MJ VS LEBRON VS WHOEVER THREAD

[dautjazz]

People like to talk about MJ like he was perfect because he went 6-0 in the Finals, but he was far from perfect in the 1996 and 1998 Finals, and he lost to a young Magic in the 2nd round in 1995. To me between what Lebron did in 2016 which tops anything MJ ever did in the playoffs, and his longevity, I have him over MJ. RINGZ aren't everything, if not Russell would be #1.

1. Lebron
2. MJ
3. Kareem
4. Wilt
5. Magic
6. Bird
7. Shaq
8. Duncan
9. Olajuwon
10. Russell

I mean Lebron is good and all, but as soon as he went west he went from the finals all the time to missing the playoffs and this all while he had been down in a series each and every year of his career at least 3-2 in a series (2 of the years even with HCA that was won and 3 of the years where he lost with HCA). No other top 10 player has this happened to. All the other top 10 players all time has gone thru a playoff run without being down 3-2 in a series.

Jordan is the GOAT. Never lost with HCA and never was down 3-2 in a series with HCA and never played with anyone who won league or finals mvp for a season either.

Oh come on man, the Lakers were playing fine, they were in 4th, then the Pelicans' GM decide to make a circus around the trade deadline, making the Lakers increase their offer to the point where they were including everyone outside of Lebron, then to just say sike. Obviously that destroyed the Laker's locker room. Lebron also missed 27 games, lets not act like Magic put together an incredible supporting cast for Lebron last year to carry the load when he was hurt. Not to mention the 2nd best player, Ingram, had blood clots and missed 30 games. Kuzma missed 12, Ball missed 35, Rondo missed 36, etc. Hard to say how MJ would faired in this situation since he only played 15 seasons, and that's being generous since he only played 18 games his 2nd season and 17 games in his return season. MJ in 1998 was the same age as Lebron was last season, do you think an injured 34 year old MJ would of been able to push the Lakers through all the **** that was going on with that squad and all their injuries?

Never lost with HCA, BUT he lost to the Pistons three years in a row, and he lost to a 22yr old Shaq and 23yr old Hardaway in 1995, with a loaded Bulls team that had won 55 games the season before without MJ. So we are going to penalize Lebron for missing the playoffs, but we'll ignore the fact that MJ had his short comings. Also MJ would of missed the playoffs several seasons in the modern NBA.

Between 1985 the Bulls made the playoffs with 38, 30, and 40 wins. For comparison's sake, Lebron's Lakers had 37 wins are were 9 games out of the playoffs.

[Quattro]

:roll:

Me being a Knicks fan doesn't change that you seem to struggle with counting. Russell and Kareem have won much more, hence "sustained excellent", Lebron has stayed at his peak prime level much longer, hence "sustained excellence." Jordan lacks sustained excellence when compared to goats, hence he isn't the goat.

Jordan was in his prime for his entire career

And his prime was far shorter than Kareem and Lebron.

Are you sure you're good at counting?

Ya it’s fine. Can we stick to the topic at hand though please. You know, how much better than Lebron Jordan was?

[Joao Saraiva]

Yeah, I'm not sure why Wilt would be above the "players might go up and down" thing, when KG and Duncan had similar peaks stastically with much better longetivty. Hakeem has the best peak case outside of lebron, mj, and shaq, and there's a long slew of greater winners.

Because unlike Wilt they don't provide stupid statistical outlier seasons. That's why. They didn't lead the league in scoring, FG%, minutes, hadn't crazy TRB% like Wilt... Should I carry on?

Im' confused, are we comparing overall players, or "goat volume scoring" "goat minuites", and "goat trb%"?

Why the **** should anyone care about "stastical outlier seasons" if none of those seasons are an actual outlier as an overall package?

All right if you think Wilt isn't an outlier after having a ton of records in the NBA for more than 50 years... Idk what to say. Maybe look on what outlier means? I'm actually confused somebody can't understand what outlier means.

