Honestly, GOAT is kind of a silly conversation because basketball has changed so much from era to era. If we're going real old school, might as well just give it to Wilt for putting up 2k numbers in real life. Nobody is ever having a 50 point or 27 rebound season again. Those records will never be broken. Should probably be more invested in who was the best player of each decade instead.
I would not call it psychotic but just an unhealthy dose of competitiveness and syndrome of not able to lose. I was lucky to have witnessed Jordan's era.
In regards to recent developments with LeBron, I see them as a net zero in his overall argument at best. It just seems dumb to say, look at what he's doing at 38, carrying his team, top 5, best ever at 38 (debatable), and turn around and say, well, he's 38, can't expect him to carry a team anymore.
The game has evolved so much since Jordan's time. Back then it was a game played by US players. Now it's a game played by players from around the world. The best 4 players in today's NBA are foreign -- Jokic, Giannis, Embiid, and Doncic. Would they have been playing in the NBA during Jordan's time? Lebron's peak performance was around 20 years after that of Jordan's... think about how much the NBA has evolved over that time. It would be like comparing a 1990's player to a player from the 60's or 70's. It's a totally different game with vastly superior players today.
Kareem couldn't do anything without past prime -matured past stat padding Oscar Robertson(at the time top 10 all time-goat to many of his generation-still the goat to Kareem) and Magic Johnson(goat to most of his generation). Kareem did what? Missed the playoffs twice and lost in the first without them, but still had 2 all stars too. Kareem got smoked by HOF bigs and All Star bigs left and right through his career. Magic kept him relevant for that decade. Magic surpassed Kareem in the GOAT conversation LONG before Jordan started winning and everyone said he would never win because scoring champ/guards never win without a dominant big. Kareem has been part of the LeNarrative push ever since Bron started inching closer to the scoring title as a tool to prop Bron up. "Kareem is the GOAT because he's the scoring champ." "1.Kareem 2. LeBron 3. MJ" "1. Kareem 2. MJ 3. LeBron." All after decades of no one ever talking about Kareem. All of that talk so that Bron passing him would now mean he's the greatest. No one bought it but you bronsexuals. LeBron and Kareem have been to 10 finals in over 2 decades! GOATS! Well Magic went to1 less in half the time. The truth is Bron barely just edges out Magic due to his Miami days defense and some days i personally don't know if i'd take him over Bird who, yes, is better than Magic both offensively and defensively and the 2 advantages Magic has over Bird-#1) IQ/Passing is just an edge if any due to #2) Magic was just more athletic for the run n gun style to bunch up assists-though his half court is also still the best. Bron and Magic careers spent with stacked teams in weak conferences parallels well, but Kareem is nothing but big numbers without his star perimeter help feeding him-just like Shaq. It's no question combining their advantages with all timer perimeter help boosts them even higher and makes for nearly unbeatable teams. Hakeem never had that advantage and on the flip side Michael never had that advantage. Since someone else already compiled the argument against Kareem, i'll just post it here, but i already knew how overrated he was and Hakeem is the greatest Center of all time. Give Hakeem the help LeBron has had through his career and Hakeem probably has a better argument over MJ than LeBron. http://nobodytouchesjordan.blogspot.com/2015/10/section-23-hakeem-olajuwon-greatest.html http://nobodytouchesjordan.blogspot.com/2015/01/section-17-jordan-and-hakeem-vs-kareem.html
And to another point about Magic surpassing Kareems legacy so fast? Because longevity is respected, but doing more in such a short time span easily trumps it. That's basically the only argument for LeBron over MJ-longevity and we saw with our own eyes that argument in reverse easily won by Magic vs Kareem. Now were supposed to believe the flip side works for LeBron's favor. I'll welcome a friendly argument if only because at least LeBron didn't need to be spoon fed like Kareem, but they both needed to stack the deck with still too many failures once at the top of their powers.
