Greater: Kobe Bryant vs Stephen Curry

[Some smartguy]

Kobe. He was a near match for Curry offensively but was named to 9 All-Defense Teams.

Curry's level of impact on offense blows Kobe out of the water lol.

Magic Johnson & Larry Bird has 0 All-Defense teams & 3 All-Defensive teams respectively.

Are they worse than Kobe Bryant in all-time ranking as well?

Sorry, were we talking about Magic and Larry? On the GOAT curve, Magic beats out Kobe, and Bird is similar, but a case could be made that Kobe was a better player than both of them. Magic and Bird had better careers, but Kobe is probably the best overall player of the three.

How does Curry have a significantly higher offensive output? Looking at any stats, advanced or regular, Curry only has a slight edge offensively. He shot a better percentage and had, as I said before, a near match for Kobe in advanced stats.

[Southpaw]

It's Kobe by a safe margin right now tho Steph can still overtake him. The problem with Steph right now is he has a very high but short peak and the rest of his career has been injury riddled. Let's see how he finishes his career and assess from there.

[art_tatum]

Kobe wasn't great in the Finals either, and I think Curry was probably better in the Finals than Kobe. I'll take a healthy peak Curry over peak Kobe, but yeah his Curry has had a relatively short prime, lets say it started in 2013-14, and he's missed a ton of games. Curry injuries and relative short prime for a superstar hurt his all-time placement, if not he'd easily be top 20 all-time, maybe top 15.

Yeah if you actually look at the numbers, curry had better playoffs and finals performances on avg. Even when he lost the 15 fmvp he was at 27 ppg and top 3 all time in 4th quarter scoring.
His only bad year was 2016.
Now curry had 2 years with durant but kobe also had 4 with shaq in the finals. Curry then had 3 with green and klay ( except his missed time 2019). While kobe had 2 with gasol + by um/odom. So I think talent level is sort of even.

Defensively im sure kobe had more impact, not sure about the advanced stats didn't look that up.

You cant just look at raw numbers, the pace in the early to late 2000s was much slower than todays

Numbers are inflated today with the higher pace and softer calls that heavily favor offenses

Kobe had Shaq, an MVP caliber guy like KD, but he didn't have 2 more all stars on top of good role guys

And in 2009 and 2010, his team, while one of the best at the time, didn't compare to what Curry had

Curry is getting really exposed and this year may really hurt his legacy

Curry has 0 fmvps and in 2015 they beat a destroyed Cavs team whose 2nd best player was likely Mozgov, and next 3 were JR, Delly, and TT, just think about that

If BKN does well this year, KD does great (seems to be fine), and GS suffers, this is an awful look for Curry

Curry is 33 in a few months, not like he has much more time and he keeps getting hurt

If he can't win a fmvp in his career, he will effectively have let KD basically cuck him since he begged for KD to come

Curry had his chance in 2016 and he blew it and in 2017/2018 they would have had a shot even w/o KD to win it all, but Curry was scared of Lebron

Those lakers team's during the 3 peat and even the year after were all time teams.
You can't just say after 4games last season and 1 game this season curry is washed and can't lead a team. That does what he did in 2013 2014 and the 2019 finals a disservice.
As you recall prime kobe couldn't lead the lakers team anywhere before gasol came halfway through the 07? season. Was kobe exposed? No, even when He had more sample size. And he also didn't have fmvps when playing next to shaq either. " experts" now say he should've gotten it in 2015 based on that they didn't fully understand his gravity and style. But it doesn't matter. Everyone knows he's the top player in those teams and in 2019. If you look at 17 and 18 playoffs minus the finals curry actually has better stats and lead the offense more than durant. He got pushed to 1b bc its hoe the cavs defend the warriors offense, deny curry first. When he finally played a different team in the finals with no durant and missing some of klay, he added 30 and had the beat offensive game in the series when klay was out.

Kobe is amazing in his prime but I would still take prime curry in a team.

Also its draymonds annoying ass that called durant. And its his annoying ass that drove him out lol

[LakerLegend]

2001 Kobe was already better than Curry ever was.

Curry has benefited more than anyone due to softening of defense and the era/system/team he plays in.

