RGM GOAT Debate Thread (Part 2)

[The Explorer]

All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

So you want to use all-nba selections as the definitive measure of teammate strength. Fine. Let's see you keep that same energy when evaluating opponent strength too. How many 1st team all-nba players did James face in all his years making the playoffs?

2005: 0
2006: 0
2007: 0
2008: Kevin Garnett
2009: Dwight Howard
2010: 0
2011: Derrick Rose
2012: 0
2013: 0
2014: 0
2015: 0
2016: 0
2017: 0
2018: 0
2019: 0
2020: James Harden
2021: 0
2023: 0
2024: Nikola Jokic

In 19 playoff appearances, James only faced 5 1st team all-nba players. Compare to someone like Bryant, who faced 14 1st team all-nba players in 13 playoff appearances. Nearly triple the amount of elite opposition in far few postseasons.

So if All-NBA is your gold standard, then by that same logic, James consistently had easier roads through weaker elite competition, and your attempt to discredit the strength of his teammates by that metric completely backfires.

You're missing some

2007 he faced Tim Duncan in the Finals
2013 Duncan again
2015 Curry
2016 Curry again
2018 KD in the Finals

So that brings him up to 10 guys, which is double what you said. And if Ant makes it this year, that brings it to 11. I don't think anyone has ever claimed the East was tough during LeBron's reign, but what I am gonna say is the same thing I keep saying

Why do y'all have to just lie like that when the actual numbers would still prove your point?

You're missing some for Kobe too, I think it's actually 18, so you could say Kobe faced nearly double the number of 1st teamers, so I don't know if it's intentional or you're just using numbers you saw on a meme without fact checking them

If it's the former, that's just bad faith, if it's the latter, that's just you being dumb.

Nope. My post listed all-nba 1st team competition in his conference. What you listed was his finals competition, not his conference competition. You missed the point entirely. The point is Kobe faced much tougher competition in terms of all-nba 1st team opponents in his conference throughout his shorter career than James did.

[DOT]

So you want to use all-nba selections as the definitive measure of teammate strength. Fine. Let's see you keep that same energy when evaluating opponent strength too. How many 1st team all-nba players did James face in all his years making the playoffs?

2005: 0
2006: 0
2007: 0
2008: Kevin Garnett
2009: Dwight Howard
2010: 0
2011: Derrick Rose
2012: 0
2013: 0
2014: 0
2015: 0
2016: 0
2017: 0
2018: 0
2019: 0
2020: James Harden
2021: 0
2023: 0
2024: Nikola Jokic

In 19 playoff appearances, James only faced 5 1st team all-nba players. Compare to someone like Bryant, who faced 14 1st team all-nba players in 13 playoff appearances. Nearly triple the amount of elite opposition in far few postseasons.

So if All-NBA is your gold standard, then by that same logic, James consistently had easier roads through weaker elite competition, and your attempt to discredit the strength of his teammates by that metric completely backfires.

You're missing some

2007 he faced Tim Duncan in the Finals
2013 Duncan again
2015 Curry
2016 Curry again
2018 KD in the Finals

So that brings him up to 10 guys, which is double what you said. And if Ant makes it this year, that brings it to 11. I don't think anyone has ever claimed the East was tough during LeBron's reign, but what I am gonna say is the same thing I keep saying

Why do y'all have to just lie like that when the actual numbers would still prove your point?

You're missing some for Kobe too, I think it's actually 18, so you could say Kobe faced nearly double the number of 1st teamers, so I don't know if it's intentional or you're just using numbers you saw on a meme without fact checking them

If it's the former, that's just bad faith, if it's the latter, that's just you being dumb.

Nope. My post listed all-nba 1st team competition in his conference. What you listed was his finals competition, not his conference competition. You missed the point entirely. The point is Kobe faced much tougher competition in terms of all-nba 1st team opponents in his conference throughout his shorter career than James did.

You didn’t say conference.