[life_saver]

Lebron is the better basketball player whereas MJ is the better gambler

[iggymcfrack]

It's kind of funny when I see people say that MJ was "by far" the best player on all his championship teams. Outside of scoring, which we all know MJ was the best scorer on those teams, lets look at the other totals between MJ and Scottie Pippen.

In order, I'm going minutes played,rebounds, assists, blocks, steals for each Finals they won.

1991 MJ - 220, 33, 57, 7, 14
1991 SP - 218, 47, 33, 5, 12

1992 MJ - 254, 29, 39, 2, 10
1992 SP - 244, 50, 46, 4, 9

1993 MJ - 274, 51, 38, 4, 10
1993 SP - 266, 55, 46, 4, 9

1996 MJ- 252, 32, 25, 1, 10
1996 SP - 248, 49, 32, 8, 14

1997 MJ - 256, 42, 36, 5, 7
1997 SP - 256, 50, 21, 11, 10

1998 MJ - 250, 24, 14, 4, 11
1998 SP - 237, 41, 29, 5, 10

MJ's totals - 1,506, 211, 209, 23, 62
SP's totals - 1,469, 292, 207, 37, 64

Even though MJ played a total of 37 more minutes, looks like Pippen dominated the boards, push on assists, Pippen with more blocks and a push on steals. Plus factor in that Pippen was the anchor on defense for probably 5 out of those 6 Finals. I'd give the edge to MJ in 1991 even though Pippen had a breakout defensive series one would say. Plus this isn't even counting Rodman's defense and rebounding in 96,97 and 98.

So to suggest that MJ was by far the best player on those Bulls championship teams, the numbers show that is a far cry from the truth.

Dude. Dude. How old are you? Did you watch those games?

If you did not watch those games, then you have no idea.


Do you realize the heat Jordan dealt with? Hand checking on the perimeter, clobbered when he went to the rim. You were allowed to hand and hip check.

Ridiculous observation of you actually watched the series.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I watched those games. By the second 3-peat, you couldn’t breathe on Jordan without getting a foul called, but he was still allowed to rough people up at the other end to cause chaos and force turnovers. Acting like Jordan was disadvantaged by the refereeing throughout his Finals runs is downright ludicrous. He was probably the most protected player in the history of the NBA.

[Joao Saraiva]

It's kind of funny when I see people say that MJ was "by far" the best player on all his championship teams. Outside of scoring, which we all know MJ was the best scorer on those teams, lets look at the other totals between MJ and Scottie Pippen.

In order, I'm going minutes played,rebounds, assists, blocks, steals for each Finals they won.

1991 MJ - 220, 33, 57, 7, 14
1991 SP - 218, 47, 33, 5, 12

1992 MJ - 254, 29, 39, 2, 10
1992 SP - 244, 50, 46, 4, 9

1993 MJ - 274, 51, 38, 4, 10
1993 SP - 266, 55, 46, 4, 9

1996 MJ- 252, 32, 25, 1, 10
1996 SP - 248, 49, 32, 8, 14

1997 MJ - 256, 42, 36, 5, 7
1997 SP - 256, 50, 21, 11, 10

1998 MJ - 250, 24, 14, 4, 11
1998 SP - 237, 41, 29, 5, 10

MJ's totals - 1,506, 211, 209, 23, 62
SP's totals - 1,469, 292, 207, 37, 64

Even though MJ played a total of 37 more minutes, looks like Pippen dominated the boards, push on assists, Pippen with more blocks and a push on steals. Plus factor in that Pippen was the anchor on defense for probably 5 out of those 6 Finals. I'd give the edge to MJ in 1991 even though Pippen had a breakout defensive series one would say. Plus this isn't even counting Rodman's defense and rebounding in 96,97 and 98.

So to suggest that MJ was by far the best player on those Bulls championship teams, the numbers show that is a far cry from the truth.

Dude. Dude. How old are you? Did you watch those games?

