Seeing is believing after LeBron James made history… so put your phones DOWN! 

It was the shot that breathed new life into an old debate and simultaneously gave the older of heart a reason to yell at newer clouds.

You will have probably seen the pictures by now — they were side by side in these pages and elsewhere on Thursday.

One shows Michael Jordan’s last dance with the Chicago Bulls 25 years ago and the jump shot that bookended a remarkable body of work. The other is of Lebron James, in a similar pose for the same outcome, and with it more points than any bouncer of a basketball in history.

The difference between those players, and indeed their respective levels of greatness, is better discussed by the more informed. 

But the difference in their settings is easier to arbitrate, given the earlier of those images captured what it once meant to watch a sporting wonder do wondrous things, and the latter is a modern image of countless faces squinting into their camera phones.

LeBron James’ big moment after becoming the NBA’s highest points scorer was accompanied by a horde of fans recording on their camera phones

25 years ago, a similar shot showed Michael Jordan in his last dance with Chicago Bulls as fans watched on in amazement

Scanning that James picture for fans living in a big sporting moment is to see only 20 or so out of hundreds with their eyes on the flesh and an uncluttered, unfiltered experience of history.

Beyond Phil Knight, the white-haired man in the front row and otherwise known as the founder of Nike, those without phone in hand are awfully hard to spot. It is a little like a game of Where’s Wally, were there not an overwhelming temptation to suggest the wallies make up the majority.

Obviously that is a touch dour. A bit blind to the way things are. And, besides, camera phones are brilliant. But then so is sport.

Not always — too many plans for Super Leagues in football, too many with a fondness for cartel bosses in boxing, too many chemicals in athletics, cycling and across the board, too many blind eyes to beheadings and bonesaws, too many muppets in suits.

Memory space on a mobile is fine for the day-to-day stuff – but real memories are far more satisfying 

The feeling you are seeing something special – like Emma Raducanu’s fairytale triumph at the US Open – cannot be replicated 

But we endure all that and all the less sinister mundanities because sport becomes great through its greatest moments, and of those it is the rareness that elevates. That feeling you are seeing something today that will not be replicated tomorrow, next month or maybe ever.

It is Bolt running 9.58sec. Nadal beating Federer in five in the darkness on Centre Court in 2008. Messi holding the World Cup. Chloe Kelly stabbing at the loose ball. Bubba Watson from the trees at Augusta in 2012, Seve from the car park, Ali from the ropes, Emma Raducanu from nowhere, Aguero. A jump shot by a living legend.

Memory space on a mobile is fine for the day-to-day stuff. Memories burned into the brain via the sights of a special split-second in time will always feel far better and offer a more satisfying picture.