The EuroLeague's GOAT Vote: All-Time Top 25 Players Ranked From #1 (Vassilis Spanoulis) To #25 (Kostas Sloukas)

[pepe1991]

With all due respect, only question is: Dražen Petrović or Toni Kukoć.

Due what he did and with how small and irrelevant team he did it, Toni Kukoć is only Euroleague GOAT.

Jugoplastika, team from city that at times had around 180 000 people at most, from country that was falling apart into a first war on Europien ground since World War 2, with zero foreign players and two boys from home town won 3 Euroleagues in a row, in 1989, 1990 and 1991. It's not that they won it, they destroyed everybody on their path.

Toni was final 4- MVP - 3 times in a row. After him and Jugoplastika, only 3 teams won back to back titles since. Nobody tripled.

Show me another Euroleague player that did what Toni did. There simply isn't such player. Šarūnas Jasikevičius? He won 3 Euroleagues in a row by changing team. And he is yet another player from list of people who couldn't keep up with speed to play in nba, years after Divac, Rada, Drazen, Toni already carved the path.


Dražen was pretty much Jordan- level unguardable for Euruopien basketball. Guy averaged 37 ppg in national championship, won two Euroleagues, won first Jugoslavian championship at age of 16 (but political reasons took away title ). Yugoslavia had best basketball league in those years in the world. Case and point- from 1980- 1992- 6 times Euroleague champion was from Yugoslavia.
Dražen had streak over 4 years in Europien competitions where he averaged 33 ppg.

Both influenced game more than Vassilis Spanoulis. Dražen made game perimeter oriented and was scoring menace, Toni was 6'10 guard and walking mismatch.
Both were more important for international crossover of Euro players to NBA .
Both had important nba careers, unlike Llull or DeColo ( or Spanoulis or Šarunas ).
Both had HUGE impact on national teams ( unlike their countryman Vujčić who is often mentioned ).
Both are in basketball HOF.




From Greece fans POV, i would rank Theodoros Papaloukas over Spanolis. From talent pov, Bodiroga was above half of people here mentioned.

Cradle of basketball in Europe is Yugoslavia, weather somebody likes it or not. To this date it's still the same. Doncic, Jokić are just latest instalments of very long history. History goes all the way back to Radivoj Korać and Kresimic Cosic and 1960s.

[Mirotic12]

League tiers between NBA, Euroleague, and other leagues around the world are not clearly defined, which was the discussion. Neither that nor tiers veteran players in the leagues are clearly defined. You waited over a month to answer something completely different from the conversation we were having lol. I genuinely can’t tell if you are trolling or really can’t track the conversation but think you did.

Tiers of worldwide international basketball leagues:

Tier 1.

National Basketball Association (NBA)

Tier 2.

EuroLeague

Tier 3.

EuroCup Basketball
FIBA Basketball Champions League
Liga ACB (Spain)

Tier 4.

Greek Basketball League (Greece)
Lega Basket Serie A (Italy)
LNB Pro A (France)
Basketboll Super Ligi (Turkey)
ABA League First Division (Adriatic League)
VTB United League (Russia)
Basketball Bundesliga (Germany)
Israeli Premier Basketball League (Israel)
Lietuvos Krepsinio Lyga (Lithuania)
National Basketball League (Australia)
FIBA Basketball Champions League Americas
FIBA Europe Cup

Tier 5.

FIBA South American League
Novo Basquete Brasil (Brazil)
Liga Nacional Basquetbol (Argentina)
Baloncesto Superior Nacional (Puerto Rico)

Tier 6.

NBA G League
Polska Liga Koszykowki (Poland)
BNXT League (Belgium & Netherlands)
LNBM (Romania)
National Basketball League (New Zealand)

Tier 7.

Chinese Basketball Association (China) Basketball 1 League (Japan)
Philippine Basketball Association (Philippines)

[Myth]

League tiers between NBA, Euroleague, and other leagues around the world are not clearly defined, which was the discussion. Neither that nor tiers veteran players in the leagues are clearly defined. You waited over a month to answer something completely different from the conversation we were having lol. I genuinely can’t tell if you are trolling or really can’t track the conversation but think you did.

Tiers of worldwide international basketball leagues:

Tier 1.

National Basketball Association (NBA)

Tier 2.

EuroLeague

Tier 3.

EuroCup Basketball
FIBA Basketball Champions League
Liga ACB (Spain)

Tier 4.

Greek Basketball League (Greece)
Lega Basket Serie A (Italy)
LNB Pro A (France)
Basketboll Super Ligi (Turkey)
ABA League First Division (Adriatic League)
VTB United League (Russia)
Basketball Bundesliga (Germany)
Israeli Premier Basketball League (Israel)
Lietuvos Krepsinio Lyga (Lithuania)
National Basketball League (Australia)
FIBA Basketball Champions League Americas
FIBA Europe Cup

Tier 5.

FIBA South American League
Novo Basquete Brasil (Brazil)
Liga Nacional Basquetbol (Argentina)
Baloncesto Superior Nacional (Puerto Rico)

Tier 6.

