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

Here is a better question.
Why would MJ care at 39 ?

The guy retired twice and still accomplished more with tons of money at 35 and still was the best player in the league ?

The only sensible thing mj would of continue is to win more rings or at the very least try to get a 4 peat but stupid as management was , they made the stupidest decision ever made by a professional sport team by splitting a 3 peat championship team , denying MJ the opportunity to make history .

Fwiw I would of been very pissed too shrug

Ps: one thing is for sure that define era very well , management would never split a team , a championship team for sure , without lebron support .

Jordan was better at every age that he played from 21-38

And Jordan got hurt right before his 39th birthday (so Bron is better at 39), but 38-year Jordan easily averaged better raw stats than 38 or 39-year Lebron when we consider pace and DRTG - the league gives up 20 more PPG and most of that goes to the stars, so Jordan's 25/6/5; would be 30/7/6 or something in today's game

Regarding TS, that's a function of defensive attention such as taking over a 19-win team and going .500 with them (19 win improvement)... Otoh ,Lebron faces zero defensive attention by virtue of AD leading the way, while 4 other teammates get Pippen stats.

You could easily say that the only reason Murray could score 26 PPG is because Jokic is a great playmaker and unselfish passer.

Maybe if Jordan was a better passer/playmaker then Pippen scores a lot more. It's hard for anyone else to score when Jordan is taking half the possessions as his own scoring attempt.

yeah if only mj could lead his team to 14th place as the 2nd best player at age whatever he'd be goat, but alas

Are u serious ?!?!
Pippen demonstrate many times he was rather weak mentally .
Wtf u think pippen didn’t had the ball but kukoc did when the game was on the line when mj wasn’t on the team ?

And pippen still had like 16 fga per game while being lower in fg% then mj …
And less reliable on the FT than MJ .

U give too much the ball to pippen u end up with LeBron results on blaming others when u lose lol ….

hes talking preseason favorites. its also got a lot to do with the weak East where the Cavs were basically a lock for the finals but would always be dogs to the West.

^^^ that's just really absurd on so many levels:

* Jordan has a massive track record of teammates growing alongside him and increasing their scoring, while Lebron has the track record of cratering many teammates and teammates scoring less alongside him (far below their career highs/capacity).. It's well-known that Lebron imposes spot-up roles that stall young players, so zero rookies grew from single digits to meaningful producer on his watch (zero young player development in 2 decades) - the inability to develop young players means that Lebron needs ready-made stars to win and more help in general compared to organic casts that developed young players and chemistry.

* Pippen averaged the same in 94' as his highs alongside MJ - so he was playing to capacity alongside MJ, which means all of MJ's scoring was needed

* Poor efficiency is the sign of someone that can't handle additional load, and Pippen was a historic bricklayer.. So are you saying that Pippen deserved more shots when he was averaging 15.7 on 34% in the 96' Finals??? What about the 93' Finals when he shot 46% true shooting (0% from three and 59% from FT line)... Are you saying Pippen deserved more shots??.. Do you realize that Pippen has the worst shooting splits ever for a playoff run of 15 games and 35 MPG - he did this twice and they were title runs (96', 98') - he also nearly set the record for bad efficiency on the 93' run.... What about the 93' 1st Round when he shot 33% or the 92' ECSF (X-Man dominated him) - you think Pippen deserved more shots???.... C'mon.. Absurd take.. The Bulls went 6/6 and were unbeatable with minimal all-star help because MJ was just THAT dominant

I’m impress by your rarely unbiased take …

Lebron played during the weakest era of the east by far for like his entire career.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/fri...

And obv mj had it pretty hard .
No wonder he couldn’t win anything without a decent team pre 90s .

Of course but that's the case for any franchise player, and Lebron wasn't favored in the preseason until he teamed up with the next-best player in the league

Wade was #2 across the board in 2010 (PER, BPM, VORP, WS/48) and yet the Magic/Bird-like team-up fell to underdog vs baby Westbrick (2012), or loser to 1-star Mavs (2011) and fossil Duncan (2014).

Lebron's team-ups were favored every year from 2011-2016 but fell to underdog or loser every year, except the Allen miracle - it took a miracle for Bron-ball to not underachieve favored talent (lose with preseason favorites, or fall to underdog).

Nonsense.. Dirk won 67 games in 2007 and the same net rating as the 2014 Spurs with similar cast as Lebron's 2009 cast.

and then Dirk executed the goat upset in the Finals with a worse cast than Lebron had in 2010.

So Dirk has carried weak casts to better teams in the regular season and obviously won with less in the postseason, while Lebron needed among the most help ever to actually win titles - he never won as 1st option without 2 franchise players and perennial all-stars as teammates (and he actually mostly lost with this and only won at poor frequency).

