Ben wrote:Really and truly false. Why are you sleeping on Kukoc like that? He was better than anyone on our current team except Rose. Wonderful passer, capable scorer and rebounder, beautiful shot... he was terrific. Kukoc was a better all-around player than Rodman, in fact. Rodman was just better at his one skill than anyone else around-- well, let's call it 2 skills, because one of them was getting under the other team's skin.
I strongly disagree with the claim that Kukoc was better than Noah, Deng, or Rodman. I'd take Jimmy and Boozer over Kukoc also possibly. What was Rodman's one skill? Was it arguably the best all around defense of any player ever (and of course defense is half the game), or was it inarguably the best rebounding of an era? Or was it the excellent outlet passing? Kukoc was pretty much a piss poor rebounder for a guy who played more 4 than anything, and was also an outright poor defender. Rodman is a HOFer. Kukoc was a significant step down from him IMO. I mean the biggest difference between a team that couldn't beat the Magic to the best team of all time was replacing Kukoc with Rodman in the starting lineup.
Dude.
It doesn't matter what his career 3P was; that year he was absolutely unbelievable. 50.6% from the floor, 51.5% from 3, and you're going to call him overrated on that particular team?
Kerr shot .321 from 3 in the playoffs that year. I know he had a great regular season but I'm a playoffs guy and other than a memorable shot or two off of MJ double teams, Kerr wasn't a good playoff player most years of his career especially including the 95-96 team. BTW, Scottie and Kukoc scored just 13-15 pp36 in those playoffs also and both shot under 40% from the field.
Like we have anyone even remotely like that. (We don't.) You say that you would take Kirk over Kerr, but they play very different roles-- and as a dead-eye sharpshooter Kerr was probably the best in the league that year, whereas as a utility guard Kirk is far below average.
Kirk has a MUCH higher career 3pt % in the playoffs than Kerr (and in fact in only one year in his career did Kirk shoot nearly as bad as Kerr did in the playoffs that year), higher scoring rate, light years better defense, much better ball handling and playmaking. I mean, there's a reason that Kirk was a lottery pick and near all star caliber player in his career and Kerr was never really anything more than Anthony Morrow or Kyle Korver at best.
Gar Paxdorf wrote:The big men were sub-par but adequate, and not worse than Nazr. The thing was that we were so deep, we could just rotate guys in and out and give fouls. The rest of the team was tremendous at rebounding and D, so it didn't matter so much. Team rebounding was probably better on the 95-96 squad, compared to its opponents, than it is on our current squad compared to our opponents.
The reason that Bulls team had to rotate guys in and out to give fouls was because they were so bad that's all they could do. Nazr even at his old age wipes the floor with Wennington, Edwards, Haley, Salley, etc IMO. Defense was top of the league elite for both that Bulls team and our current squad if healthy. Rebounding I think our current squad has an edge if healthy.
Again, you're just not getting how incredibly important it is to have TWO giants like MJ and Pippen, who together were better than LBJ and Wade, plus an incredibly skilled player like Kukoc and an absolutely elite rebounder like Rodman. That foursome is just incredible. They blew everyone else out of the water. Our team now is neat, I love them, but it will be a big surprise to most of us if we win the title.
I actually don't think 95-96 MJ and Pippen was better than LBJ and Wade at their peak. Pippen scored 14.8 pp36 on 39% shooting in the playoffs that year. But you're still right, that foursome is awesome. But you play 5 guys at a time and at least 8 even in the biggest games. And I absolutely think that Boozer, Butler, Taj, Brand, Nate and Dunleavy are all better than the 5th best player on that Bulls team.
[/quote]Anyway, I'll let others take a hand in this. I appreciate the diversion, and you do a good job in giving us something else to talk about besides Nate and FA.
I'll take it!
