I mean as far as I can tell he has 0 career first place votes for DPOY [not wins, just votes], and more often than not got no DPOY votes [in fact, I think just that year]... so yeah, I guess he was a candidate, lol. He has I think 6 all defensive teams, which is great. He WAS definitely a great defender. He also happened to play with other really great defenders. Like Bird (who won a DPOY), Dennis Johnson, Parish, etc. Interestingly... Dirk was also a better defender when on better defensive teams. That's just how it works, not just for those two guys, but everyone. I absolutely agree that McHale was a better defender than Dirk by a wider margin than Dirk was a better offensive player. But I also don't think that margin translates to impact the same. Because team defense is the most important thing, which even a lesser defender like Dirk can contribute effectively to. These days defensive versatility is probably second most. Can a big switch and somewhat effectively guard that wing or guard. Back then I'd say more interior protection... which McHale certainly provided more than Dirk. It's probably just semantics I guess. What would be elite. A top [x] all time interior defender? Whatever that [x] is, I don't think it should be low enough to include McHale...
Yeah, who needs stats? Let's all just use emotion to determine how to rank players. While we're at it, let's let our hearts guide our investment portfolio, too. Same arguments I've hashed through a million times... It's not Lebron's fault that he plays in the east. Yes, the east is weaker, but seven straight finals appearances is still amazing. How many players can even say they've led a team out of the first round seven straight times? Anyway, if you don't even put Lebron "close to" the top, then we're at an impasse. I've wasted my time on sports fans obsessed with cliches and convinced that championships are individual accomplishments. No more. Thankfully, the majority of people (especially non-casual fans) are finally starting to realize how incredible and once-in-a-lifetime of a player Lebron is. You are in a shrinking minority.
Why is Lebron not under scrutiny for laughing it up and quitting in games this year, blaming the lack of help passively again? Harden would get straight up MURDERED!!!
"East is weaker" is an understatement. Lebron single handedly ruined the East and they never had another chance to fix it. And like I said, no player ever in the history of NBA has had such an easy road to the finals. Also, I never said you should throw stats out the window. What I posted might not be easy for you to understand, but I'm saying you don't pick players in the top-10 for just their stats. KD might've caused the GSW, but he used Lebrons blueprint. Great for bandwagon idiots out there to make an easy decision on buying jersies and to rank over MJ.
How did Lebron single-handedly ruin the East? Are you not aware that the East has been significantly weaker than the West since he was in high school? They've only had a few good teams at the top, and they've been garbage after that. Look at when Lebron was still in Cleveland. The only other decent teams in the East were Boston and Orlando. Did Lebron make the Celtics Big 3 get old? Did Lebron ruin Dwight Howard's back? Did Lebron wreck Derrick Rose's knee? Crappy GMs and some bad luck ruined the East. As for no player in history having such an easy road to the Finals, you might want to check out some of Magic Johnson's playoff runs in the 80's: - In 1982, the Lakers played 46 and 48 win teams en route to the Finals. - In 1984, the Lakers played the 38-win Kings, the 43-win Mavs, and the 41-win Suns in the Western conference playoffs. - In 1985, they played two crappy teams (36-win Suns!) and a decent Nuggets squad. - In 1987, the 42-40 Warriors were the BEST team the Lakers played in the West! The others were the 37-win Nuggets and the 39-win Sonics. - In 1988, the Lakers first round opponent won 31 games. I've left out 1982, when the Lakers only playoff opponent was a 40-win team that upset them, as well as 1986, when they lost to an up-and-coming 51-win Rockets team in the WCF after beating two teams with a combined 81 wins.