NBA G League
Polska Liga Koszykowki (Poland)
BNXT League (Belgium & Netherlands)
LNBM (Romania)
National Basketball League (New Zealand)

Tier 7.

Chinese Basketball Association (China) Basketball 1 League (Japan)
Philippine Basketball Association (Philippines)

Cool. Now share the source that indicates that these are clearly defined as you said and not just a subjective opinion.

[Mirotic12]

Due what he did and with how small and irrelevant team he did it, Toni Kukoć is only Euroleague GOAT.

Jugoplastika, team from city that at times had around 180 000 people at most, from country that was falling apart into a first war on Europien ground since World War 2, with zero foreign players and two boys from home town won 3 Euroleagues in a row, in 1989, 1990 and 1991. It's not that they won it, they destroyed everybody on their path.

Toni was final 4- MVP - 3 times in a row. After him and Jugoplastika, only 3 teams won back to back titles since. Nobody tripled.

Show me another Euroleague player that did what Toni did. There simply isn't such player. Šarūnas Jasikevičius? He won 3 Euroleagues in a row by changing team. And he is yet another player from list of people who couldn't keep up with speed to play in nba, years after Divac, Rada, Drazen, Toni already carved the path.

Toni Kukoc didn't win three straight EuroLeague Final Four MVPs. He won it in 1990, 1991, and in 1993. His Split teammate, Dino Radja, won it in 1989. So Kukoc didn't win three Final Four MVPs in a row, and he didn't win it each time on his own team.

Also, the EuroLeague Final Four MVP that Kukoc won in 1993 is an asterisk Final Four MVP award. Because his team at the time, Treviso, didn't win the EuroLeague championship. They lost in the EuroLeague Final to Limoges.

Kukoc got the Final Four MVP award, even though his team lost in the championship game. The vote for the Final Four MVP was held before the game ended, and it was a controversy when Kukoc got the award over Jure Zdovc and Michael Young from the winning Limoges team.

It was the first time a player from the losing team got the Final Four MVP award. After that, they changed the rules, so that the MVP could only come from the winning team.

So in reality, Kukoc really had two legit Final Four MVPs, and one asterisk illegitimate Final Four MVP.

As far as Kukoc winning the three EuroLeague championships with Split is concerned, that was one of the most ridiculously stacked teams in EuroLeague history. It had great coaches and players, and was without any doubt or question at all, by far and away the most stacked, deepest, and most talented team in the EuroLeague at that time. It's not even debatable either.

So all three of Kukoc's EuroLeague championships were won with the clear cut best, deepest, and most talented team in Europe. And he wasn't the clear leader of those first two championship teams either. As Dino Radja was equally important to the team's first two titles and was Final Four MVP on one of them. And over those two years, Radja was the team's first option on offense.

Then when Kukoc was playing on Treviso, that team also had the most expensive roster in Europe at the time. With the most expensive roster, he made the EuroLeague finals, but lost in the championship game.

The difference between those Split teams and Treviso, was that Treviso was a stacked and deep team for the time, while Split was a stacked and deep team for all of history, and is still universally considered to be one of the most stacked EuroLeague teams ever.

So, Kukoc won 3 EuroLeague championships, all of them with one of the most stacked teams ever, and the by far and away most stacked team at the time.

He won 2 of the 3 EuroLeague Final Four MVPs from those championships, with Dino Radja winning the other one. He was one of a two headed beast on that team, along with Radja, and it was a debate as to who was the best player of the team.

On the 1989 EuroLeague championship team:

Dino Radja - 18.6 PPG (MVP)
Toni Kukoc - 14.3 PPG

On the 1990 EuroLeague championship team:

Toni Kukoc - 17.9 PPG (MVP)
Dino Radja - 17.3 PPG

Kukoc also made another EuroLeague final, while playing on the most stacked team of the time (Treviso), and lost in the final to an underdog team (Limoges), in what is considered to be one of the biggest upsets ever in EuroLeague history.

Toni Kukoc's EuroLeague resume:

4 finals appearances (all on the most stacked teams in the league).
3 championships won (all on an all time stacked team).
2 championships won as one of the two best players on the team.
1 championship won as the best player on the team.
The EuroLeague Final he lost was one of the greatest upset losses in EuroLeague history.

2 legit Final Four MVPs.
1 eligitamite Final Four MVP (in the current era, he would have been disqualified and ineligible for the Final Four MVP award).

It's certainly good enough to be considered one of the all time great EuroLeague players. But that's not enough to be considered the EuroLeague GOAT. Several players had better EuroLeague careers than that.

[pepe1991]

Toni literally won 1991 Euroleague after both Rađa and Ivanović were gone to play in Italy. Pretty damn impressive.

Calling Jugoplastika team "stacked" is silly. 4/5 starters were local boys + almost entire bench was from locals. All were born in Split, Jugoplastika's city, with population of hardly 200 000 people. Barcelona alone had population of what, near 4 million people + at one point their coach was non other than Bozo Maljković - former Jugoplastika coach.