Furthermore, Lebron needed an all-star teammate to win 40 games in 05', while MJ needed nothing to win 40 games.. Lebron also added a HOF coach and 22/5/5 all-defender to win 50 games in 06, while MJ needed no cast or coaching to win 50 in 88'.

The 2008 Cavs were hot garbage

Then Lebron got the all-star spacing that his stiff-arm needs to be MVP and have a true contender, so the team increased to 66 wins in 2009.

Mo Williams taught everyone for the first time that Lebron's drive-heavy game "needs spacing" to be MVP and have a true contender.

Accordingly, it was the arrival of Mo that increased the Cavs by 19 wins and Mo spearheaded this increase by achieving superior PER, BPM, WS/48, VORP, scoring and efficiency than 1990 Pippen

The 2007 Mavs and 2009 Cavs were Year 7 organic juggernauts with all-star sidekicks and other teammates that were recent all-stars.. There's no comparison with these casts and Jordan's zero all-star teammates and worst-ever casts from the 80's.

You will claim that Josh Howard and Mo Williams were garbage but they provided similar scoring levels to Pippen, while their teams had superior defenses (6th and 3rd) than the 1st three-peat Bulls (7th, 4th, 7th).. aka more help on both sides of the ball.

More importantly, the 2010 Cavs added a 3rd option that was a better scorer than prime Pippen because Jamison scored 1k more points in 3k less minutes and is a rare 20k scorer in history - Jamison drastically outplayed Lebron in the 2007 1st Round.. So the 2009 and 2010 Cavs had more scoring options and better defenses than the 1st three-peat Bulls..

Any top 20 all-time player will have a 60-win organic juggernaut and league favorite by Year 7, such as Jokic, Giannis, Curry, Dirk, MJ and Lebron.

All of these "organic" casts achieved favorite status via chemistry instead of having many star teammates.

The difference is that Lebron gave up after Year 7 and started teaming up with opposing franchise players thereafter.. "Organic" teams are characterized by 1 franchise player, but Lebron achieved better casts by taking the top 3 franchise players from 3 different teams in the conference and put them on 1 team - he diluted his competition and consolidated power on 1 team.. By giving up on winning with "normal" rosters and chemistry (organic), he never really learned how to win and only learned how to team-hop (talent-based winning, all-star team strategy).
.

GOAT list

1. MJ
2. Mo Williams

3. Antawn Jamison

GOAT: anyone who played with LeBron.

Scrub: anyone who played with Jordan.

It's amazing how according to TWOG Jordan was so great at developing players YET AT THE SAME TIME they were still worthless scrubs. Make it make sense.

Wow I got punked by a news story today that LeBron announced his retirement at the end of this season. Big headlines. It's an internet site and I used to always double check any big story on reliable sources, and never caught them in any pure BS before. I didn't double check this one. They click baited me, I guess. It's called Smart News coming with phone apps, but I've checked out a lot of amazing true crime stories on there and found them all verified previously. Never had read their sports before I don't think.

So I just checked it all out, saw his statement. If you ask me, it looks like the Brett Favre retirement plan coming our way. Anyway, I couldn't quite believe the story, but it had part of me going.

In the first full season without Jordan, his only full season in his prime without Jordan, Pippen was 3rd in MVP voting. The next two years he was 7th and 5th.

A team led by prime Pippen was a 55 win team.

He was one of my favorite players. Maybe a college GOAT candidate but not the pros. 😀 I had noticed something different about his college play that I thought bit uncanny when I saw the same thing mentioned about him in a sports column. In a game at UNC where he had something like 30 points and 16 rebounds, a guy did a tracker on him and he had the ball in his hands for 46 seconds in that game, with 30-some points and 16 rebounds. That's the thing I had noticed about him ... every time he got a rebound he passed it immediately, every time he got an entry pass into the post he wheeled and shot instantly ... many of his possessions being less than a second. Like it was a hot potato. It just seemed a crazy different style of play, and I had noticed it then loved catching that article that mentioned the same thing about him.

Well, I guess it's my day to be surprised. You could have knocked me over with a feather when I just now looked up his NBA career, and saw that he played well over 1000 games (putting him in the top 100 in the history of the league), and scored over 20,000 points (coming in at #51 in league history). I had literally no idea he had that kind of stay in the NBA. It looks like his teams either missed the playoffs or went out in the first round almost all his seasons, all but two I think, so being a casual NBA fan, watching deep playoffs only, I literally never knew he was doing any of that. Sick.

But I do know his time of possession, if there was such a stat, for his production in college had to be one of the greatest in history. He never dribbled in his career. And it was hair trigger outlet passes and shots when he touched the rock.

Ah welcome back, you fellow lunatic

Yeah that's the weird thing about it because Jamison's low time of possession and quick shots upon the catch were thought to likely fit well with Lebron.. But instead it was a weak fit and Jamison saw his averages instantly crater.

