LeBron > Jordan GOAT Super AIDS Containment, solved #22999 post by Matt R. (addendum #23174)

Are you literally ******ed or what?

How many titles has Durant won without Steph Curry?

This is record-breaking levels of idiocy and lack of self-awareness, even by your low standards. Are you just blatantly trolling everyone now?

For someone who keeps parroting the narrative that "LeBron can't win without team hopping and superteams" (a dumbass narrative, but let's run with it), you then think Durant, who joined the 73-win Warriors and literally made the NBA unwatchable for 3 seasons from a competitive balance standpoint, is superior to LeBron James? Jesus ****ing Christ are you even listening to yourself? Go get your head examined.

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^^^ wow that's the most rings and best championship frequency in the history of 3-pointer basketball or since ABA merger, aka "modern era"

Accordingly, in the modern era, Jordan has the most rings as the best player and arguably twice as many as anyone else (it can be argued that Duncan and Lebron were the best player for only 3 of their chips), while also having the best championship frequency (that you pointed out above) - the goat won 40% of the years that he played and this included an injury year, baseball year and 2 "fun" years at 39-40 years old, otherwise he actually won 6 of 11 years

2010 Wade............ 28 PER..... 9.2 BPM
2010 Kobe............. 21 PER..... 4.1 BPM

2010 Bosh.............. 6x all-star.... 1x All-NBA
2007 Pau................ 1x all-star.... 0x All-NBA

Lebron teamed up with a Kobe-Pau II, otherwise he was a 1-trick pony like Iverson, Dwight or Kidd.. Wade was actually #2 across the board in 2010 (PER, BPM, VORP, WS/48), so Lebron teamed up with the next-best player in the game - that's like Bird teaming up with Magic.

History shows that Lebron took the top 3 first options in the conference and put them on 1 team, yet still got credit for winning the conference after that.. People somehow view this as a great accomplishment, but imagine if Jokic teamed up with the top 1st options in the West like SGA and Curry or something - should he get credit for making the Finals after that?... smh

Not for MJ - he won 6 in 7 years with a perfect championship record the instant that he got 1 all-star teammate, while Lebron has goat choke or record loss with 2 all-star teammates, and a lottery record on the championship level with super-teams (20-21 in the Finals excluding 07', 15', 18')

Night and day.. It was constant winning for one guy, while the other guy had constant losing and need for more help

In 1991, Phil was a 1st-time, nobody coach and MJ was the goat candidate

Literally.

So MJ didn't need the goat coach - he just needed a 1st-time nobody coach that he could turn into the most accomplished coach ever.

No one ever had to use the most possessions in the league to win - that's evidence of a trash cast that was carried, not a "perfect" cast that somehow got to use the least possessions of any cast ever... There's never been a lower-producing cast - this is statistical fact - they're the lowest-scoring championship cast of all-time and there's never been a bigger statistical gap between 1st option and cast in NBA history.

Of course, MJ was so arrogant that he worked harder on defense than anyone ever has (smh), so he was the best defender at his position as well, in addition to his goat offensive load.

Essentially, whoever MJ won with was going to be considered the "perfect" cast - it's essentially impossible to carry a team to 6 chips in most people's eyes and it must be a great cast - but this is false - it's absolutely possible to carry a team to 6 chips because the stats confirm that MJ did exactly that.. But carry on and keep imagining that there are performances you can point to where teammates dominated - they never did - only MJ dominated and he's the only multiple-time champion that never had dominant teammates or elite-scoring teammates.

Why couldn't anyone else "smash it" despite having more all-star teammates and not needing to produce nearly as much on either end as MJ?..

MJ "smashed it" with the least all-star help for a top 20 all-time player and the least rim protection of any dynasty.

So you're just making up whatever you want to believe and hoping it's true if someone looks into it (it isn't)

Durant was unbeatable with Curry, while Lebron was quite beatable with everyone - there's no one that Lebron was unbeatable with or mostly won with - he mostly lost everywhere he went... Who can't go 1/4 with AD, or 1/4 with Love, or 1/4 with Wade (except Allen miracle)??