While this is true. Arguments can be put together. Wilt had peers calling him a stat padding loser and in big games against HOF center opponents, he like Kareem also came up small more times than not. He was so into his stats that teammates and peers called him out on his coming up small in big games due to his record of never fouling out. Once he got 4 fouls, he played completely different so he wouldn't foul out even in the biggest playoff games. He's a career playoff choker and while he had less help overall than Russell and Kareem and Shaq, he choked and came up small even when he got the help. Despite era, Bill Russell, while having his FG% and efficiency and lack of scoring and stacked HOF team can be an argument against-he deserves his spot at #2 behind Hakeem. Bill actually stepped up big in scoring and efficiency and overall game in the Finals showing he could if he wanted to go that route.
Describe to me what they are vastly superior in? Positionally compared. Then think about what they also lost. The game is vastly different. 100% That does not mean they are vastly superior to a player skilled for their era. -The league has become vastly better at 3pt shooting. Correct. Once the 3pt became welcomed into the gmae as a real tool-the league as a whole took off including bigs who never shot the 3 ball before. Guys like Marc Gasol. Ibaka. Brook Lopez, etc. Proving that if you go take 90s players and tell them the 3 is the biggest part of the game and have them all train non step shooting techniques and reps. They would adapt just as the same. -Handling has improved. Correct. With an asterisk. Towards the end of the 90s with A.I. at the lead, carrying started to go uncalled. Even MJ noticeably started to cup the ball more than he had. Players take advantage of what they can get away with as they should. Today, uncalled traveling is commonplace. Players are carrying just to dribble up the court by themselves. Literally almost fully cupping the ball. In the 90s, they would look like they CAN'T dribble. All that cupping they are used to is b/c their era allows so much freedom of movement with the ball in their hands to get away with crazy looking advanced moves that 90s "couldn't possibly do." They could once they learned what they can get away with and started practicing the moves. Same argument for 60s players who were strictly forced to dribble palm down. -Bigger and stronger? Sure, at PG and SF position overall but others? They're smaller and thinner and getting hurt at alarming rates. People throw weight comps without using their eyes. Tons of 90s weights were never updated from the players college/rookie weights. NBA is a mess when it comes to proper measurements records. The eye test? C's were taller. PF's were much stronger looking. SF's were a bit shorter and thinner. SG's are still on avg the same and point guards became overall bigger. That's the change of the positonless game, but it is positions. It's really mostly PF-SF-SF/SG-SG-SG/PG. -Positionless bball has created vastly superior skill sets- For bigs who want to play like guards. Sure. You can't tell me the 90s bigs were not forced into a box and that many of them couldn't handle the ball if allowed. They wanted to. Their handles were appropriate for the era. THey would have evolved their handles to fit this era. Embiid showing he's a regular season player as he flops and spends his time int he perimeter playing like a guard and will never win until he starts dominating inside-exactly what Hakeem told him and Embiid instead insulted Hakeems intelligence. An era of disrespectful spoiled brats. Positionless ball created a bunch of soft, **** talkers who never back it up. In essence the 2 skills that are vastly superior in the era = Shooting. Proven can be trained by many in just 1 summer. Dribble. Our very own Hakeem coudln't dribble in the early days. By the 90s and on his own without the training with guards he'd afford today, he was crossing those bigs up and facing up. Shooting and Handles in a league that prioritizes shooting and allows freedom of handles are the 2 easiest skill sets for the older guys to adapt and learn. LOST from positionless ball? Post play. Post footwork. Post passing. Post entry passing. Inside-Outside tactics. 2x defensive post defenders-now usually 1 that's taken away from the basket resulting in easier way tot eh basket-90s players would have feasted that after careers learnign how to get past their perimeter defenders and then find creative ways to score around several giants camped in the paint. Boxing Out 2x defensive and offensive rebounding machines-we see how the game can still slow down and get more physical in the playoffs even in this inflated stat padding pace and space era. Those guys are huge difference makers. 90s teams could still bully ball the best teams today and i believe even without the training-drop them in and they can still shoot the 3 well enough to compete. Intimidation factor "Not in my house." "No more layups" was not a fake threat by tiny Dame Dolla and McCollum before continuing to give up tons of layups. It was a message sent with a physical play. "that's not basketball." Yes it is. As long as they're not trying to kill anyone or take them out the game. It can completely change the way the opponents game is being played and forced to beat you from the perimeter. Again-we see even the best shooting teams of all time today struggle to shoot in slower-more physical-grind it out games. 90s playoff teams would have a lot of these/most of these teams intimidated and shook.
