Everyone else from the 2003 NBA Draft grew old. LeBron James somehow hasn’t

Even at 41, LeBron James is leading the Los Angeles Lakers in minutes played, scoring and assists in this postseason. (Photo by Joshua Gateley/Getty Images)

(Joshua Gateley via Getty Images)

With Luka Doncic sidelined by a hamstring injury and Austin Reaves unavailable for the opening four games of the series, James carried the Los Angeles Lakers past the younger, more athletic Houston Rockets in the opening round of the playoffs. The NBA’s most grizzled veteran then led all scorers with 27 points on Tuesday night as the underdog Lakers opened the Western Conference semifinals with a 108-90 loss to reigning champion Oklahoma City.

“The man has made close to $580 million in contract money and he's still grinding like an undrafted rookie,” said Troy Bell, the 16th overall pick in the 2003 draft.

Or as Hayes puts it, “We've never seen a player at this age have this type of impact. I know he's not going to play forever, but it damn sure feels like it.”

For some 2003 draftees, their introduction to James came via Michael Jordan, of all people. Each summer, Jordan invited an assortment of rising stars to serve as instructors at his Flight School camp in Santa Barbara, Calif. Among those who received invitations to the 2002 edition were an assortment of top college prospects and a high school phenom who Sports Illustrated had already anointed “The Chosen One.”

At the end of the first day of camp, the instructors split into two teams and treated the campers to a show. Early in that pickup game, 6-foot-11 Minnesota Golden Gophers forward Rick Rickert found himself in an unenviable position — on an island trying to slide his feet to prevent a 17-year-old James from blowing past him to the rim.

At first, Rickert was confident. He showed up to Minnesota as a prized recruit and validated the hype by winning Big Ten freshman of the year honors. Why would Rickert be scared to check some high school hotshot two years younger than him? Then James got Rickert off balance and shook free of him with a step-back dribble. The way Rickert remembers it, the separation was so chasm-like that he couldn’t even contest James’ shot.

“I’m standing in the lane and now this dude’s at the 3-point line,” said Rickert, who nine months later would become the 55th pick in the 2003 NBA draft. “I might be exaggerating a little bit, but that’s what it felt like. I'm just sitting there like, ‘Holy crap, I wasn't expecting that.’”

It wasn’t long before James also began leaving NBA players gobsmacked. The endlessly hyped teenager became the NBA’s rookie of the year after averaging more than 20 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists during his debut season.

By 2005, James made his first of 22 consecutive NBA all-star teams. By 2007, James dragged a pedestrian Cleveland Cavaliers roster to the first of his 10 career NBA Finals appearances. Before long, James overtook Kobe Bryant as the NBA’s best player and biggest superstar and began amassing a résumé rivaled only by Jordan. No one has ever entered the NBA with more buildup than James. And yet, if anything, James exceeded expectations.

At the same time that James was ascending the NBA’s all-time scoring chart and refusing to give in to the Golden State Warriors dynasty, other luminaries from the 2003 NBA Draft class began showing their age.

Spinal injuries cut short point guard TJ Ford’s NBA career in 2012. Severe knee injuries and an unflattering viral video sent Josh Howard tumbling out of the NBA in 2012 and forced the former all-star to stop pursuing basketball in 2014. From 2016 to 2019, Kirk Hinrich, Mo Williams, David West, Nick Collison, Kendrick Perkins and James’ former Miami Heat co-stars Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh each also announced their retirements. When Carmelo Anthony couldn’t find an NBA team willing to offer him a contract before the 2022-23 season, James became the final 2003 draft pick still active.

Last March, James became the NBA’s ultimate ironman, breaking Hall of Fame center Robert Parish’s record for career games played. He now has appeared in 1,622 regular-season games and another 299 playoff games, the equivalent of nearly another four full seasons.

“He’s an anomaly,” Rickert said. “We might not see anyone like him for a long, long time.”

Credit James’ unprecedented longevity to his discipline taking care of his body. He devotes long hours every day to preparation, strength and conditioning and recovery.

It starts the first 6 to 8 weeks of the offseason when James goes out of his way not to touch a basketball. He instead spends his time doing yoga, pilates, stretching, massages, anything he can do to rejuvenate his body.

For James, the latter half of the offseason is all about ramping up his conditioning, sharpening his skills and getting his mind right. There’s no substitute for logging 38 minutes in an NBA game, but James tries to get himself as close to game shape as possible.

Rest, hydration and nutrition are key for James in-season. He aims for 8-10 hours of sleep per day. He totes around a 1 gallon jug of water and downs a couple of those by the time he goes to bed at night. A private chef helps ensure that his meals are balanced and loaded with lean proteins, fruits and vegetables.

Chocolate chip cookies and ice cream are James’ vices, he admitted last year on the Mind the Game Podcast with Steve Nash, but even when he cheats, he’s purposeful about it.

When Carmelo Anthony (left) retired, it left LeBron James as the only player still active from the 2003 NBA Draft. (Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images)

(Jamie Squire via Getty Images)

“I have to get the dairy-free ice cream and the low-fat, gluten-free cookies,” James said. “My daughter goes in [the freezer]. She gets her vanilla bean ice cream with extra cream. I’ll be looking at it like, ‘Damn, that looks so good.’”

Painstaking preparation has enabled James to play at a high level into his 40s, but he is only human. There are times when he’ll get out of bed the morning after a game with an aching back, sore ankles and heavy legs.

As James admitted to Nash, “Those are the moments I’m like, ‘Bron, what the hell are you still doing out here? What the f— are you doing?”

To Bell, what James is doing is unfathomable. The former two-time Big East player of the year at Boston College knows firsthand how tough it is to even play at a high level into your mid-30s.

At the end of his 13th season of professional basketball, Bell remembers dialing his agent and revealing that he was ready to retire. He had played in six different countries and on three different continents. His surgically repaired knees ached and his stiff back felt like it was made of rusty iron.

“Please don’t reach out to me about another job because I’ve never been good at turning down good contracts,” Bell instructed his agent. “I have to transition to being a normal working person because my body can’t do this anymore.”

While Bell has started a second life as a high school basketball coach in his native Minnesota, James keeps adding to his unparalleled NBA résumé. He surpassed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the NBA’s all-time leading scorer three years ago. A year later, he became the first NBA player to play alongside his own son.

James scored 10 or more points in 1,297 straight games from January 6, 2007, to December 4, 2025. Then he ended that streak in the most fitting possible way earlier this season, driving and kicking to an open Rui Hachimura in the left corner for a buzzer-beating 3-pointer rather than forcing a shot to try to reach 10 points.

It has been 23 years since Bell first met James before they both became first-round picks in the 2003 NBA Draft. How James’ career has unfolded since then is so remarkable that Bell likens it to an unrealistic movie script.

Said Bell, “If they would have given all of us a pen and paper in 2003 and had every single one of us write down our ideal NBA career, none of us would have been able to write down anything better than what he's currently living.”