Is there a reasonable argument that MJ was actually better at basketball than LeBron?

[The4thHorseman]

Him being All-NBA probably still had something to do with playing with MJ and winning. Just looking at stats shows how much better D was played at the time, because offensively he was nothing special during 93' when they beat my Suns. Just comparing him with someone like Oubre he was better at assists and nothing else though being 27 at the time while I'm comparing with a 24yo KO.

Uh, no it didn't. Pippen was a great player who finished 3rd in MVP voting in 1994, was 1 bad call away in game 7 of making the ECF and that was done WITHOUT MJ. That was done with him never being 1st option before, nor looked as a leader until then.

He was that good.

For 1 season. Bulls struggled badly the second year Jordan was gone. They were a horrible 34-31 when Jordan returned and then he got them to 47-35.

Horace Grant was also gone that season. When MJ came back in 95, the Bulls only needed 3 wins in their last 17gms to qualify for the playoffs. Safe to say Chicago would have done that without the help of MJ.

Then the Bulls aquired the reigning 4x rebounding champion (who won the next 3 rebounding titles, 7 straight) before the 96 season and the rest is history.

[MavsDirk41]

MJ never willed a team to the finals on his own... Hell heb could never get out of the first round on his own.

- Jordan never chocked in the finals
- Jordan was never the 3rd best player on the court in a finals series
- Jordan never colluded with other all star players to form superteams
- Jordan never stormed off the court like a big baby on multiple occasions after losing in the playoffs
- Jordan never mocked another player and then was outplayed by that same player in a finals series

[jfs1000d]

Arguments for LeBron:

Highest box and non-box statistical peak in a much, much more internationally competitive and sophisticated era against superior athletes and teams who actually mathematically understand how to play basketball

Far superior versatility and longevity


"Arguments" for MJ:

Romanticized sociopathy

Scored a lot of points (on worse efficiency even adjusted for era) on impossibly stacked teams against Kurt Rambis and John Stockton with the greatest coach ever while sticking his tongue out and being "feared"


I have no doubt whatsoever that Kawhi could have three-peated twice in MJ's situation.

Yes. More dominating scorer. He was relentless.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[MavsDirk41]

Pippen did become a great player, but you made it sound as if Scottie would have been just an avg. player w/o MJ making him into what he became. We have no idea what kind of player he could have become if he stayed with Seattle. People like to say MJ made Pippen when they have no idea what would have happened if he played elsewhere. Safe to say he became a better player with MJ around, but he also had a lot of talent even before the 2 stepped on a court together. He was the best all around 2nd option player of the 90's. Every Finals the Bulls played, Pippen outscored and outplayed the other teams 2nd option.

I know Kukoc wasn't a finished product, but he was a 25yr old rookie who played pro ball since he was 17 and was probably the best international perimeter shooter (with size) in the NBA at the time. If he was 17yr old rookie, then that would be a different story.

MJ signed a 8yr 25mil contract in the summer of 88 which was huge money at the time. That was the first year of free agency and MJ didn't have enough years in to qualify for free agency. So he couldn't have left if he wanted to. He took the big bucks and hoped he would get over the hump.

Funny you say James built stacked teams yet he never had a teammate make All-NBA on both sides of the court like Pippen did from 1992-1998. Rodman led the league in rebounding all 3 seasons he was there. MJ and his teammates got to use the shortened 3pt line which was the same distance that the WNBA uses now. Steve Kerr one of the best 3pt shooters during that time and was a 50-40-90 guy a season with MJ. So you can say LeBron stacked teams, but the Bulls were just as stacked in an era where the fans were craving for offense, instead of the usual 77-73 Final type scores. Plus James didn't have to take practically a 2yr layoff so he could rest up and recover from his mental and physical exhaustion (as MJ put it in the last dance). That no doubt played a huge factor into his success from 96-98.

The 2 year layoff is what is most impressive. To step away for that long and to come back and THREE peat is insane. Lebron never faced an all nba player on the way to all those finals when he was in the east which was a significantly worse conference than the west. Jordan never had a big man as good as AD either.

Jordan didn't comeback and have a 3 peat. He comeback and the Bulls got bounced in the 2nd round. MJ thought by switching back to his #23 jersey mid-series he'd play better.

LeBron never had an All-NBA teammate on both sides of the court like MJ did in 5 out of the 6 titles Chicago won.

I love how you talk about Jordan having Pippen for his 6 rings like peopls dont know that James had Wade, Bosh, Irving, Love, and Davis for his 4. Those are some pretty good players no? Lol you James fans are hilarious.

[lessthanjake]

Honestly, I think the simplest way to put it to people who didn’t watch Jordan contemporaneously is as follows:

In the 2010s, it felt essentially inevitable that LeBron’s team would make the Finals. But in the 1990s, it felt just as inevitable that Jordan’s team would *win* the Finals. And, to put it a bit differently, in most of their title years, the Bulls felt just as inevitable to win as the Durant-era Warriors did. Except that those Bulls teams weren’t anywhere near as “unfair” on paper as those KD Warriors teams were. They simply had Jordan, and when you gave Jordan a good supporting cast it was almost inevitable that he’d win the title. To LeBron’s credit, he was able to have the same sort of air of inevitability about making the Finals, but obviously that’s not as good.