Accordingly, it isn't impressive that Lebron won in many different places since he mostly lost everywhere and wasn't capable of mostly winning anywhere like KD

That's why KD is superior - his brand of ball is capable of mostly winning and therefore having all-time teams, while Lebron-ball cannot mostly win regardless of cast and infact mostly loses with every cast.. Essentially, both guys have elite production rates, but KD's skillset can have all-time teams, so he's superior to Lebron, whose skillset cannot have all-time teams

It isn't a narrative because it's the historical record over large sample size of prime career - it's interesting because he had the natural talent to become goat if he could've learned how to have an unbeatable, all-time dynasty with his skillset - he was going to figure it out eventually - but now we'll never know how a big man ball-dominator achieves an all-time, unbeatable team because this bum gave up on the organic chemistry learning curve in 2010 and started teaming up with opponent's thereafter.. It's a travesty tbh that could've yielded a great debate about which dynasty was better - Lebron's or Mike's - but instead, it's a fake debate where we must pretend that it doesn't matter that Lebron never learned how to have a great team that mostly won, smh.

It's called 1st mover advantage - Lebron had it and it allowed him to have first-pickings.. So Durant's only mistake was waiting 6 years to respond, which made his moves look late and desperate (the warriors team-up), while he was also stuck with older, injured, used-up pickings, aka injured guys ljke harden or kyrie, which he invariably loses with and looks bad compared to the 1st mover lebron.

Again, bird's eye view of this thing

I must have missed when LeBron played with prime Stepth Curry. Care to remind me when he did?

On the other hand, LeBron DID win with Kyrie Irving, Durant did not win with Kyrie Irving.

Durant also did not win with prime Devin Booker. Durant is 0 for his career without Curry.

You're just a hypocrite.

Also it's hilarious when you say that LeBron needed to be carried by Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis, etc...

How many titles does Kyrie Irving have?

How many titles does Anthony Davis have?

Who was the finals MVP in all those years?

You have it completely backwards, as usual.

MJ “turned” Phil Jackson into a great coach. Delusional nonsense.

The esteemed Bill Bradley said he always knew Phil Jackson would make a great coach one day from playing with him / hanging around him.

Come here to me @fallguy:

1) Who’s a better rebounder, LBJ or Jordan?
2) Who’s a better passer, LBJ or Jordan?
3) Who would win in a 1 on 1 in your opinion, LBJ or Jordan?

Not sure which is funnier- seeing the All Star MVP being mentioned as though that means anything or being told I'm the results oriented one when I say LeBron gets ripped when guys miss wide open shots at the end of the game and Jordan gets praised when Paxton and Kerr hit their shots.

It's like bizarro world.

Jordan passes to open guy they hit the 3=great pass from Jordan.

LeBron passes wide open 3 point specialist they miss= bad pass.

But im told don't be results oriented .Amazing stuff.

Like I said pure pretzel logic.

LeBron passes to open guy they hit the 3 = carried

LeBron extends his #1 lead over Jordan with continued play this season.

After the 2020 finals, I had LeBron 2nd all time behind Jordan by a small margin.

Since the 2020 finals, LeBron has in order of most important to least important but still significant:

1) Broke Kareem's all time scoring record and at the same time reached 4th all time in assists.
2) Added 3 all-nba teams to his resume, 2nd team 2021, 3rd team 2022 and 2023. At the current rate of play this season LeBron will add a 2nd team all-nba.
3) Beat the reigning champions in 2023 and made the WCF finals as 1a/1b of his team next to AD.
4) IST MVP - Which is a tiny accomplishment but whatever we'll take it.

This has been enough to catapult LeBron to GOAT status last year.

- Breaking Kareem's record is a gigantic accomplish, and once LeBron becomes the only player in the history of the game to have 40K points, he will pretty much be cemented as the GOAT scorer.

- Making 4 all-nba teams between the ages of 36-39 is an extremely appressive feat, especially if a player has played 17 straight seasons before hand. 4 all-nba teams between 36-39 is something Jordan would not be able to do no matter how many times you re-run his career and told him to play forever.

