Kobe's hand size vs Jordan's hand size

[Prolific Scorer]

Hasn't this been proven false over and over again? I'm not even a Jordan stan but damn..

If anything MJ played TOUGHER defenses, there were no illegal defenses, defensive 3 seconds. Opposing bigs could just camp out in the lane all day making it crowded and alot tougher to finish at the basket.

Not to mention defenders were allowed to handcheck, making life a little easier for defenders to try and stay with premere swingmen / slashers.

People just spout out anything, believing it's true. I guess if you say it enough you think people will eventually believe it.


HEY THE EASTER BUNNY IS REAL. I PROMISE.

[Frosty]

Hasn't this been proven false over and over again? I'm not even a Jordan stan but damn..

If anything MJ played TOUGHER defenses, there were no illegal defenses, defensive 3 seconds. Opposing bigs could just camp out in the lane all day making it crowded and alot tougher to finish at the basket.

Not to mention defenders were allowed to handcheck, making life a little easier for defenders to try and stay with premere swingmen / slashers.

People just spout out anything, believing it's true. I guess if you say it enough you think people will eventually believe it.


HEY THE EASTER BUNNY IS REAL. I PROMISE.

Give them something to cling to please

[Lakers05]

There was also no zone back then. Also, no one has yet to prove that handchecking was actually allowed. One tried to show it with a video, when it in fact, showed that handchecking was never allowed. That video also showed that Jordan were going against stiffs after stiffs. I mean, John Starks, Jeff Hornacek, Craig Elo(who's so bad that I can't even find his stats. I mean, putting him on Jordan is like putting Mike Penberthy on Kobe).

I mean, you would NEVER see Popovich put Ginobilli on Kobe, unless he absolutely has to. SVG tries as fast as possible to put Pietrus in the game(like I said, they should have just started Pietrus, not that it would have changed the series, but at least, it would have gotten them closer. The Magic had a chance to break away in game 4, but they couldn't do it, because Kobe was able to take advantage of Lee enough in the first quarter for us to stay in the game). Ray Allen gets torched immediately if he gets put on Kobe.

Also, if defenses were so tough, then why was the league average so high? People are so quick to put down Kobe's 61 points against the Knicks, well, imagine a league where that type of defense is THE AVERAGE. 37 PPG don't sound so impressive anymore. I seriously believe that, going against the same type of midgets and lead-footed defenders, Kobe could have averaged 40 back then.

Now league average doesn't tell the whole story. It doesn't show which position was strong and which was weak, and Jordan happened to play in an era where wings were extremely weak, especially defensively. Heck, the only guy that could reduce his PER happened to play on his own team(who couldn't do ANYTHING against Kobe, yes, he had surgery and past his prime back then, but you'd at least expect him to be somewhat decent, considering how good he was in his prime. Instead, he got torched on a regular basis.)

[NO-KG-AI]

Who are these stellar wing defenders that play today? The only great wing defenders that play right now are specialized guys that play better against jump shooters. Shane Battier or Ron Artest are going to cut Jordan's angles off? Give me a break.

[Lakers05]

They won't shut him down, but they'll contain him, and not just Artest and Battier, there's Bowen, Pierce, Marion, Carmelo(his size is enough to prevent Jordan from grabbing boards), Jefferson, Lebron, etc.

Then you go to the shooting guards and you have, Wade, Allen, and Roy who even if they can't defend him, will make him work defensively. So you can see that these days, if Kobe is not being guarded by defensive specialists, he has to guard guys who can score very well.

Jordan was guarded mostly by SGs and even PGs, a huge advantage over being guarded by SFs(if nothing else, his rebounding gets greatly inflated because of it), yet none of those guards was elite. So he didn't have to work offensively OR defensively. And if there's a guy that could conceivably make him work, he could just simply put Pippen on him.

I mean seriously, how much would Kobe average if he had guys like Wade, Allen, Roy and Hamilton on him all day, and have someone else defend them on the other end? I'd say easily 35. In his prime, probably 40.

[Baller 24]

Hasn't this been proven false over and over again? I'm not even a Jordan stan but damn..

If anything MJ played TOUGHER defenses, there were no illegal defenses, defensive 3 seconds. Opposing bigs could just camp out in the lane all day making it crowded and alot tougher to finish at the basket.

