1. That was not the point of the argument, those posters only used those to prove to you that there were talented shooting guards in the league at the time. Not as weak as you originally claim. Some of them weren't as athletic as you think shooting guards now, but I think alot of them were far better shooters and one-on-one defenders than a list of league's top SG of this decade in comparison. That poster mentioned TR Dunn, because he was one of the best defenders in the NBA and a nightmare to play against, so was Robert Reid (just ask Larry Bird about that). Jeff Hornacek was a dead eye shooter could hit any shot on the court, and could eat any player alive. If he played in the right year, he could've easily had two or three years as all star. http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/h/hornaje01.html http://www.nba.com/news/survey_2004.html 2) Totally disagree on #2, you still do not realize how good Mitch Richmond was and bad his supporting cast was. Do you have any idea how tough the West was in the 90s and how many good squads were around, Suns; Rockets; Spurs; Jazz; Trailblazers; Supersonics; and Lakers. All of those teams had 5 or more season, during the 90s were they won 57% or more of their games. Sacramento did not have the overall talent to win 57% of their games. Richmond did not have the chance to play on a quality team or even in a weak conference, such as early 2000s Eastern Conference. I'm sure that same Sacramento team could probably be solid team in that era of Eastern conference. Name some things that were wrong with Mitch Richmond's game, then show how inferior it is to say Michael Redd, Reggie Miller, or Joe Johnson and maybe this argument could hold up. This is how many seasons MJ played in the league with the following players: Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Alex English: (7) Clyde Drexler: (12 and 1/5) Charles Barkley: (12), during Charles for good bit of his played at small forward and was guard on several occasions by MJ. Dominique Wilkins: (about 10) Adrian Dantley: (6, 5 injured in last season) Michael Finley: (5) Ray Allen: (4) [as rookie and 2nd year player and later on in Ray Allen's prime] Grant Hill (at his best): (3) Paul Pierce: (2) - one of the league's top scorers at time Vince Carter: (2) - see Paul Pierce Tracy McGrady: (2) - see Tracy McGrady Allen Iverson-Eric Snow-Aaron McKie: (2) Richard Jefferson, Jason Kidd, and Kerry Kittles (together): (2) 3) How can you Melo, LBJ, and Pierce were matchup head to head to Kobe, while MJ was not matched up against these players, when in reality he was for period of times or even the entire game against forwards who were closer to his size (Dantley and Wilkins). Some of those players were in the heart of their prime, when MJ was only 2nd or 3rd year player, there were already rumblings of him possibly being the greatest ever, kind of like LeBron James from other players. The man as d@mn rookie was averaging 28 ppg, and being considered a dominant guard, while he went on to average 37 ppg in only his 3rd season. His career did not start, when he started winning championship. He'd already been the league as top flight player for over half a decade. Also, he did not have luxury of playing on a star-studded team, like Kobe did in the beginning. Again, just off the top of you head how do you think MJ, circa 84-93 or 95-98 would do against the likes of Wesley Matthews; Manu Ginobili; Arron Affallo; Kevin Martin; Andre Igoudala; Derek Fisher (who does guard shooting guards on occasion); Brandon Roy; Ron Artest; Trevor Ariza; Joe Johnson; James Posey; Ray Allen 23-24 year old Artest vs. 38-40 year old Jordan (looking at those numbers, I suspect Artest would be overmatched against the 80s or 90s version of MJ) http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/h2h_finder.cgi?request=1&p1=artesro01&p2=jordami01 MJ vs. Ray Allen (from 2001-2003) http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/h2h_finder.cgi?request=1&p1=jordami01&p2=allenra02 MJ against modern players, not quite as dominant, but remember the man was 40 at that point. http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/j/jordami01/gamelog/2003/ The end all to be of this argument is as you said players' actual talent and accomplishment . . . if that is the case then MJ wins in blow out. 5x MVPs (Kobe only has 1) 6 Finals MVPs (Kobe only has 1) 10x Scoring Champion (Kobe only has 2, has no chance at getting that given his current age and team makeup) 8x scoring 30 or more ppg (Kobe only has 3) 1 DPOY (Kobe has none) 10 All NBA First Team (Kobe only has 8, already played 15 seasons, which means he would need more seasons to equal or pass MJ) In 2001-02, MJ also had better numbers against teams over .500 and/or teams that were rated in top 10 in overall defense than Kobe. Though, MJ did a bit worse against teams under .500 than Kobe that season. Also of each of both players 60 or more point games, only one of Kobe's performance was against a playoff team (Dallas Mavericks), while out of all of MJ's 60 or more performances only one was non playoff team (Orlando Magic with Shaquille O'Neal. Kobe's: (05-06 Raptors, 06-07 Blazers, 05-06 Mavs, 08-09 Knicks, 06-07 Grizzlies) MJ's: (89-90 Cavs, 92-93 Magic, 85-86 Celtics- in the playoffs, 86-87 