[Kobe187]

1. Jordan

2. KAJ
3. Kobe
4. Wilt
5. James
6. Magic
7. Duncan
8. Curry
9. Shaq
10. Bird

11. B. Russell
12. H. Olajuwon
13. O. Robertson
14. N. Jokic
15. J. West

[DOT]

Also, I would just like to point out, the whole "faced x amount of All-NBA players in conference" thing requires you to believe that Kobe's 30 minutes total scoring 3.7 ppg in the 2nd round in 1998 is worth more than LeBron's 2007 title run because all 5 of the 1st team All-NBA guys played in the West, and somehow we should dock LeBron for that

The knots some people twist themselves into is wild.

[The4thHorseman]

All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

So you want to use all-nba selections as the definitive measure of teammate strength. Fine. Let's see you keep that same energy when evaluating opponent strength too. How many 1st team all-nba players did James face in all his years making the playoffs?

2005: 0
2006: 0
2007: 0
2008: Kevin Garnett
2009: Dwight Howard
2010: 0
2011: Derrick Rose
2012: 0
2013: 0
2014: 0
2015: 0
2016: 0
2017: 0
2018: 0
2019: 0
2020: James Harden
2021: 0
2023: 0
2024: Nikola Jokic

In 19 playoff appearances, James only faced 5 1st team all-nba players. Compare to someone like Bryant, who faced 14 1st team all-nba players in 13 playoff appearances. Nearly triple the amount of elite opposition in far few postseasons.

So if All-NBA is your gold standard, then by that same logic, James consistently had easier roads through weaker elite competition, and your attempt to discredit the strength of his teammates by that metric completely backfires.

Funny how you're counting players Kobe faced while playing with Shaq. You might want to start at 2005 cause that's when he finally got to call LAL his team and became the focal point of their offense.

[jars]

I think a major deciding factor to me is the cultural impact of Jordan. Obviously he was an amazing player and there are lots of valid arguments for him or LeBron as the GOAT. But Jordan was also in the right place at the right time - a pioneer in the marketing of basketball, shoes and brands - which made the things he did on the court seem otherworldly to me. I just think we are unlikely to see anyone surpass his legacy because of all the things he did on the court AND outside of basketball.

Lebron has had a different cultural impact as he came in during the rise of the internet and was more accessible which I think helped and hurt him.

[michaelm]

All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

So you want to use all-nba selections as the definitive measure of teammate strength. Fine. Let's see you keep that same energy when evaluating opponent strength too. How many 1st team all-nba players did James face in all his years making the playoffs?

2005: 0
2006: 0
2007: 0
2008: Kevin Garnett
2009: Dwight Howard
2010: 0
2011: Derrick Rose
2012: 0
2013: 0
2014: 0
2015: 0
2016: 0
2017: 0
2018: 0
2019: 0
2020: James Harden
2021: 0
2023: 0
2024: Nikola Jokic

In 19 playoff appearances, James only faced 5 1st team all-nba players. Compare to someone like Bryant, who faced 14 1st team all-nba players in 13 playoff appearances. Nearly triple the amount of elite opposition in far few postseasons.

So if All-NBA is your gold standard, then by that same logic, James consistently had easier roads through weaker elite competition, and your attempt to discredit the strength of his teammates by that metric completely backfires.

Funny how you're counting players Kobe faced while playing with Shaq. You might want to start at 2005 cause that's when he finally got to call LAL his team and became the focal point of their offense.

I don’t agree with most of the arguments which are being made about Kobe either, but all of the players who won multiple titles had elite help, and LeBron sought out such help more than pretty much any other player. If the fit of most of those players with him was suboptimal that is his problem.

I have a fundamental dichotomy with you guys, you seek to diminish Jordan on the basis of the strength of his teams while in my view good to great teams being built around him and him accepting a team offensive scheme are perhaps the most significant contributors to his greatness.

[michaelm]

The knots some people twist themselves into is wild.

Very true, but this doesn’t characterise only one side of the debate.

[ScrantonBulls]

The knots some people twist themselves into is wild.

Very true, but this doesn’t characterise only one side of the debate.

Lol, read literally 3 random pages from this thread and try to say with a straight face that one side doesn't do it much more frequently than the other. It isn't even close quite frankly. The mental gymnastics displayed regularly by MJ fans in this thread is astounding. Somebody who has MJ #1 even admitted in this thread a couple pages ago that the MJ crowd is more disingenuous in this debate.

[MVP1992]

Read on Twitter

[michaelm]

The knots some people twist themselves into is wild.