No, Lebron DID steal one of the big 3 in Boston, Ray Allen. Without him, that's one less chip in Lebrons house. I'm not gonna argue that the East has had bad luck. Whether it's drafts or injuries, they never got their **** together. But it does mean that Lebron has had it easier getting to the finals. If you want to argue that he makes any team a contender, I'd argue that he has absolutely no competition in the East. Is it Lebrons fault? Partially, yeah. Franchises didn't give af to even compete w him because his team was too good out East when he joined Miami Heat. Here's a list of all-nba talent Lebron faced to get to the nba finals. Tell me if it surprises you, because it didn't surprise me at all.
And Lebron used Barkley's and Allen/Garnett's blueprint... He's not the first player to do it. He's just the best, because he had absolute *garbage* for seven years in Cleveland. The best player they ever gave him was mo ****ing williams. Anybody would look for greener pastures after giving away 40% of their career to that mess.
The player who had the easiest road to a Finals is not Lebron, that would be Kobe who a series shooting 40%. Kobe can put up a totally horrible performance and still won a ring, in every series where Lebron didn't play like Lebron their team lost so it is easy to see who had an easier road. The best players are talent mixed with a lot of luck, if you look at MJ all his rings were won back to back which meant he relied on just one era, spefically when his GM and coach were way better than anyone else and he had Scottie Pippen who was undeniably the 2nd best wing player in the league. People like to believe Jordan wasn't lucky, but he spent 15 years playing and only had 6 rings. If it was all him how come he lost the 9 other times he played? The league was pretty weak when Jordan was playing, which team came even close to the Bulls? If the Bulls had Hakeem and the Rockets had Jordan Hakeem would be the GOAT today.
Lebron has been to 8 finals, 7 straight and won 3 as clearly the best player on his team every time. He’s built up this thing called goodwill.
If you don’t think Lebron couldn’t do what Larry and Magic did on those stacked teams your greatly mistaken. Better than Jordan? Maybe, maybe not but his career hasn’t been better. Jordan meant more to the nba than just his game on the court. He made the nba what it is today. Elevated it to a place magic and bird couldn’t. Anyone who has Lebron outside the top 5 is a moron and shouldn’t even have his opinion taken seriously. His been hands down the best player for 12 years. There’s 2 other players (mj and Kareem) that can make that same claim. Holding his finals loses against him is stupid. Most players don’t even get there and he’s won 3 titles to go with 4 MVPs. He has a case for the goat, doesn’t mean he is the goat but it’s not crazy if you think he is. It’s crazy to not consider it.
LOL!!!!!!!! The 90s were weak?!!??? Only 6rings?!? First, 6 rings is pretty fking good. He had two 3-peats, that's something Lebron wishes he can ever do. Too bad he ain't ever doing it, much less get 6 rings, unless he ring chases like KD did, which MJ never fking did. Secondly, MJ's era had wayyyyyy more talent. John Stockton, Patrick Ewing, Shaq, Kobe, Hakeem the dream, Clyde Drexler, Isaiah Thomas, Allen Iverson, Reggie Miller, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Penny Hardaway, Alonzo Mourning, Shawn Kemp, Chris Webber, David Robinson, Tim Duncan, Dikembe Mutumbo, Gary Payton, Dennis Rodman, Grant Hill, Tim Hardaway, Dominique Wilkins.... Granted, lots of players started in the 80s and made their way into the 90s. Still was better basketball, nobody knew who was making it to the finals except when MJ was dominating. It's also called the Golden Era of NBA for a reason.
You're basically telling me Lebron is the goat if you only consider stats and capabilities. Yeah I'll agree. Too bad you didn't read my full post. I said you don't pick players to be top-5 with only stats and capabilities. He's not top-3 for me. He's not done yet, but I can't place him above MJ, Bill Russell, Larry Bird, Kareem. You want go have a toss-up with Larry, Magic and Lebron, fine. He isn't better than Kareem. For me, you're not better than Larry if you're not taking down 10-15 of the 50 greatest to ever play. And you and I just gonna have to disagree about the finals appearances. No way I give Lebron that much credit for making it there in the sorry ass east. And MVPs?! Steve Nash got 2, does he mean he's top-10? Nope! Not even close!