Pistons, 86-87 Hawks) One group of bottom feeders (except the Mavs) with 34 win average (16th - 29th in points allowed, 26th, 11th, 23rd-but dead last in points allowed,30th) vs. A murderer's row of team with 51.8 win average among them (10th, 12th, 1st,2nd, 5th - defensive ratings of each team) Kobe put up some outstanding numbers, but personally I think it is like New England put up otherworldly numbers against a bad team, like the Lions or Rams. Winning a game 59 or 72 to 3 or nothing, it looks dominant and all, but it was against the Rams. MJ's best performances is like a scoring team scoring alot of points against the 84-87 Bears; 92 Cowboys; or 2000 Ravens. Which feat do you think most people would choose as being tougher scoring over 60 against 85-86 Celtics and 86-87 Pistons or the 05-06 Raptors and 08-09 Knicks? With all that being said, MJ was most likely a better all-around athlete than Kobe. Much better jumper; much faster runner; much more agile; physically stronger; and better hang-time. MJ did and was quite capable of playing other sports, given his athletic skills and competitiveness. I do not think Kobe could do that. 4. The Bulls did a great job in 1994 without MJ and Pippen running the show, but in 1995 they were quickly falling out of the playoff picture and by the team MJ came back for a 2nd run, they were only the 7th ranked team in Eastern Conference. Also, 1994, they got crushed in the last game. Kobe for his entire career benefited even more from other players, during his first 3 seasons, he was on roster, which featured Shaquille O'Neal, Nick Van Exel, Eddie Jones, Rick Fox, Elden Campbell, Derek Fisher, and Robert Horry. Later on, he was on team feature the ever-dominant Shaq with Rick Fox, Derek Fisher, Ron Harper, Glen Rice, Isiah Rider and few other odd faces. Even in 2004, he had even more help with Karl Malone (who was still an all-star quality player averaging 20 ppg) and Gary Payton. In late 2000s version, he is on a team feature the largest frontline rotation in the league with Andrew Bynum and Pau Gasol being backup by Lamar Odom, while also having Trevor Ariza and Ron Artest at small forward. Yet somehow, MJ benefitted more from Pippen whose number were not outstanding by any means in the playoffs.
I agree with you 100 percent! The most amazing thing about The Dream is his playoff stats are eye popping especially until he was about 33 or so. Other than Shaq and Jordan, no one's playoff stats come even close in that era or the current. Plus the variance of his regular season to playoff stats is greater than both Shaq and Jordan. He just dominated when it counted. It's annoying because people say in 95 Jordan did not get to put enough games under his belt, so that's why he wasn't the "real Jordan" His individual stats in the 95 playoffs were just as good as they were in the 96 playoffs. The big difference was adding Dennis Rodman to a contending team. He made them really tough to beat in 96. Also big things people forget are in 96 when we were defending our tittle again, we we not the same team either. Kenny Smith's(who was terrible by that time) career was coming to an end and Sam Cassell(stats are terrible in the playoffs in 96) was banged up and missed a month plus at the end of the season. We had no point gaurd who could consistently run the offense that year and take the pressure off Dream. Clyde Drextler was banged up too and missed many games at the end of the season and was hurting in the Seattle series. People say Seattle had our number, but our 95 team and Hakeem were playing at a much higher level than our 96 team. Plus that Seattle team was Seattle's best team of that era(67 wins in the west). Chicago was also fortunate that they did not have to face Seattle with Nate Mcmillan who missed the finals. I think then it would have been a 7 game series at the very least. In summary no one could have beaten the Rockets in 95, by the western conference finals they were playing at such a high level as a team and Dream was scoring at will, I wish that could have continued in 96. We should have replaced Kenny Smith with a stud in the off season. The 96 season, still in my eyes, had the best contending teams of all time in one season. 70 plus win Bulls, 64 win Sonics, The Magic coming back as the now experienced young stars although Nick Anderson when off the deep end, the usual great Jazz team, defending champ Rockets, Magic Johnson coming back to the Lakers, and the Spurs too. Stacked with great teams. It was also the begining of Jordan securing his place as the greatest of all time! Until the 2nd 3peat it was debatable. Even though we got Barkley the following year, things were never the same. We still needed a point guard(nothing against Matt Maloney) and we needed to stay healthy. Pippen, Jordan, Stockton, and Malone never missed games but our big three missed plenty. It's important to stay healthy and it's important to have a solid point gaurd or gaurd play in general and that effected the Dream's last few good years. Without a healthy Sam or Kenny being serviceable, we could not have won back to back tittles. It makes a huge difference.
I don't think he has become underrated; he is just not seen doing anything on sportscenter or interviews so people don't talk about him that much.