The only thing I can think of is that guys like Jamison or Love weren't catch-and-dunk guys with crazy athleticism to posterize guys (finishers).. So even though they score quickly upon the catch and are fundamentally-sound, anything aside from an instant poster or jumpshot is a bad fit with Lebron.. Even the quick-iso ability/footwork of Jamison, Love or Bosh is too much and amounts to clashing with Lebron's hold-time... Only AD is a sufficient athletic talent to provide exactly what Lebron's game needs for a "good fit"... Similarly, great jumpshooters (instant finishers) like Kyrie or Mo fit well with Lebron.. Otoh, every other player type that wasn't the aforementioned instant finishers were bad fits like spotty-shooting ball-handlers (Westbrook, Ingram, Hughes) and fundamentally-sound bigs that lack elite athleticism (Love, Jamison).. So Lebron wouldn't fit with a bricklayer/lane-clogger like Pippen or fundamental bigs like Duncan or Mchale.. What a shame...

Unfortunately, Lebron lacks the expert jumpshooting skill and great instinct to play off teammates (off-ball).. Consequently, he must rely on ball-dominance and impose spot-up roles, which hinders young player development, fits and strategic capacity/coaching, thereby producing perennial underdogs and Finals losers regardless of cast.. Btw, the Cavs chose between Jamison and elite athlete/finisher Amare, aka wrong choice.

Imagine that you're an NBA player and you circle your calendar and buy tickets and hotel reservations for all your friends because the greatest basketball player to ever lace them up is coming to town - you're going to face the GOAT.

Now imagine that right before ganetime, the GOAT hurts his elbow or something and can't play... You would deflate like a balloon - you wouldn't have nearly the same energy - we saw this happen earlier in the year when Boston relaxed vs Lakers with Lebron out.

Now imagine an entire season of that... See 1994...

No one cared about playing the Bulls without the GOAT, while the Bulls also had massive surprise factor/no pressure period - it was a honeymoon period until the pressure of the 94' playoffs made the Bulls crack like walnuts.. Accordingly, the cat was out of bag in 1995 like Ngannou vs Joshua... aka the "real" Bulls without MJ were borderline lottery in 95' before MJ returned to restore 3-peat caliber in his first full season back.

The problem with the whole "Pippen won 55" thing is that he didn't build a 50-win team from scratch and never could - he was handed the keys to the most well-oiled machine of all time after 6 years as an apprentice.. The Bulls had to 3-peat with MJ before they could dip their toe in the water and play without him.. And this was against opponents that were asleep at the wheel without the leader of the pride present.

Okay you're just trolling. I'm impressed by how dedicated you are to it.

Jordan might be the GOAT, but your mental gymnastics are actually hilarious. I'm starting to really enjoy these creative views.

So how come when LeBron left the Cavs they went from 61 wins to 19 wins the next year. Weren't the Cavs opponents all relaxed and deflated? Why could the great Antawn Jamison and Mo Williams not win more than 19 games?

No, "letdown" is a real thing as we saw earlier this year:

^^^^ that's a microcosm of the 1994 season..

No one gave a **** about playing the Bulls without the GOAT... Pippen wasn't some "star" that you're imagining him to be - he wasn't highly-regarded in 1993 (Mikal Bridges at best) and it took time for the consistent winning-spotlight to inflate him - his gaudy ring count eventually inflated him for an increasing number of fans that weren't there to see how much of an unnoticeable, replaceable robot he was outside of the occasional dunk.

Do you realize that Pippen had a shot to secure the 1997 Bulls their 70th victory to make it back-to-back seasons of 70 wins??... Pippen missed the rim entirely and the Bulls had to settle for 69 wins.. This was far from the 1st or last time that Pippen missed massively-critical shots.. He missed 2 FT's in Game 4 of the 1998 Finals right before Miler's historic three over Jordan to win the game... He turned the ball over with the game on the line in the closing seconds of Game 1 of the 1999 1st Round... He had the "migraine" game and "sit out" game and "dumb foul" game - these were legendary chokes... He even lost a 17 point lead in 4th quarter in Game 7 of WCF - he couldn't make the Finals without MJ despite being 6th option on a stacked team and 17 point lead in 4th quarter of final game...

Pippen was a historic lane-clogger and bricklayer with the worst clutch-time stats of any all-timer - Ostertag and Hornacek destroyed Pippen in clutch-time and Hornacek was a better all-round player (scorer, goat shooter, passer, playmaker, crafty, effective in any offense)

because it isn't a troll.. everything I said about 1994 was backed up by an example of a situation that happens all the time (letdown).

i was painting a picture of opponent mindset every night in 1994 - they didn't give 2 bird shits about playing the Bulls without MJ there.. No boogey man... No grim reaper... No legend to face.. No GOAT.. Nothing to tell grandkids

2014 SPURS............... 8.1 net rating... 8.00 SRS... 62 wins
1997 JAZZ'.................. 9.7 net rating... 7.97 SRS... 64 wins
1996 SONICS............. 8.2 net rating... 7.40 SRS... 64 wins

What makes the 14' Spurs "better than any team Jordan faced"??