Phew--imagine a modern NBA contender being transported back to, say, 1989 and going up against the Pistons with late 80s officiating. On paper, those Pistons teams look way less talented than a team like, say, this year's Celtics. Nobody scoring over 20 a game? How can you expect to contend like that?? But the modern Celtics would be obliterated. They would crumple like wet paper against that kind of physical play.
Era vs Era advantages. My point is great players adapt with enough time, but i do think reverse would be WAY harder. Sure, some guys wouldn't be around. Let's say 90s and below. It was a big man's NBA. That means for evry skilled HOF big, your team needed big bodies on the bench to throw at them. Many of those guys probably wouldn't be on a roster today, but still a lot would. They'd be guys like Boban, etc. Todays fans including players refuse to see how they'd adapt in reverse or make believe that these guys would continue to have all the same advantages and put up Wilt like numbers in the 80s and 90s. Scrubs bigs of today think they'd be Wilt in the 60s. Gilbert Arenas and JJ Reddick really think today's players can be dropped into the 60s and wear some flat footed converse all stars, learn all the rules including having the dribble like those players and end up looking as funny as the guys they make fun of. They could just spot up and shoot from the outside, i guess. Still only 2 points. Careful though. Those shots are idiotic to them. Miss a few, they're never passing it back to you. So after all the game adapting they would do, they'd also need to go out into a vastly different world with the (to them) pennies they'd make and get back to the grind and play 40+ min again and again and again with none of the R&R they're used to or advanced in medicine/supplements/recovery. I remember Gilbert was asked that and he just does what he and the new media do and just started yelling louder "NO! THey gotta play in MY era!"
Huh??? So by that logic MJ never really did anything and kept getting smoked left and right before Pippen and Phil Jackson came. Pippen is also a HOF wing and Def the best sf during the entire MJ era. If you gonna penalize Kareem for having HOF pg than Jordan never won a ring or even got to NBA finals without Pippen. Wasn't he getting owned by Pistons again and again before he had help? If the Bulls GM was a dumb one MJ would never have been the goat cuz he wouldn't even be able to get past Pistons. MJ stans like you are so weird. You act like MJ beat up every opponent singlehandedly and the rules only apply to everyone else except MJ. Nobody can be helped by their HOF teammates? Ok, except let's forget MJ's Bulls were so strong they resched ECF without him. Meanwhile Cavs got Kyrie when Lebron left but ok let's just gloss over all that Kareem missing playoffs is a big deal but MJ quitting basketball and being a scrub in baseball isn't a big deal lol. I mean I take the guy who's on the court playing. Whenever somebody says MJ or Magic achieved more with less this is literally performance punish you are punishing Lebron and Kareem cuz they were able to stay in the NBA more years. Meanwhile MJ and Magic who had truncated careers are rewarded because they only played in their prime.
Doubt it. It's kinda like the Scalabrine effect. Brian Scalabrine looks like a scrub on the NBA but he looks like a superstar vs college players. Same thing would happen if you take a modern team and put it back in 1980s. That's partly cuz of tech and partly cuz of globalization. Nba players in 80s were just mostly just best in the US now nba players are best in the world. Get the best 200 from 220M vs best 200 of like 15B and I'm sure you'll see a huge difference. Modern Celtics would destroy everyone in the 1980s. They would all look like supermen since everybody is dunking left and right. These are all professional athlete undergoing the best training and physical training+all tech advancements in the last 40 yrs. There'd be some adjustment since Celtics play in modern era, but they would adapt to the physical play pretty soon. Some players wouldn't survive 80s era like Steph Curry, Cp3 or Trae Young. But Jason Tatum, Marcus Smart, Jalen Brown etc these guys have big frames and can take the contact in 1980s. Basketball didn't stop in the 1980s lol, it kept progressing and made so many advancements in a 40 year period. It's only in the NBA people are stuck in the past and tbh I blame it all on MJ.
