LeBron James is widely considered to be the best NBA player in the game today, but that doesn't mean that teams would pick him No. 1 if they were starting a franchise from scratch.
As great as James is, he's now 30 years old and entering his 13th professional season. Because of these and other factors, a survey of the league's general managers came back with both Anthony Davis and Kevin Durant as players they'd want ahead of James if creating a team today.
Davis is the logical choice, so it's no surprise he garnered 86.2 percent of the vote. He's a dominant two-way player who averaged 24.4 points and 10.2 rebounds last year, and led the league in blocked shots in each of the past two seasons. More importantly, Davis is just 22 years old entering his fourth NBA season, which undoubtedly makes him the better long-term selection.
If LeBron is looking for some positive news to come out of this survey, there's plenty to be found. More than half of the league's general managers believe the Cavaliers will win the title this season, and almost 40 percent of them believe that James will finish the year by taking home MVP honors.
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