That's a results-oriented conclusion due to the Heat being beaten by so much.. But the reality is that ONLY the heat were beaten by that much, while the fossil Mavs took the Spurs to 7 games and OKC took them to 6... The Heat were the preseason favorite and the odds were even entering the Finals, yet they lost by record amount (definition of underachievement).

Furthermore, 37-year old Duncan had every age excuse to lose in the 14 Playoffs that Lebron had last year, yet we see the difference in results (record victory for Duncan at 37 years old vs sweep loss for Lebron at 38 and missed play-in at 37).

It isn't gymnastics or creative - it's intuitive and based on historical trends like the aforementioned "letdown" example... Another intuitive conclusion is that we know Lebron's performance against the 07' Pistons wasn't THAT great because we know that Lebron's caliber was infact 22 on 36% vs Spurs - the bed-wetting against championship comp completely invalidates his one-off against weaker comp.

How great could his performance against the Pistons have been if he was actually a caliber that consistently gets locked up against Finals comp???.. Lebron was locked up by the 07' Spurs, 08' Celtics and 11' Mavs, so who cares about a one-off game against a garbage opponent like the #6 SRS Pistons in 07'.. Lebron simply can't carry bed-wetting teammates or weak help over top teams because he never won a series against a top 5 SRS opponent with weak scoring & efficiency from a sidekick (no carry-jobs vs top teams in 2 decades)..

Of course it's intuitive why Lebron can't carry the scoring load or weak help vs top teams - he's too ball-dominant at carry-job volume - he has insufficient brand of ball at carry-job volume, so he can't beat top teams by carrying the scoring load and therefore needs great scoring help.. This contrasts with expert jumpshooters that can score 40 while the ball moves (Curry, Kobe, MJ), so they have sufficient brand of ball at carry-job volume to beat top teams and win with weak scoring help like Klay, Lowry, Terry, Pippen or Pau.. Or Wiggins... This contrasts with the all-time scoring help that ball-dominators needs, aka Kareem, Wade, AD, etc, etc, etc

the 2011 Cavs didn't just lose Lebron - they lost their entire starting 5 because Mo and Varejao were out and the team lost Shaq, Delonte and Zydrunas, which was a total of 52 ppg..

And that's what team-hoppers do - they GUT teams... And those Cavs were organic with normal rosters, so they couldn't afford to lose talent like their entire starting 5 (Mo, Varejao, Shaq, Delonte, Zydrunas)... Otoh, the 15' Heat were injured (Wade/Bosh missed 40 games) but the 16' Heat nearly made the ECF just like the 94' Bulls, while Wade played better than Pippen ever did..

Wade was an all-star from 13-16' with 21 PER and star in the 16' Playoffs, so Lebron fans don't realize that their dissatisfaction with Wade is only because he fell to Pippen-caliber during those years - so they should know why Bulls fans were often dissatisfied with prime Pippen - it's because he was like 13-16' Wade.

So we've explained the 11' Cavs (lost their entire starting 5, not just Bron) and we've explained the 15' Heat (injured but still nearly made playoffs and ECF in 16' with fossil Wade as a star), and now the 19' Cavs lost their best player to injury (Love) in addition to LeTeamGutter

It’s one year .
His absolute peak .
One year is not a trend .
It was down hill from there with or without mj z
And Grant was as important as pippen !
Look what happen the year right after for pippen .
Barely .500 until mj cameback

About what ?

Interestingly enough, Wades 3 best MVP vote years are 3rd, 5th, and 7th, the exact same as Pippen.

Lebron EPM: 5.6
AD EPM: 4.2

On/off net rating per Cleaning the Glass:

Lebron: +8.6
AD: +1.4

Lakers net rating with Lebron on, AD off: +5.4, 1448 possessions
Lakers net rating with AD on, LeBron off: -2.0, 1906 possessions

Lebron BPM: 6.3
AD BPM: 5.1

Lebron bests AD in most advanced metrics and the Lakers play like a top 3-4 seed roster with him on the floor, whereas they play like a lotto team with AD.

Lebron haters are simply delusional at this point. He’s inarguably been a top 10 player at age 39 and could be ranked as high as 5th or 6th. Their brains simply cannot process it so the reaction is to pretend it’s a league wide conspiracy with all the players and owners in on it by “not guarding him” or acting like he’s not the best player on the team despite extreme evidence otherwise. They operate on an anti-Occam’s Razor principle and cannot process information as their visceral, 20 year long hatred of Lebron warps their minds. Sad to see.