Very true, but this doesn’t characterise only one side of the debate.

Lol, read literally 3 random pages from this thread and try to say with a straight face that one side doesn't do it much more frequently than the other. It isn't even close quite frankly. The mental gymnastics displayed regularly by MJ fans in this thread is astounding. Somebody who has MJ #1 even admitted in this thread a couple pages ago that the MJ crowd is more disingenuous in this debate.

As opposed to 93 or so non-random pages of you guys attributing Jordan’s success to Scottie Pippen, trashing LeBron’s team-mates, exalting LeBron’s opposition, trashing the opposition of the Jordan Bulls and deeming LeBron Jordan’s superior on the basis of so-called advanced statistics which didn’t exist for Jordan to chase in his time, including acclaiming LeBron’s statistics after the age of 35 playing no defense on teams which were never going to seriously contend.

The even larger problem for those of your ilk is that LeBron very obviously set out to match or surpass Jordan for titles won (if not what was the purpose of his moves ?, cf ‘The Decision’), and when he realised he couldn’t do so pivoted to accumulating longevity statistics, with his partisans such as you trailing in his wake.

[OriginalRed]

The knots some people twist themselves into is wild.

Very true, but this doesn’t characterise only one side of the debate.

Lol, read literally 3 random pages from this thread and try to say with a straight face that one side doesn't do it much more frequently than the other. It isn't even close quite frankly. The mental gymnastics displayed regularly by MJ fans in this thread is astounding. Somebody who has MJ #1 even admitted in this thread a couple pages ago that the MJ crowd is more disingenuous in this debate.

Don't generalize an entire fanbase over the actions of some. I've seen hoardes of Lebron fans do exactly the same thing you critize Jordan fans for doing here on other forums and social platforms. Both sides have disingenuous fans that lie to fit their agenda.

[ScrantonBulls]

Very true, but this doesn’t characterise only one side of the debate.

Lol, read literally 3 random pages from this thread and try to say with a straight face that one side doesn't do it much more frequently than the other. It isn't even close quite frankly. The mental gymnastics displayed regularly by MJ fans in this thread is astounding. Somebody who has MJ #1 even admitted in this thread a couple pages ago that the MJ crowd is more disingenuous in this debate.

Don't generalize an entire fanbase over the actions of some. I've seen hoardes of Lebron fans do exactly the same thing you critize Jordan fans for doing here on other forums and social platforms. Both sides have disingenuous fans that lie to fit their agenda.

I will certainly generalize the RealGM MJ fanbase when it comes to this topic. Just read this thread. The amount of lazy, disingenuous, and intellectually dishonest stuff that's gets posted by that crowd when it comes to LeBron of the MJ vs LeBron debate is overwhelming. One side is much, much more guilty of it than the other. You even have MJ fans admitting to it.

I know both sides have people guilty of it. But on RealGM, one side is far more guilty of it. The proof is in the pudding.

[michaelm]

Lol, read literally 3 random pages from this thread and try to say with a straight face that one side doesn't do it much more frequently than the other. It isn't even close quite frankly. The mental gymnastics displayed regularly by MJ fans in this thread is astounding. Somebody who has MJ #1 even admitted in this thread a couple pages ago that the MJ crowd is more disingenuous in this debate.

Don't generalize an entire fanbase over the actions of some. I've seen hoardes of Lebron fans do exactly the same thing you critize Jordan fans for doing here on other forums and social platforms. Both sides have disingenuous fans that lie to fit their agenda.

I will certainly generalize the RealGM MJ fanbase when it comes to this topic. Just read this thread. The amount of lazy, disingenuous, and intellectually dishonest stuff that's gets posted by that crowd when it comes to LeBron of the MJ vs LeBron debate is overwhelming. One side is much, much more guilty of it than the other. You even have MJ fans admitting to it.

I know both sides have people guilty of it. But on RealGM, one side is far more guilty of it. The proof is in the pudding.

Nonsense. Some on the MJ side of the debate have been less assiduous in checking the accuracy of the cherry picked numbers they post but most on both sides of the debate fairly obviously start with their conclusion and work back from there rather than engaging in genuine debate. I include myself, I have considered MJ to be the GOAT since his heyday, and no one including you has posted anything to persuade me to change my opinion.