Your really going to compare Steve Nash to Lebron? That’s ridiculous. Bill Russell? The guys who played on an allstar team with what a 12 team nba? Really? The talent level wasn’t all that back then. By your logic it would be better for Lebron to be 3/3 in the finals and get bounced in the ECF? I don’t get it. I just assume you really like Larry bird even though you have admitted you didn’t even get to watch him. You do realize the nba has more top talent now than in any era. A lot of these guys would be considered top 50 had they played in the 70s and 80s. And I read your post you don’t like stats which is odd but that’s your opinion which is fine. But numbers do mean something, they actually mean a lot. MVPs mean something 3 championships mean something. Lebron resume stacks up against anyone’s outside of jordan and Kareem which I already said. Your acting as if Lebron hasn’t won anything which is odd the man has 3 championships. The east is the easier path sure but he still had to beat the best teams out west to win. Even that young thunder team he beat had 3 of the top 5 players on it and assuming harden wins mvp all would have won one of those. That thunder squad is equal if not better than the rockets team bird beat in the finals.
It is only called the Golden Era because that was the time the baby boomers watched the NBA as kids. Since these kids are now the grown up people speaking on tv and writing the sports columns then obviously it will be called the "golden era" because it was the golden era for those guys (including you I guess). But objectively speaking the 80s are nowhere near the golden era, the golden era might not even have arrived because the NBA is still growing, it still hasn't reached its peak in popularity. NBA during the 80s didn't have globalization so the talent pool wasn't as good as now because the rest of the world back then haven't been exposed to the NBA. Saying there was "way more talent" back in the 80s is just dumb because how many is the available pool of players then vs now? There were only 228M people in the US back then vs 7.3 billion people now, with a much larger pool of total population the NBA has a lot more talent now compared to before. Just look at Kevin Durant, how many 7'1 SFs played during the 80s? As for MJ I'm not belittling his two 3 peats at all but like I said he was the only one with a good team in his era. Which other superstar during the 80s had a stacked team to go against MJ? The only one I remember were Isiah Pistons but they were a lot older than MJ, by the time MJ and Pippen reached their peak that team was really old. The 2nd best team to go against them were Stockton and Malone but those two are not exactly superstars on the level of MJ, Kareem, Hakeem, etc. They were more like 2 Pippens or 2 Klay Thompsons in this era. Finally, more than half of the players you listed were 90s players. Kobe, Tim Duncan, Allen Iverson? Duncan was drafted 1997 LOL
First of all IMHO Kareem is more deserving of GOAT than MJ because Kareem was still dominating at age 43 and his hook shot would still translate to today's NBA. Secondly Bill Russell should be the GOAT over MJ because he has more MVPs, Rings and FMVPs than MJ if you will jist look at stats. Third, the real MVP during the 80s era was Hakeem and not MJ, MJ was just lucky the Bulls drafted him 3rd and Hakeem was unlucky the Rockets drafted him first. MJ got to play with Pippen and Phil Jackson, Hakeem got to play with Ralph Sampson and a bunch of crackheads. If the Bulls had Hakeem, Hakeem today would be the goat because he and Pippen would be the best duo in the league whereas MJ would be playing on a lottery team. Finally you are crazy if you think Bird is better than Lebron, dont be dumb. How many top 10-15 players did Bird really overcome? A lot of the players today would worm their way in the top 15 when they retire, guys like Curry, Lebron, Durant, Paul and Harden would be among the greatest not to mention guys like Duncan, KG and Dirk who are all better than Bird.
You're listing individual names, not teams. I think the Knicks and Pacers were good back then, but Jordan's teams were never tested. They never faced the Rockets and the one team that could have owned them, the Magic, got dismantled.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Chicago_Bulls_seasons On Magic team, you're right. Knicks and Pacers both met w/ Jordan in the playoffs, constantly got routed by them.