During their first two title runs, Jugoplastika didn't have single foreign player.


Bottom line, Toni Kukoć achieved 3-peat with born city that has population of two hoods of Paris, and did it with pretty much buddies from youth basketball team.
For his case for Euroleague GOAT, aside from titles, MVP awards , he also changed perception of size. 6'10- ball on the floor, face up, shooting over defenders, playmaking.
From impact POV- he is only player i know that won Euroleague, NBA, olympic medal, World cup medal and Eurobasket medal ( + won national leagues in Italy and Yugoslavia and national cups in both places).


How GREAT Kukoć really was? Well, national finals , 1991, verge of war, rivality between Partisan & Yugoplastika is boiling up and splitting over basketball, and Toni is getting standing ovations in middle of Serbia as Jugoplastika (POP) is taking another title. 4th in a row. That's also important to add. Yugoslavia had probably strongest league of that era in Europe. Toni's Jugoplastika won 4 in a row


Who in your mind had greater career than him ?

[LuDux1]

Cradle of basketball in Europe is Yugoslavia, weather somebody likes it or not. To this date it's still the same. Doncic, Jokić are just latest instalments of very long history. History goes all the way back to Radivoj Korać and Kresimic Cosic and 1960s.

I agree with sentiment, more or less, but not wording. Maybe "midwife", "nursery" or "breeding ground"?

I mean Latvia won first Eurobasket in 1935 with local players

[zimpy27]

League tiers between NBA, Euroleague, and other leagues around the world are not clearly defined, which was the discussion. Neither that nor tiers veteran players in the leagues are clearly defined. You waited over a month to answer something completely different from the conversation we were having lol. I genuinely can’t tell if you are trolling or really can’t track the conversation but think you did.

Tiers of worldwide international basketball leagues:

Tier 1.

National Basketball Association (NBA)

Tier 2.

EuroLeague

Tier 3.

EuroCup Basketball
FIBA Basketball Champions League
Liga ACB (Spain)

Tier 4.

Greek Basketball League (Greece)
Lega Basket Serie A (Italy)
LNB Pro A (France)
Basketboll Super Ligi (Turkey)
ABA League First Division (Adriatic League)
VTB United League (Russia)
Basketball Bundesliga (Germany)
Israeli Premier Basketball League (Israel)
Lietuvos Krepsinio Lyga (Lithuania)
National Basketball League (Australia)
FIBA Basketball Champions League Americas
FIBA Europe Cup

Tier 5.

FIBA South American League
Novo Basquete Brasil (Brazil)
Liga Nacional Basquetbol (Argentina)
Baloncesto Superior Nacional (Puerto Rico)

Tier 6.

NBA G League
Polska Liga Koszykowki (Poland)
BNXT League (Belgium & Netherlands)
LNBM (Romania)
National Basketball League (New Zealand)

Tier 7.

Chinese Basketball Association (China) Basketball 1 League (Japan)
Philippine Basketball Association (Philippines)

Australian NBL is tier 3, on par with Eurocup and BCL.

NBL teams usually play in the NBA preseason.

[Mavrelous]

Really odd ranking for Mike James, no way I'd rank him above Anthony Parker, or even short stint players like Luka and Bogi, but good for him getting recognition...

[Bankai]

Odd List. Are they only counting Players who spent most of their careers in the Euroleague, and not majority in the NBA?

[Mirotic12]

Tiers of worldwide international basketball leagues:

Tier 1.

National Basketball Association (NBA)

Tier 2.

EuroLeague

Tier 3.

EuroCup Basketball
FIBA Basketball Champions League
Liga ACB (Spain)

Tier 4.

Greek Basketball League (Greece)
Lega Basket Serie A (Italy)
LNB Pro A (France)
Basketboll Super Ligi (Turkey)
ABA League First Division (Adriatic League)
VTB United League (Russia)
Basketball Bundesliga (Germany)
Israeli Premier Basketball League (Israel)
Lietuvos Krepsinio Lyga (Lithuania)
National Basketball League (Australia)
FIBA Basketball Champions League Americas
FIBA Europe Cup

Tier 5.

FIBA South American League
Novo Basquete Brasil (Brazil)
Liga Nacional Basquetbol (Argentina)
Baloncesto Superior Nacional (Puerto Rico)

Tier 6.

NBA G League
Polska Liga Koszykowki (Poland)
BNXT League (Belgium & Netherlands)
LNBM (Romania)
National Basketball League (New Zealand)

Tier 7.

Chinese Basketball Association (China) Basketball 1 League (Japan)
Philippine Basketball Association (Philippines)

Australian NBL is tier 3, on par with Eurocup and BCL.

NBL teams usually play in the NBA preseason.

I considered putting the NBL on tier 3 with EuroCup and FIBA BCL, but I just don't think the best teams in the NBL are comparable.

Take like the top 3, 4, 5 teams in EuroCup and BCL, and they are significantly stronger than the top 3, 4, 5 teams in the NBL. And the same thing with the NBL compared to the Liga ACB.