If you did not watch those games, then you have no idea.


Do you realize the heat Jordan dealt with? Hand checking on the perimeter, clobbered when he went to the rim. You were allowed to hand and hip check.

Ridiculous observation of you actually watched the series.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I watched those games. By the second 3-peat, you couldn’t breathe on Jordan without getting a foul called, but he was still allowed to rough people up at the other end to cause chaos and force turnovers. Acting like Jordan was disadvantaged by the refereeing throughout his Finals runs is downright ludicrous. He was probably the most protected player in the history of the NBA.

To be fair you shouldn't let scoring out of the equation.

Being a great scorer is a big thing, and you're basically excluding the best contribution of MJ. Why should you?

Also MJ playing more minutes just shows he was more available. You can't fault him for that. You should reward him for maintaining high impact on a ton of minutes.

Also in 98 remember that Pippen went down in game 6. Jordan didn't have great efficiency that night, but he did whatever was needed to get the W...

Jordan was the best player on his team. Even in 96, the worst of his NBA finals series.

[stormi]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

[OdomFan]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

I disagree with the bold. Boo hoo he punched someone in the face, it's not like he put them on the injury list. Steve Kerr respected MJ for demanding him to step it up and it paid off when MJ gave him the ball for a Finals winning basket. All of MJ's teammates respected him.

[iggymcfrack]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

Jordan was a better free throw shooter by a significant margin. That’s his one clear edge.

Also, I’m all for recognizing that today’s era is significantly tougher with a much larger player pool and generally has a lot more skill on the floor at any given time, but saying Jordan isn’t close to today’s superstars is ridiculous. He was a mega-elite scorer who was very efficient due to what he did at the rim even when the jumper wasn’t falling and he’s one of the best perimeter defenders in the history of the league. He might not have been able to bring a championship to Cleveland in LeBron’s shoes, but he’d still be one of the very best players in the league in any era.

[OdomFan]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

Jordan was a better free throw shooter by a significant margin. That’s his one clear edge.

Jordan also listened to his coaches better.

[iggymcfrack]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

Jordan was a better free throw shooter by a significant margin. That’s his one clear edge.

Jordan also listened to his coaches better.

Jordan’s basically said himself that he didn’t start paying attention to his coaches until Doug Collins and later Phil Jackson joined the team. Great players will listen to great coaches. Meh coaches? Not so much. Other than Spoelstra, LeBron’s had a pretty rotten run of coaches throughout his career. Paul Silas, Brendan Malone, Mike Brown, David Blatt, and Tyronn Lue have all shown themselves to be largely incompetent and have won absolutely nothing away from LeBron.

[GusFring]

Find it funny the new ideas for goat bball players is being an activist or how they changed things off the court. I know its probably boring to always see MJ as the goat but we're talking basketball here, not activism and personality.

[ckman]

First DPOY was given in the 1980s. Good to see you not having any knowledge about NBA history.

So? that doesn't explain anything about how Jordan got way more NBA defensive 1st team than the other , i'm not the one who saying one is way better defensively than the other

So? You posted that Cowens, Hayes and DeBusschere didn't have DPOY to make a case for Jordan, when they couldn't have won this award because it didn't exist in 1970s.
DeBusschere also played half of his career without all-defensive teams.

You know that all-defensive teams only shows how good you are relative to position? Jordan is ATG defensive guard, nobody denies that but ATG defensive guard pales in comparison to ATG defensive center. Cowens and Hayes had to fight with Thurmond, Kareem Wilt, Gilmore, Walton and Unseld for ONE spot. All of them were better than any guard defensively.

Not to mention that I am talking about defensive impact, not meaningless defensive accolades.