Bottom line is that they are two of the most dominant players in NBA history, but I preferred how Jordan and the Bulls played. Rings are not everything, but they are not nothing either. It very likely is harder to win 6 rings in this era, particularly by LeBron’s method with his ball dominance pretty much requiring him to mostly carry his teams. Jordan didn’t become ultimately successful until he accepted coaching and the triangle offense, and maybe wouldn’t have won the 4 titles LeBron has won had he played in his stead in this era using LeBron’s method, he quite possibly couldn’t carry a team on his own to the same extent. On the other hand I don’t really see LeBron accepting coaching even from Phil Jackson, accepting a more team oriented game plan, and a team with him replacing Jordan getting the same benefit from the rest of the team including Pippen that was the case with Jordan as the leading player.

[AlexanderRight]

So what is it that apparently makes LeBron partisans dispassionate about him while Jordan partisans are biased/wearers of rose coloured glasses where Jordan is concerned ? .

I voted Jordan #1 in the top 100 project, but the Jordan side almost certainly has more disingenuous gotcha type stuff like top 75/all stars played with stuff as if all those guys are created equal. Like oh, 40 year old LeBron played with the **** version of Luka doncic, wow, how did they lose. Or he played with 37 year old ray Allen. Or Kyrie was an all star but oops, he missed the finals. Or Kevin love was an all star but was basically a massive liability against the only opponent, golden state, that actually mattered so it would be like having pippen except every time you get to the finals, pippen just sits out or gets injured so who cares if you have pippen. Like is anyone really trading first 3 peat pippen and his fit in 90s basketball for both Kyrie and love and their fit in 2016 against the warriors? I mean pippen had his off games offensively certainly but I'm not sure you make that trade.

Like we all agree LeBron crapped the bed in the 2011 finals, but theres basically nothing more he could have done after (or really before) that no matter how many supposed to 75 guys he played with and 2016 is a finals Jordan could basically never win (maybe 20% at his peak) so that wins back a lot of the 2011 let down.

Spot on. It's really a shame, because there is a great case to be made for Jordan to be the GOAT. But for whatever reason, a lot of the Jordan fans in this thread post disingenuous arguments or straight out lies. Look at my signature for example. Like, why are we trying to count the number of all stars a guy played with instead of looking at teammates that made actual all-NBA teams while playing with said player? Counting all stars is silly for many reasons. One, it is heavily based off fan voting, aka a popularity contest driven by casual fans. Two, it doesn't even encompass an entire season. All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

Are you really going to pretend like I didn't just prove to you two pages ago that LBJ has had more teamates make ALL NBA with him than MJ and more teammates make All Star with him than MJ? Do you not understand that Westbrook and Dwight Howard have nothing to do with either of those lists because neither of them made All-NBA or All Star with Lebron?

Are you really going to pretend that Wade/Bosh/Kyrie/Love/AD are were not legitimate All Star caliber players but instead the product of fan homer voting and in fact didn't deserve to make the All Star game with LBJ?

Are you really going to pretend that 7 different players encompassing a total of 17 All Star appearances NEXT TO LBJ is not substantially more help than 1 player making the All Star game with MJ 6 times?

Is that your thing? To just completely ignore facts and arguments when they thoroughly refute your narrative to then just make another thread/post two days later with the same tired talking points and just hoping people didn't see/forget those same shallow arguments getting dismantled time and time again...

[bledredwine]

I voted Jordan #1 in the top 100 project, but the Jordan side almost certainly has more disingenuous gotcha type stuff like top 75/all stars played with stuff as if all those guys are created equal. Like oh, 40 year old LeBron played with the **** version of Luka doncic, wow, how did they lose. Or he played with 37 year old ray Allen. Or Kyrie was an all star but oops, he missed the finals. Or Kevin love was an all star but was basically a massive liability against the only opponent, golden state, that actually mattered so it would be like having pippen except every time you get to the finals, pippen just sits out or gets injured so who cares if you have pippen. Like is anyone really trading first 3 peat pippen and his fit in 90s basketball for both Kyrie and love and their fit in 2016 against the warriors? I mean pippen had his off games offensively certainly but I'm not sure you make that trade.