Of course the above hand waves a lot of context—these players had different teams and faced different opponents. But I think it gets to the essence of how much these two players dominated the league. When they had good supporting casts, Jordan just had a different level of stranglehold over the league.

[JRoy]

Jordan never flopped like a bitch and pretended to be hurt.

I am the furthest from a Jordan fan but there is no comparison.

[Rust_Cohle]

Honestly, I think the simplest way to put it to people who didn’t watch Jordan contemporaneously is as follows:

In the 2010s, it felt essentially inevitable that LeBron’s team would make the Finals. But in the 1990s, it felt just as inevitable that Jordan’s team would *win* the Finals. And, to put it a bit differently, in most of their title years, the Bulls felt just as inevitable to win as the Durant-era Warriors did. Except that those Bulls teams weren’t anywhere near as “unfair” on paper as those KD Warriors teams were. They simply had Jordan, and when you gave Jordan a good supporting cast it was almost inevitable that he’d win the title. To LeBron’s credit, he was able to have the same sort of air of inevitability about making the Finals, but obviously that’s not as good.

Of course the above hand waves a lot of context—these players had different teams and faced different opponents. But I think it gets to the essence of how much these two players dominated the league. When they had good supporting casts, Jordan just had a different level of stranglehold over the league.

Exactly, lebron was amazing but a big chunk of his career is being overshadowed by the warriors

[Rust_Cohle]

Uh, no it didn't. Pippen was a great player who finished 3rd in MVP voting in 1994, was 1 bad call away in game 7 of making the ECF and that was done WITHOUT MJ. That was done with him never being 1st option before, nor looked as a leader until then.

He was that good.

For 1 season. Bulls struggled badly the second year Jordan was gone. They were a horrible 34-31 when Jordan returned and then he got them to 47-35.

Horace Grant was also gone that season. When MJ came back in 95, the Bulls only needed 3 wins in their last 17gms to qualify for the playoffs. Safe to say Chicago would have done that without the help of MJ.

Then the Bulls aquired the reigning 4x rebounding champion (who won the next 3 rebounding titles, 7 straight) before the 96 season and the rest is history.

Without Jordan, the bulls don’t make anymore finals, Jordan never had a dominant big man. Jordan would AD would have been even more dominant.

[IG2]

Lebron went up against ZERO all NBA players in the eastern conference, in a bad conference compared to the west during his finals streak.

Imagine making a statement this factually wrong

2011 Derrick Rose
2012 'Melo and Tyson Chandler
2013 Paul George
2014 Al Jefferson and Paul George
2015 Pau Gasol
2016 Andre Drummond and Kyle Lowry
2017 Isaiah Thomas and Derozan
2018 Derozan and Oladipo

^^ All made the All NBA Team the year they faced LeBron in the playoffs

[Iwasawitness]

The 2 year layoff is what is most impressive. To step away for that long and to come back and THREE peat is insane. Lebron never faced an all nba player on the way to all those finals when he was in the east which was a significantly worse conference than the west. Jordan never had a big man as good as AD either.

[Blame Rasho]

Lebron went up against ZERO all NBA players in the eastern conference, in a bad conference compared to the west during his finals streak.

Imagine making a statement this factually wrong

2011 Derrick Rose
2012 'Melo and Tyson Chandler
2013 Paul George
2014 Al Jefferson and Paul George
2015 Pau Gasol
2016 Andre Drummond and Kyle Lowry
2017 Isaiah Thomas and Derozan
2018 Derozan and Oladipo

^^ All made an All NBA Team the year they faced LeBron in the playoffs

Well that is a murders row isn’t it lol…

Anyways this thread has been fun read

[lessthanjake]

Lebron went up against ZERO all NBA players in the eastern conference, in a bad conference compared to the west during his finals streak.

Imagine making a statement this factually wrong

2011 Derrick Rose
2012 'Melo and Tyson Chandler
2013 Paul George
2014 Al Jefferson and Paul George
2015 Pau Gasol
2016 Andre Drummond and Kyle Lowry
2017 Isaiah Thomas and Derozan
2018 Derozan and Oladipo

^^ All made the All NBA Team the year they faced LeBron in the playoffs

That person’s statement was obviously wrong, but I feel like this list kind of makes the broader point. This is not a very good group of players. We can just look at the names and tell that if these are the best guys LeBron was playing in the East, then he had some serious cakewalks. And even if we look at the all-NBA team placements themselves, those are overwhelmingly guys who only made the all-NBA third team. Derrick Rose is the only one who made the 1st team, and the only ones that even made the 2nd team in those years were a 34-year old Pau Gasol, Isaiah Thomas, and 2018 DeMar DeRozan. The runs in the East were generally jokes, though I do actually think the Eastern Conference run in 2011 was genuinely a difficult one. Of course, after actually getting through a difficult conference run for probably the only time in his career, LeBron proceeded to lay probably the biggest Finals egg ever by a major superstar.

