a single, prolonged period of concentration.

That’s mostly because of Jokić’s unique genius. Since the break, he has recorded four triple-doubles, including almost three games in a row of 15-15-15! and simply put on a dominate scoring and playmaking display, taking a legendary defender like Anthony Davis behind the woodshed.

Jokić is virtually in playoff mode, and the Nuggets’ other players have adopted a same approach. James, being an all-time great who has spent a great deal of time in this zone, is probably well aware of another fact: the NBA as a whole should be terrifieԀ that Jokić and the Nuggets are finally clicking.

Mics caught how Nikola Jokic hilariously teased LeBron James before he scored 40,000 points

LeBron James and Nikola Jokić share a great deal of respect for each other as two of the greatest players of all time. That’s why, after Saturday night’s overwhelming victory for Denver, James came to terms with the fact that the defending champion Denver Nuggets are just invincible when they’re playing at their best. It’s also the reason why Jamal Murray, Jokić’s jogging partner, said the Nuggets take every game against the Lakers so seriously that it ruins their celebrations: they really value their status in the basketball world. Jokić also has enough self-awareness to know when history is unavoidable. James needed something before to the Lakers’ game against the Nuggets.