Look at the numbers perimeter guys like Doncic/Trae Young/Westbrook/Harden have been doing.

Videogame numbers unfathomable before.

[D.Brasco]

2001 Kobe was already better than Curry ever was.

Curry has benefited more than anyone due to softening of defense and the era/system/team he plays in.

Look at the numbers perimeter guys like Doncic/Trae Young/Westbrook/Harden have been doing.

Videogame numbers unfathomable before.

2016 Curry is one of the GOAT seasons in NBA history, 2001 Kobe is not on that level. Career goes to Kobe however.

[Beethoven]

The great Kobe Bryant of course lol

[Marrrcuss]

Imagine Kobe never having to play defense

[UnbelievablyRAW]

I think the fact everyone universally has the Warriors out of the playoffs because they don't have Klay says something about how great they think Curry actually is. No one looked at Lebron or Harden or even Spurs Kawhi and didn't think their teams would be among the top of the conference every year regardless of injury or roster.

[Gerald3Wallace]

It’s kobe. And I don’t think Curry is catching up. Turning 33 in three months. Not having Klay there is gonna hurt his chances for another ring.

[karkinos]

Curry had a higher offensive peak, but Kobe was a significantly better defender.
Kobe also had greater longevity, assuming a normal decline curve for Curry. Kobe was also the unquestioned best player on two title teams, while Curry only one. Curry also doesn't have a FMVP, while Kobe has 2.

It's a good comparison, but I feel like it's Kobe pretty comfortably tbh.

agree
it's about if you value peak vs longevity at the end of the day

[UcanUwill]

Better and Greater are somewhat different. I think Kobe is easily greater, better also but not by as much as greatness goes.

[Young gun 6]

If I was ranking their best seasons it would be something like (inc playoffs):

1) Curry
2) Kobe
3) Kobe
4) Kobe
5) Curry
6) Kobe
7) Kobe
8) Curry
9) Kobe
10) Kobe
11) Kobe
12) Kobe
13) Kobe

[CodeBreaker]

Recency bias.

Steph was injured all last season and didn't have a good first game. Public perception is always short-term memory.

If this thread was made 2 years ago, Steph would be leading.

Recency bias is the reason why curry gets votes in the first place.

I don't want to sound inconsiderate but people also tend to overinflate players careers once they retire.

I feel Kobe is very much underrated today compared to his prime years of playing. And Curry is still in his prime.

And I always hated Kobe, because I never liked the Lakers.

[JujitsuFlip]

I like how this poll turned out, kudos to the GB for getting it right!

[Optms]

Both playes exude greatness and have had their nay sayers.

But Curry is unlike anything I have seen before. Curry will go down as a top 5 player ever. I do not even mind that his defense isn't good, his offense is that otherworldly.

[Onlytimewilltel]

I like how this poll turned out, kudos to the GB for getting it right!

Start another one today and you’ll probably get slightly different results. What have you done for me lately is a thing.

[Sakkreth]

Kobe is around 12th all time, Curry is not top 15 yet, but might crack it. Probably won't overtake Kobe tho.

[reanimator]

Kobe sure is one of the very few players who is a consistent litmus vs other players. I wonder if you aggregated all the comparison threads ever posted on Realgm, which players would come out on top.

[JujitsuFlip]

I like how this poll turned out, kudos to the GB for getting it right!

Start another one today and you’ll probably get slightly different results. What have you done for me lately is a thing.

I was about to until I searched and found this one. It has nearly 500 votes, no way a new poll will match that level of voter participation.

[bbalnation]

Steph and Kobe actually have similar enough careers, funnily enough. Whether its playing with an arguably more dominant force (KD & Shaq) for 3-4 seasons in their early primes, their early career slow rise to success then immediate championship level success, their rings /finals totals at that point in their respective careers.

At this point, I have Kobe, because of that second 2peat and 3rd finals run. What he did after that wasn't too bad either.

5 titles
7 finals
20 seasons

There's a pretty good chance you're going to the finals with Kobe on your team, whether he's a 1A or 1B on your team.

Its similar with Steph now. Hes been there a lot, as a 1A or 1B. His career isn't over yet though.

3 rings
5 finals
13 seasons