[IG2]

That person’s statement was obviously wrong

Only reason I responded

2013-2017 were the 'easy' conference runs for LeBron. 2011, 2012, 2018 and 2020 were all plenty challenging.

[NZB2323]

Undefeated in the finals, undefeated with home court advantage, 3 peated twice, had the coach run an offense designed to take the ball out of his hands and he still put up insane stats.

I think 1998 is more impressive than any Lebron run. 1998 Bulls are the oldest team to ever win a championship, and we all know how well Lebron did with an old team:



Lebron missed the playoffs and deleted the tweet. Pippen had surgery during the 98 season and only played in 44 games. Lebron never won a championship in a season where his 2nd best player only played in 44 games, and that includes 2 shortened seasons. Pippen had a back injury for game 6 and that’s the only game in Finals history where a player outscored all of his teammates. In the final 2 minutes Jordan scored, stole the ball, and scored again. No other Chicago Bull touched the ball. And that wasn’t even the best version of Jordan.

There’s also leadership. Jordan was a hardass who demanded the best but I’ll take that over a passive aggressive leader who led Wade get fat on his team.

And then there’s 2011 for Lebron.

[elchengue20]

Every team Jordan beat in the Finals was better than 2011 Mavericks. Like literally, there are six teams who would have been NBA champs right now if they had just existed in the 2010-2011 season.

Nice troll thread though.

Stupid argument, Lebron was 26, MJ never won anything at that age neither.

Also the whole world (deserved or not) wanted LeBron to fail. MJ never faced that type of pressure, even less at a young age, actually it was the opposite, everybody wanted to see him win.

If anything it shows you how amazing it is how Lebron bounced back from that failure and had the best 7 year stretch in the history of basketball after that.

[Rust_Cohle]

Lebron went up against ZERO all NBA players in the eastern conference, in a bad conference compared to the west during his finals streak.

Imagine making a statement this factually wrong

2011 Derrick Rose
2012 'Melo and Tyson Chandler
2013 Paul George
2014 Al Jefferson and Paul George
2015 Pau Gasol
2016 Andre Drummond and Kyle Lowry
2017 Isaiah Thomas and Derozan
2018 Derozan and Oladipo

^^ All made the All NBA Team the year they faced LeBron in the playoffs

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/uvu38g/number_of_allnba_first_team_members_lebron_went/

[Optms]

Only argument Jordan has is the 6 for 6 Finals. The MVPs and DPOY.

Lebron equals or bests him every where else in terms of production and skill. Lebron faced better competition. Won with 3 different cores on 3 different teams. Took a dynasty team that would have mopped the floor with the Bulls to stop him from taking over. Has him on longevity as well. GOAT.

[Rust_Cohle]

Every team Jordan beat in the Finals was better than 2011 Mavericks. Like literally, there are six teams who would have been NBA champs right now if they had just existed in the 2010-2011 season.

Nice troll thread though.

Stupid argument, Lebron was 26, MJ never won anything at that age neither.

Also the whole world (deserved or not) wanted LeBron to fail. MJ never faced that type of pressure, even less at a young age, actually it was the opposite, everybody wanted to see him win.

If anything it shows you how amazing it is how Lebron bounced back from that failure and had the best 7 year stretch in the history of basketball after that.

His 7 year stretch was wildly overshadowed by the Warriors. He’s also got the two most lopsided finals defeats in nba history for point differential for the spurs 2014 and 2017 warriors

[Rust_Cohle]

Only argument Jordan has is the 6 for 6 Finals. The MVPs and DPOY.

Lebron equals or bests him every where else in terms of production and skill. Lebron faced better competition. Won with 3 different cores on 3 different teams. Took a dynasty team that would have mopped the floor with the Bulls to stop him from taking over. Has him on longevity as well. GOAT.

And those metrics are more than enough to surpass lebron. Put Jordan on 2011 Miami and they definitely beat Dallas.

Lebron has been part of some of the most lopsided finals in nba history and Jordan never had a big as good as AD.

[elchengue20]

Every team Jordan beat in the Finals was better than 2011 Mavericks. Like literally, there are six teams who would have been NBA champs right now if they had just existed in the 2010-2011 season.

Nice troll thread though.

Stupid argument, Lebron was 26, MJ never won anything at that age neither.

Also the whole world (deserved or not) wanted LeBron to fail. MJ never faced that type of pressure, even less at a young age, actually it was the opposite, everybody wanted to see him win.

If anything it shows you how amazing it is how Lebron bounced back from that failure and had the best 7 year stretch in the history of basketball after that.

His 7 year stretch was wildly overshadowed by the Warriors. He’s also got the two most lopsided finals defeats in nba history for point differential for the spurs 2014 and 2017 warriors

The Warriors had to get freaking peak KD to a 73 win team beat him.