Lol so basically what you’re saying is just based on your logic of center is more defensive impactful
Instead of providing any proves or stats to back it up, you just make a statement of a 9 time Defensive 1st team guard is WAY MORE worse defensively than a 1 time Defensive 1st Team center & another 0 time defensive 1st team center based on that logic
Then you went on asking other to provide reason to prove you’re wrong while you unable to provide anything, got it

btw Jordan career DBPM 1.2
Hayes career DBPM 1.0
but i’m sure this is also a meaningless stats because Hayes is a CENTER

[BigtimeNBAfan]

One major strike against MJ that isn't brought up with the constant "Lebron played with superteam" argument is Jordan's team won 55 games without him. Lebron's supposed super team missed the playoffs without him in 2015. It is a myth those Heat teams were a better supporting cast than what MJ had.

[70sFan]

So? that doesn't explain anything about how Jordan got way more NBA defensive 1st team than the other , i'm not the one who saying one is way better defensively than the other

So? You posted that Cowens, Hayes and DeBusschere didn't have DPOY to make a case for Jordan, when they couldn't have won this award because it didn't exist in 1970s.
DeBusschere also played half of his career without all-defensive teams.

You know that all-defensive teams only shows how good you are relative to position? Jordan is ATG defensive guard, nobody denies that but ATG defensive guard pales in comparison to ATG defensive center. Cowens and Hayes had to fight with Thurmond, Kareem Wilt, Gilmore, Walton and Unseld for ONE spot. All of them were better than any guard defensively.

Not to mention that I am talking about defensive impact, not meaningless defensive accolades.

Lol so basically what you’re saying is just based on your logic of center is more defensive impactful
Instead of providing any proves or stats to back it up, you just make a statement of a 9 time Defensive 1st team guard is WAY MORE worse defensively than a 1 time Defensive 1st Team center & another 0 time defensive 1st team center based on that logic
Then you went on asking other to provide reason to prove you’re wrong while you unable to provide anything, got it

btw Jordan career DBPM 1.2
Hayes career DBPM 1.0
but i’m sure this is also a meaningless stats because Hayes is a CENTER

It's common knowledge that interior defenders are far more impactful than guys on perimeter. It's not my logic, it's a common knowledge. Perimeter player can't anchor defense, it's easy to understand why - layups are the most efficient shots in basketball and center is in ideal position to contest thesr shots. Center is also in perfect position to observe plays, help his teammates and navigate them. All you need to do is play one basketball game and you'll know that.

Tell me why the most inpactful defenders by various impact metrics are all bigs if I'm wrong?

DBPM doesn't rank defense, it's just a differential between BPM and OBPM. Besides, BPM is just a combination of boxscore stats and you can't judge player's defensive impact based on boxscore stats. You need to look at impact stats like DRPM, DRAPM and others. You also have to watch games of course. How many Hayes games have you seen?

[Roddy B for 3]

MJ was just better than LeBron.

[ckman]

So? You posted that Cowens, Hayes and DeBusschere didn't have DPOY to make a case for Jordan, when they couldn't have won this award because it didn't exist in 1970s.
DeBusschere also played half of his career without all-defensive teams.

You know that all-defensive teams only shows how good you are relative to position? Jordan is ATG defensive guard, nobody denies that but ATG defensive guard pales in comparison to ATG defensive center. Cowens and Hayes had to fight with Thurmond, Kareem Wilt, Gilmore, Walton and Unseld for ONE spot. All of them were better than any guard defensively.

Not to mention that I am talking about defensive impact, not meaningless defensive accolades.

Lol so basically what you’re saying is just based on your logic of center is more defensive impactful
Instead of providing any proves or stats to back it up, you just make a statement of a 9 time Defensive 1st team guard is WAY MORE worse defensively than a 1 time Defensive 1st Team center & another 0 time defensive 1st team center based on that logic
Then you went on asking other to provide reason to prove you’re wrong while you unable to provide anything, got it

btw Jordan career DBPM 1.2
Hayes career DBPM 1.0
but i’m sure this is also a meaningless stats because Hayes is a CENTER

It's common knowledge that interior defenders are far more impactful than guys on perimeter. It's not my logic, it's a common knowledge. Perimeter player can't anchor defense, it's easy to understand why - layups are the most efficient shots in basketball and center is in ideal position to contest thesr shots. Center is also in perfect position to observe plays, help his teammates and navigate them. All you need to do is play one basketball game and you'll know that.