Like we all agree LeBron crapped the bed in the 2011 finals, but theres basically nothing more he could have done after (or really before) that no matter how many supposed to 75 guys he played with and 2016 is a finals Jordan could basically never win (maybe 20% at his peak) so that wins back a lot of the 2011 let down.

Spot on. It's really a shame, because there is a great case to be made for Jordan to be the GOAT. But for whatever reason, a lot of the Jordan fans in this thread post disingenuous arguments or straight out lies. Look at my signature for example. Like, why are we trying to count the number of all stars a guy played with instead of looking at teammates that made actual all-NBA teams while playing with said player? Counting all stars is silly for many reasons. One, it is heavily based off fan voting, aka a popularity contest driven by casual fans. Two, it doesn't even encompass an entire season. All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

Are you really going to pretend like I didn't just prove to you two pages ago that LBJ has had more teamates make ALL NBA with him than MJ and more teammates make All Star with him than MJ? Do you not understand that Westbrook and Dwight Howard have nothing to do with either of those lists because neither of them made All-NBA or All Star with Lebron?

Are you really going to pretend that Wade/Bosh/Kyrie/Love/AD are were not legitimate All Star caliber players but instead the product of fan homer voting and in fact didn't deserve to make the All Star game with LBJ?

Are you really going to pretend that 7 different players encompassing a total of 17 All Star appearances NEXT TO LBJ is not substantially more help than 1 player making the All Star game with MJ 6 times?

Is that your thing? To just completely ignore facts and arguments when they thoroughly refute your narrative to then just make another thread/post two days later with the same tired talking points and just hoping people didn't see/forget those same shallow arguments getting dismantled time and time again...

DAMN.

[ScrantonBulls]

I voted Jordan #1 in the top 100 project, but the Jordan side almost certainly has more disingenuous gotcha type stuff like top 75/all stars played with stuff as if all those guys are created equal. Like oh, 40 year old LeBron played with the **** version of Luka doncic, wow, how did they lose. Or he played with 37 year old ray Allen. Or Kyrie was an all star but oops, he missed the finals. Or Kevin love was an all star but was basically a massive liability against the only opponent, golden state, that actually mattered so it would be like having pippen except every time you get to the finals, pippen just sits out or gets injured so who cares if you have pippen. Like is anyone really trading first 3 peat pippen and his fit in 90s basketball for both Kyrie and love and their fit in 2016 against the warriors? I mean pippen had his off games offensively certainly but I'm not sure you make that trade.

Like we all agree LeBron crapped the bed in the 2011 finals, but theres basically nothing more he could have done after (or really before) that no matter how many supposed to 75 guys he played with and 2016 is a finals Jordan could basically never win (maybe 20% at his peak) so that wins back a lot of the 2011 let down.

Spot on. It's really a shame, because there is a great case to be made for Jordan to be the GOAT. But for whatever reason, a lot of the Jordan fans in this thread post disingenuous arguments or straight out lies. Look at my signature for example. Like, why are we trying to count the number of all stars a guy played with instead of looking at teammates that made actual all-NBA teams while playing with said player? Counting all stars is silly for many reasons. One, it is heavily based off fan voting, aka a popularity contest driven by casual fans. Two, it doesn't even encompass an entire season. All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

Are you really going to pretend like I didn't just prove to you two pages ago that LBJ has had more teamates make ALL NBA with him than MJ and more teammates make All Star with him than MJ? Do you not understand that Westbrook and Dwight Howard have nothing to do with either of those lists because neither of them made All-NBA or All Star with Lebron?

Are you really going to pretend that Wade/Bosh/Kyrie/Love/AD are were not legitimate All Star caliber players but instead the product of fan homer voting and in fact didn't deserve to make the All Star game with LBJ?

Are you really going to pretend that 7 different players encompassing a total of 17 All Star appearances NEXT TO LBJ is not substantially more help than 1 player making the All Star game with MJ 6 times?

Is that your thing? To just completely ignore facts and arguments when they thoroughly refute your narrative to then just make another thread/post two days later with the same tired talking points and just hoping people didn't see/forget those same shallow arguments getting dismantled time and time again...