This is a funnier and a better video to watch: <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/1BLjWjc_eII&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/1BLjWjc_eII&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>
Jordan will probably go down as the greatest two guard in history. I know a lot of people don't like him but I think Kobe will go down as the 2nd greatest 2 when it's all said and done.
I'm not sure what the argument is. Are you saying he had to work harder on defense than Jordan did? Because rule changes have made it much easier for him to score than it was in Jordan's day. Jordan faced possibly the 2 best defenses of all-time in the Pistons and Knicks. There isn't really much relevance in comparing "competition at the 2", when single coverage can't really stop really good perimeter players anyway. The only valid angle I can see you taking is saying Bryant had to work harder on defense, so he had to use up more energy than Jordan. But the problem you'll always have is that Bryant wasn't even the best player on his own team for half his career, which allowed him to rest on both ends a lot.
I agree with a majority of this post and often bring up that Kobe has faced much better competition at the 2/3 spot as far as defenders go. There weren't too many Ron Artest like players back in Jordan's day. However, and this might be me being picky, but i think it is ridiculous to say that Jordan was a better jump shooter than Kobe. Kobe is arguably the best mid range jump shooter of all time. When you factor in that Kobe is a much better 3 point shooter than Jordan he wins the shooting comparison easily. I am not really sure who was quicker, better hops, or better handles but I think it's closer than most think when you factor in that the league has gotten faster as a whole. Kobe doesn't really show that part of his game anymore and tends to take more jump shots. I will admit that Jordan was better at attacking the basket than Kobe, but the rest I feel are debatable.
Jordan was simply more athletic than Kobe. Kobe has a better shot, but Jordan version 1.0 was a physical specimen. I believe Kobe's vertical leap at his prime was 37 inches. Jordan's vert was measured at 42in.
kobe's career high in ppg came in the most perimeter player friendly era offensively of all time (2005-06) when the league completely got rid of hand checking and started calling it very tightly. In 2005-06 kobe averaged 35.4 a game (career high). that same year iverson averaged 33 (career high), lebron james averaged 31.4 (career high), gilbert arenas averaged 29.3 (career high), paul pierce averaged 26.8 (career high) it’s obvious stern wanted to shift more power to the offensive side after "boring" teams like the spurs and pistons were winning playing "ugly basketball" so stern got rid of hand checking to help perimeter offensive players. It’s not possible to compare Jordan‘s defenders vs. Kobe’s defenders when in Jordan’s era defenders were allowed to get away with much more. http://hoopshype.com/articles/defense_lazenby.htm\ <object width="640" height="505"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/NLv2F33snCE&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/NLv2F33snCE&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="505"></embed></object> i dont know how kobe came up in this discussion but for people to use an "era" argument against Jordan in a debate that involves kobe and especially when it comes to defense is quite laughable.
HAND CHECKING Please stop these silly Kobe comparisons, The people that compare Kobe to Jordan are the ones that never saw Jordan...
WOW That video is amazing. I thought I'd seen all the Jordan highlights there was to see, but there was heaps there that I didn't recognize. His finishing around the rim was phenomenal.
I'd call them premature before I called them silly. If Kobe ends up with 6 or 7 rings he deserves to be in the argument. Kobe isn't Jordan and never will be, but his shot combined with his athleticism makes him a player the game has never seen before.
Good point gmoney, I concede that point. It is a known fact that jordan's 3-point percentage was always suspect. Responses to a few points made on this thread: -Impact of his retirement: If this is not one of the most blatant measures of a persons impact on a team, I dont know what is. In the midst of multiple champion runs, Jordan retires. The team was 57-25. The next season following the retirement what was the record? 55-27. They lost in 7 games in the 2nd round to the Knicks who went to the Finals that season. Pippen, BJ Armstrong, and Horace Grant made the all star team that season without MJ. MJ was 1-9 in the playoffs without Pippen. As for all the awards, although some are a matter of fact (ppg, trophies), others were definitely influenced by media hype. Jordan played in a tougher defensive era? what about Illegal defense? what about all the favorable calls he got on a night-in night-out basis? Superstar calls were invented by MJ. His 'free throw line' dunk, in hindsight, really doesnt seem as amazing considering how many players have dunked from farther than him or the exact same distance. Look, he was great, yes. But the fact is that there are some Jordan enthusiasts who are essentially ESPN in their adoration for him. For those people, any 'comparison' to Jordan will look rediculous. For the rest of us, we respect his accomplishments but realize that he benefited a LOT from other factors- strong supporting cast, favorable matchups at the guard position, media hype, etc. I'll give one example of how much the media has changed and end on that note; in our era, sports tabloids are huge. Can you imagine how the media would react to Jordans gambling problems and his retirement today? I guarantee that many people wouldnt regard Jordan as highly today- even as a basketball player- had the media scrutiny been the same.