Tell me why the most inpactful defenders by various impact metrics are all bigs if I'm wrong?

DBPM doesn't rank defense, it's just a differential between BPM and OBPM. Besides, BPM is just a combination of boxscore stats and you can't judge player's defensive impact based on boxscore stats. You need to look at impact stats like DRPM, DRAPM and others. You also have to watch games of course. How many Hayes games have you seen?

So instead of providing any facts to back up your argument , you went on to dispute whatever stats other provided and now said it's about eye test lol
Such a lame excuse trying to say that because defensive metric mostly dominate by bigs, so some random bigs that not even on the list are WAY BETTER than the ELITE defensive guard , yeah that's your statement WAY BETTER , NOT EVEN CLOSE
Anyway , i guess people always only believe what they believe no matter they're wrong or not.
Keep believe what you believing, nothing wrong with that , just don't come out with these "Not Even Close" bs if you can't prove anything

[freethedevil]

So? You posted that Cowens, Hayes and DeBusschere didn't have DPOY to make a case for Jordan, when they couldn't have won this award because it didn't exist in 1970s.
DeBusschere also played half of his career without all-defensive teams.

You know that all-defensive teams only shows how good you are relative to position? Jordan is ATG defensive guard, nobody denies that but ATG defensive guard pales in comparison to ATG defensive center. Cowens and Hayes had to fight with Thurmond, Kareem Wilt, Gilmore, Walton and Unseld for ONE spot. All of them were better than any guard defensively.

Not to mention that I am talking about defensive impact, not meaningless defensive accolades.

Lol so basically what you’re saying is just based on your logic of center is more defensive impactful
Instead of providing any proves or stats to back it up, you just make a statement of a 9 time Defensive 1st team guard is WAY MORE worse defensively than a 1 time Defensive 1st Team center & another 0 time defensive 1st team center based on that logic
Then you went on asking other to provide reason to prove you’re wrong while you unable to provide anything, got it

btw Jordan career DBPM 1.2
Hayes career DBPM 1.0
but i’m sure this is also a meaningless stats because Hayes is a CENTER

It's common knowledge that interior defenders are far more impactful than guys on perimeter.n?

Well, generally, yes. Obviously, it still goes case by case.

"DBPM" a trash stat, but I wouldn't just auto-assume, center> perimiter player, esepcially if there's conflicting data.

[freethedevil]

One major strike against MJ that isn't brought up with the constant "Lebron played with superteam" argument is Jordan's team won 55 games without him. Lebron's supposed super team missed the playoffs without him in 2015. It is a myth those Heat teams were a better supporting cast than what MJ had.

Meh wade and bosh got way worse. The lebron cavs from the first stint are probably the better exmaple of that sort of argument, even then tho it's somewhat misleading due to roster turnover on jordan's behalf. While Lebron's best seasons stastically are generally slightly more impactful per raw impact than jordan's(with the eepction of the 09 playoffs), it's not a collosal gap. And there's a decent argument the gap there is made up for jordan being signifcantly better off-the ball

[freethedevil]

There isn't one thing Jordan does better than Lebron

Lebron is a better passer, much better shooter, better defender, way greater sense of court awareness and doesn't punch his teammates in the face.

Lebron shoots better from all 3 levels, a speciman of an athlete and has an adequate offensive game outside of spamming midrange jumpers

Jordan can be the goat of his era but he's not close to the superstars of today

Jordan was a better free throw shooter by a significant margin. That’s his one clear edge.

Jordan also listened to his coaches better.

Not really. He was beefing with phil until the end of 1989 the same way jordan beefed with spo. Post-spo the coaches were terrible lockeroom presences or tactically inept.