Now that Jordan doesn't have any more documentaries he can do to feed nostalgic meat to his fanbase, it doesn't look like Jordan can do anything anymore to reclaim #1 status. However, Jordan still has many old fans that are extremely nostalgic about the past so Jordan will continue to hold #1 status amongst nostalgic fans. But eventually they die off.

That must have been the most painful night of your life when Ray Allen hit that 3.

The Kyrie Irving 3 must have been even more painful since it put the Cavs up 3 with 1 min left in a game 7, against a 73 win team.

Eventually they die off Tien, you are correct. But also: LeBron has a camera crew following him around last few years and eventually his doc will be released. And eventually the media crew will be the JJ Redicks and the Draymond Greens as the olds shuffle off the stage.

Meanwhile, as we wait:

Pure speculation and no idea how u can come up with that .
Lebron plays around 55 games on average for the last 6 years .

When mj stop playing at 35 he was
all nba 1st team,
defensive first team,
mvp regular season,
mvp final,
Scoring champion
4th in defensive player of the year
and in less then 12 months , doing like lebron and resting around 30 games per season and playing no Defence, MJ wouldn’t be able to perform at top level ??

Man I didn’t remember the gap between 35 and 36/37 was so huge physically when I reach that age ….
It’s an impressive 12 months of declines .

I mean seriously , claiming mj wouldn’t even be better then Eddie jones for example (all nba 3rd team) 2 years later is ludicrous imo.

Yeah we don’t know for certain what Jordan would have done if he played on post 1998.

But he didn’t have the stomach for it. I appreciate this is part of Jordan’s allure for some of his fans: staying up all night gambling and smoking his cigars yet still beating people the next day. But he lacked the discipline and dedication to the game LeBron has brought to the table. The consistency, the determination to go for 20+ seasons. Jordan didn’t have it (which was totally normal).

The Bulls were no longer going to be perfect in 98, so he quit. That lack of will to continue allied to his inefficiency with the Wizards when he did add himself back on a min deal makes me doubt he would have put multiple All - NBA seasons together post 98. You can say we don’t know what happens in the hypothetical, but the hypothetical presupposes Jordan had more will at that stage of his life. The reality we live in is he didn’t have that fire anymore, he was done. And he couldn’t roll the clock back a few years later when he wanted to, he was no longer all - NBA level. Which is fine, you shouldn’t be all - NBA level at 38 years old.

You raise a great point. Maybe he didn't have that fire because he just won 3 in a row.

LeBron might have that fire still having won one chip in the last 7 years. I'd be hungry too if I kept losing.

Indeed. Don’t think anyone would have been surprised if LeBron packed it in after 2022 on that terrible team. But he kept going at an all - NBA level and hung around to make a conference finals. The determination to just put in the work year in, year out. Whatever is driving him at this age, Jordan didn’t have it. And then he couldn’t find it when he decided he wanted it again.

Quitting at that age like Jordan did is normal of course, LeBron just isn’t normal.

Make Jordan play in the NBA starting at 18 years old, take zero retirements and then tell me if he can still keep going and make all-nba teams at 36-39.

The answer is no he couldn't.

When do we put Jokic into the argument? Hot take i think he's the goat aready. As much as i love Michael no player has ever played like Jokic. I think he's the goat already all due respect to Michael. This guy is an alien!!!!!! Maybe Michael's 6 championships still tilts the scale but playing-wise this guy is not human. Otherworldy!

Maybe if LeBron had kept on winning he may have packed it up to.

The consistency, the determination to win 6 championships in 7 years. LeBron didn’t have it (which was totally normal).

You can say we don’t know what happens in the hypothetical, but the hypothetical presupposes LeBron had more winning ability at that stage of his life. The reality we live in is he didn’t have that ability, he was done.

Which is fine, you shouldn’t be - At 38 years old.

fidstar, buddy you’re annoyed. But don’t be. It’s a Friday.

MJ was a bully who got lucky. Prove me wrong.

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KD's Nets were about to ragdoll the crap out of Giannis, so KD was about to win with Kyrie and in a dominant fashion that Lebron never could - but then Kyrie got hurt and they lost the series by one inch in 7 games.

