Meet the newest basket-bald star — LebBron James.
Like his idol Michael Jordan before him, James has shaved his head in a pre-emptive strike against his receding hairline and patchy pate.
James announced on Instagram Thursday that he finally decided to go full-on bald.
“Bald head nut!!,” read the caption on the 21-second video. “#IHearEmPrayingOnMyDownfall #CantStopWontStop #striveforgreatness.”
James’ move comes after the basketball world long mocked his thinning hair. Sporting News even put a timeline together to chronicle his hairline’s gradual departure from the forefront of his dome to King James’s crown.
But James was in on the joke the whole time. During the NBA playoffs last month, James joked that he passed Jordan as the all-time leading scorer in the playoffs, but had not yet passed him follicularly.
“I didn’t go bald like Mike, but I’m getting there,” he said.
Once the playoffs were over, James took the matter into his own (or his barber’s) hands — setting the Internet aflame.
“Our Gregorian calendar no longer has BC (Before Christ) & AD (Anno Domini) years. It’s now year 0 BL (Bald LeBron),” tweeted @browns_fan_pos.
“Oh LeBron bald? ITS lit. Cavs winning the chip next year,” added @DVDJXX.
James’ Cleveland Cavaliers lost the NBA title to the Golden State Warriors earlier this month, but Steph Curry and comany have yet to face a Bald ‘Bron.
And marketers will likely have a field day with James’s new look.
“Michael Jordan turned his own hair loss into the biggest thing since double-sided toupee tape” by shaving his head, author Gersh Kuntzman wrote in his 2001 book, “Hair: Mankind’s Historic Quest to End Baldness.”