I do remember you saying he had more All-NBA teammates. I then made you aware that LeBron has had 6 in 22 seasons, while MJ had 5 in 15 seasons. I assumed you would see the math there and understand that MJ had All-NBA teammates more often more frequently I thought wrong!

Based on that, I don't think there's any reason to delve in further. Plus, bledredwine concurred with what you wrote. That's the defacto sign that you've lost

[AlexanderRight]

Spot on. It's really a shame, because there is a great case to be made for Jordan to be the GOAT. But for whatever reason, a lot of the Jordan fans in this thread post disingenuous arguments or straight out lies. Look at my signature for example. Like, why are we trying to count the number of all stars a guy played with instead of looking at teammates that made actual all-NBA teams while playing with said player? Counting all stars is silly for many reasons. One, it is heavily based off fan voting, aka a popularity contest driven by casual fans. Two, it doesn't even encompass an entire season. All-NBA is quite obviously a better metric to use for comparison. But no, they prefer to count all-star appearances of teammates which includes washed up guys like Russell Westbrook and Dwight

Are you really going to pretend like I didn't just prove to you two pages ago that LBJ has had more teamates make ALL NBA with him than MJ and more teammates make All Star with him than MJ? Do you not understand that Westbrook and Dwight Howard have nothing to do with either of those lists because neither of them made All-NBA or All Star with Lebron?

Are you really going to pretend that Wade/Bosh/Kyrie/Love/AD are were not legitimate All Star caliber players but instead the product of fan homer voting and in fact didn't deserve to make the All Star game with LBJ?

Are you really going to pretend that 7 different players encompassing a total of 17 All Star appearances NEXT TO LBJ is not substantially more help than 1 player making the All Star game with MJ 6 times?

Is that your thing? To just completely ignore facts and arguments when they thoroughly refute your narrative to then just make another thread/post two days later with the same tired talking points and just hoping people didn't see/forget those same shallow arguments getting dismantled time and time again...

I do remember you saying he had more All-NBA teammates. I then made you aware that LeBron has had 6 in 22 seasons, while MJ had 5 in 15 seasons. I assumed you would see the math there and understand that MJ had All-NBA teammates more often more frequently I thought wrong!

Based on that, I don't think there's any reason to delve in further. Plus, bledredwine concurred with what you wrote. That's the defacto sign that you've lost

So LBJ having an All-NBA teammate for 27% of his career vs MJ having one for 33% is supposed to be more important than the fact that LBJ still had more All NBA seasons next to him, 2 more All NBA players, 6 more All Star players, and 11 more All Star selections? Is that the logic you have to desperately hold onto now? If LBJ was truly the better player than just having more All-NBA selections next to him would be enough to produce better or at least equal results and the "frequency" of it wouldn't matter, but of course you've pretzeled yourself into pretending that that takes precedence.

And if frequency is so important, shouldn't it matter that MJ won rings 40% of his career vs LBJ winning at 18% clip? Of course not because that would go against your narrative and force you move the goalpost again to another arbitrary standard that you proclaim is most important. I'm sure you already got a laundry list of excuses of why that fact is.

But go ahead and run and pretend that it's not because you're getting embarrassed here. Everytime you get bodied on this topic your default cope is proclaim any evidence against your position irrelevant or "casual" without providing any better evidence of your own. And then to declare yourself smarter than any person that disagrees with you and that "you've won" just because you say so. But that's more to convince yourself because you're certainly not convincing any objective people here with that approach...

[zimpy27]

For every 2.3 people that think Jordan is the GOAT, there is 1 person that think LeBron is the GOAT.

The gap is closing on consensus.

[bledredwine]

For every 2.3 people that think Jordan is the GOAT, there is 1 person that think LeBron is the GOAT.

The gap is closing on consensus.

Nah. The PC forum posters headed over here to vote. They were all commenting around that time the voting changed as well.
If you poll the public, it's not close.

And when he retires, the gap widens again. That's how it always works.
I remember a Kobe vs MJ poll being way closer than it should have been.

Why? All of the Kobe fans that were on the forums because it was during Kobe's playing days.

The gap getting smaller after LBJ gets kicked out of the playoffs would make no sense, wouldn't you agree?