This was the third time that Kyrie showed to be the difference-maker because he put the Cavs over the top in 2016 after losing in 2015 without him.. The other time was when Kyrie led the Celtics to 33-10 start and was MVP according to ESPN (see previous post) - but then he got hurt, which dropped the Celtics from championship-caliber to a scrappy overachiever (ECF loss).. And yes, they probably lose to the Warriors in the Finals but the point is that they were real title contenders with Kyrie and not true contenders without him until Tatum/Brown developed - and we know that Gordon Hayward stunted their growth in 2019 before they overcame his unnecessary presence in 2020 (Ainge's darling).

Lebron played with a sidekick that destroyed Curry in the Finals - I'm sure if Klay destroyed Lebron, Curry would've won in 2016

Unfortunately, only Lebron had franchise players at 2nd and 3rd option, so the Cavs had other guys that could "take over" or "close", while the Warriors only had 1 franchise player and no go-to options outside of Curry - this is why the Cavs were favored on-paper in 2016 (preseason favorite) - they had 3 franchise guys (super-team) to the Warriors' 1 franchise guy.

Imagine hand-picking the preseason favorite for 6 straight years in the East and then a couple more in the West (20' and 21') - no one in history got to hand-pick opposing franchise players to form a preseason favorite (on-paper favorite) - only Lebron.. Unfortunately, Lebron's suboptimal brand of ball and chemistry underachieves favored talent (loses with preseason favorites, or falls to underdog).

Again, Lebron was 1st mover in the colluding space so he got 1st pickings.. Durant unfortunately waited 6 years to respond, so his team-ups look desperate by comparison (Warriors' team-up), or he gets crappy pickings such as old or injured players (harden, kyrie), who make him look bad.. And the book isn't closed on the Booker experiment but Durant is no longer a top 5 player so it's pretty irrelevant anyway - if the Suns win, it will be because Booker went bananas - ditto the Lakers with AD needing to go bananas..

of course, the king colluders (Bron and KD) are done winning chips and are literally hanging on to save some sort of face - karma's a bitch, even for MJ - aka retire already - they're just going to get embarrassed in these playoffs (again)..

However, the annoying thing is that the league has stacked the Lakers team with extremely solid players THROUGH THE END OF THEIR BENCH, so Lebron could get carried enough to win this year... Guys like Christian Wood averaged 21/9 with 39% three-point shooting on other teams but is completely buried on this stacked, conspired roster - GM's around the league decided they were going to stack Lebron's team, so the lakers are stacked enough to carry Lebron, while the Suns aren't because GM's don't care about KD.. The media doesn't clamor to get KD more help, so only Lebron gets this kind of treatment where GM's comply with media requests, either consciously or unconsciously..

actually, you guys use tons of context to explain Lebron's many losses, but when KD loses with Kyrie, there's zero context (like the obvious injury that caused loss).

I look at context from both sides and lebron's context is consistently weaker because he's the original team-hopper (manufactured resume) and therefore gets overrated, while people also misperceive his skillset... People can't get over karl malone dribbling like a guard but the reality is that lebron might be built like Karl, but he can't get 36k points as the roll-man, post, or deft mid-range touch like Karl did - he can't actually play like a big man and instead he scored 40k points as a point guard and ball-dominator.. His lack of true big man ability explains the horrific fits with other ballhandlers like Westbrook, Ingram, Hughes, IT and more.. He simply has a ball-dominator and it's the worst kind of ball-dominance - it's big man ball-dominance, aka abnormal for size/position, which imposes spot-up roles more than regular point guard ball-dominance (not abnormal for size/position).

The argument for KD over Lebron is 3-fold:

1) Both guys have all-time production rates/stats, but KD's skillset can have all-time chemistry and literally unbeatable/goat teams, while Lebron's skillset cannot have all-time teams regardless of cast.. Lebron-ball mostly loses with every cast and isn't capable of mostly winning with any cast, so he's inferior to KD, whose skillset can yield perennial Finals favorites instead of perennial underdogs

2) KD proved that he could do more with less by taking baby Westbrick to the Finals and favored over the veteran Heat super-team, while Lebron-ball missed play-in with AD/Westbrook and is perennial Finals underdog regardless of cast

3) KD destroyed Lebron HU in 2 different Finals and won FMVP over him............ HU............... twice