Not to mention defenders were allowed to handcheck, making life a little easier for defenders to try and stay with premere swingmen / slashers.

People just spout out anything, believing it's true. I guess if you say it enough you think people will eventually believe it.


HEY THE EASTER BUNNY IS REAL. I PROMISE.

Point on, but there are guys like Bgil and many other Kobe fans that use statistics to measure defense, although you can measure defensive statistic in some context, it clearly wasn't the same physically speaking.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5auPSMaD3vE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xJJNUkrdyQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=du-C-TvH ... re=related

[Lakers05]

I've only watched a bit of the first video but I gotta correct the announcer there, that's not hand-checking. That's putting your hand on the offensive player's hip. But that's nothing. I mean, Bowen gets away with that for virtually his entire career. The only thing that impressed me was the splitting the double move, but then again, you can make anyone look good by picking out his highlights.

[Lakers05]

Also, notice that most of the highlights are from the Knicks and Pistons, the only teams that played a resemblance of defense, at the time.

[Prolific Scorer]

Yeah, in Jordan's era there were nothing but a bunch of bums defensively. I mean really, there were no remotely good defenders let alone anyone who could guard anybody!

Vernon Maxwell
Joe Dumars
Clyde Drexler
Michael Cooper
Dennis Johnson
Sidney Moncrief
Alvin Robertson
Dan Majerle
Micheal Williams
John Starks
Gary Payton
Nate McMillian
Latrell Sprewell
Derrick McKey


Seriously, none of these guys can guard a fly, and they were just known as good defensive players for fun.

The length of ignorance Kobe stans show is infinite. They just spew nonsense in hopes nobody watched the game back then. Get a clue please.

[Frosty]

They won't shut him down, but they'll contain him, and not just Artest and Battier, there's Bowen, Pierce, Marion, Carmelo(his size is enough to prevent Jordan from grabbing boards), Jefferson, Lebron, etc.

Jordan was having no problems with Marion as an old man. No one has ever shut Jordan down, even a whole team. Heck he had Rodman on him before. Today a guy can make a name for himself as a lockdown defender by being long and guarding Kobe. Prince is still living off his rep from the Finals. We've never seen that level of defense from him since. Ray Allen made me wonder where his defense has been hiding when I saw him suddenly looking good last year vs Kobe.

Kobe builds guys defensive reputations

Jordan shredded them

[Lakers05]

Jordan had no problems with Marion? I guess getting blocked twice before making one qualifies as having no problems in your world. Same as your observation of Allen's defense. His "defense" was the reason we got a big lead in game 4, won it at the end of game 5, and hung around in game 6, until he got taken to the locker room.

But hey, if you think Allen is a good defender, then that just proves that your standard of good defense is very low, in which case, it must mean that Jordan had to face some very pathetic defenders.

[Lakers05]

Yeah, in Jordan's era there were nothing but a bunch of bums defensively. I mean really, there were no remotely good defenders let alone anyone who could guard anybody!

Vernon Maxwell
Joe Dumars
Clyde Drexler
Michael Cooper
Dennis Johnson
Sidney Moncrief
Alvin Robertson
Dan Majerle
Micheal Williams
John Starks
Gary Payton
Nate McMillian
Latrell Sprewell
Derrick McKey


Seriously, none of these guys can guard a fly, and they were just known as good defensive players for fun.

The length of ignorance Kobe stans show is infinite. They just spew nonsense in hopes nobody watched the game back then. Get a clue please.

Notice that none of those guys, save for Drexler(who's not even a good defender), is over 6'5. They may be good defenders for their position, but not against guys like Jordan and Kobe.

[ponder276]

In terms of skill sets I'd say the two were about equal. Jordan was definitely better from mid range (though part of that was due to his superior ability to create space due to superior atheticism), and more effective in the post (the Kobe is also very good in the post), while Kobe has better range on his jumper, and maybe runs the P&R a bit better (though it's hard to say, cause Jordan never played with P&R bigs with the ability of guys like Shaq or Gasol). Overall their skill sets are eerily similar though. Where Jordan pulls away from Kobe is in his physical ability (bigger hands, thicker/stronger in general, better leaper, quicker both in terms of open court speed and changing directions). Young Kobe was a great athlete, but young Jordan had significantly better tools in pretty much every way.