Considering MJ was already washed at age 38 Lebron still bring an all nba at age 38 is still amazing. Doesn't mean he needs to carry his team every night otherwise it's a net zero.
Kareem is the best and most successful 38 year old. Wizard Jordan is underrated, but he's not at LeBron and Kareem's level at that age. All-NBA just means a player is roughly a top 15 player. I would agree with that, but that's not what we hear with LeBron.
Wrong. Michael had zero all star teammates. Kareem missed the playoffs with a 5x all star. 2 All stars the next year and got swept by the Blazers while being outplayed by Walton. Next year: Adds future HOFer's Adrian Dantley and Wilkes and Lou Hudson and another all star pg. Loses in the 1st round to the Sonics being outplayed by the combo of Sikma and Marvin Webster. Same team next year loses in the semis in 5 to the same Sonics. Gus Williams averages 31 attacking the basket. That's 4 PRIME years with tons of help that resulted in busts. Nothing close to young Mike who just needed 1 all star teammate to break through. In fact, Pippen didn't make the All Star team or any all nba team in 91 during the first title run. He made an all star appearance, his first in 90. They took the Pistons to 7 before Pippen and his migraines only contributed 2 points on 1-10 and 4 reb and 2ast in 42 minutes. Jordan with not much of anything in the way of help pushed the Pistons to 7 and if Scottie showed up, he would have won his first title in 90 against the Blazers. We're talking 2 potential 4 peats left on the table if Scottie had half a heart and Krause wasn't a narcissist. In comes Magic and the rest is history with Magic winning the game clinching Finals with Kareem not even playing.
Let's not get it twisted. Lebron's stats are impressive in that he was on par with a lot of his peers in scoring and all around play because stats are inflated league wide. In the slow pace of the 02 season. Shaq averaged 27, T-Mac 25.6, Peirce 26.1 "If not for his aggravated knee injury against the Kings right before the all-star break, his numbers may have continued to improve from the 25.1 - 6.2 - 5.3 - 1.5 - 0.5 on 42% he was averaging through his first 46 games before the knee injury against the Kings. Immediately after the knee injury, the Wizards lost 9 of their next 10 games and eventually caused them to miss the playoffs. Tracy McGrady was the only player who averaged 25-6-5 at the end of the 2001/02 season No player has ever averaged 25-6-5 at age 38, but Jordan was on pace to become the oldest person to average 25-6-5 before his injury. Jordan didn't shoot as efficiently, which is expected at the end of his career and without being fully healthy in the first place. Even so, his low FG% didn't stop him from putting his team in the W column." http://nobodytouchesjordan.blogspot.com/2015/05/section-20-michael-jordans-wizards-years.html Of course LeBron went on to do that at 38(Jordan was 39 by that point while Lebron just turned 38) but in a much faster pace and space era where everyone else has crazy inflated stats too. So Michael adjusted for pace would look just as impressive as LeBron's stats except Mike was coming off of 3 years off, broken ribs, fluid being drained from his knees, a severed finger which he couldn't fully bend anymore after surgery-and also playing stellar defense on some of the games best young players and being defended by some of the games best defenders. Michael sure would have had a much easier time if he joined a superstar like KG in their prime or better yet the Lakers with Shaq and Kobe because we all know that's where LeBron would have gone in the same position as Michael. No, instead Mike was on the worst team playing for a promise that was not kept by a dishonorable man, because he was never even supposed to come back. "Jordan's numbers were also improving as the season went on. In his last 20 games up to the injury he averaged 27.5 - 6.4 - 5.2 - 1.3 - 0.5 on 44% In his last 10 games up to the injury he averaged 29.7 - 6.6 - 6.1 - 1.2 - 0.3 on 47%" https://youtu.be/2fbvY249nOw http://nobodytouchesjordan.blogspot.com/2014/09/section-2-how-washed-up-jordan-did.html