[TonyParker]

For the record, Bruce has said that MJ was by far the most difficult player he's ever had to guard. This is Bruce Bowen in his physical prime, playing against MJ that was well past his physical prime.

[HouMac]

Jordan had no problems with Marion? .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fp__LVQv ... age&fmt=18

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKhiBMvfTtg

@ anyone who thinks prime MJ doesn't BEAST today when he averaged 21.5/6/4.5/43% from the age of 38-40 on BUM knees under the tougher defensive rules of 2001-2003.

[Rerisen]

Notice that none of those guys, save for Drexler(who's not even a good defender), is over 6'5. They may be good defenders for their position, but not against guys like Jordan and Kobe.

Actually, smaller quicker guys had a better chance against Michael than taller less agile guys. That's why stout guys with good core strength like Dumars could do the best that could be asked. Taller guys just didn't have the foot speed. M.J. was guarded by taller guys like Sean Elliot, Stacy Augmon, Steve Smith, even big thugs like Anthony Mason and Xavier McDaniel and none of them could stay with him. The big guys fared WORSE than the little guys if anything.

Jordan was guarded by the best perimeter defender possibly of all time, Scottie Pippen, in practice every day and was said to have routinely lit him up. A scorer as good as M.J, you just cannot guard them 1v1.

That some people think Michael Pietrus is a good defender nowadays just shows how far individual defense has fallen in the league today. He is slow footed and has terrible instincts.

That even the Defensive Player of the Year is said to play worse man to man defense than his backup, doesn't say much for state of defense today.

The reason Kobe has trouble with taller guys is because he doesn't have the first step or separating ability of M.J. Even short guys stay with Kobe, but he just shoots over them, but big guys stay with him as well, and he has trouble shooting over them. Go watch highlights of Michael's mid range jumper or fadeaway, he creates so much space that the defender often isn't even within half a step of him when he releases his shot. Bigger guys had even less chance to match his footspeed.

What is tough for Kobe Is Not Equal To what is tough for M.J. Stop thinking they are the same player and it all makes sense.

[kooldude]

^Besides Pietrus, your post is spot on.

I don't think he's slow footed at all. His instincts are bad in terms of help defense/rotations, but his man defense was pretty good during the playoffs.

[Rerisen]

but his man defense was pretty good during the playoffs.

I think he played LeBron well (because he has a bit of bulk) but not Kobe. LeBron is very straight forward about his moves, he is just hard to stop because of his strength. But Kobe is more shifty and Pietrus was fooled often. He constantly fell for Kobe's shot fakes, was actually trying to block his shots (not good defensive fundamentals) and was slow often having to catch up and contest from the side and behind.

A lot of credit goes to the Lakers offense rubbing him as well. It's not all him being slow, I should have clarified, but having trouble getting around picks and screens.

[kooldude]

but his man defense was pretty good during the playoffs.

I think he played LeBron well (because he has a bit of bulk) but not Kobe. LeBron is very straight forward about his moves, he is just hard to stop because of his strength. But Kobe is more shifty and Pietrus was fooled often. He constantly fell for Kobe's shot fakes, was actually trying to block his shots (not good defensive fundamentals) and was slow often having to catch up and contest from the side and behind.

A lot of credit goes to the Lakers offense rubbing him as well. It's not all him being slow, I should have clarified, but having trouble getting around picks and screens.

I agree he was bad with screens and off the ball with Kobe (where he was caught dead alot of times) but straight up against Kobe, he was solid. I can only remember a few times that he fell for his fakes. Most of the time, he contested, didn't try to block the shots.

[Rerisen]

Getting back to the size discussion about Jordan defenders. I remember coming into the 93 Finals people thought Dan Majerle would do a good job on M.J. because he was big and strong 6'6", 2 time All Defensive 2nd teamer. But he couldn't do anything with M.J, and actually the times they put K.J. (Kevin Johnson) on Michael, I think he did just as well or even better than Thunder Dan.

Sure Michael could post up a short guy like K.J. and get some easy baskets inside on him, or shoot his fadeaway (which he also could over tall guys easily) but K.J. was better at moving his feet and staying in front, at least making Mike take a few more jumpers.