The best athletes ever?

See I respect this. You came with facts. I’m for sure not putting bird above lebron tho. Lebron at his athletic peak was a better scorer and defender.
The magic argument is dicey. I’ll Take it back to lebron to Miami.... Most, including me thought lebron would be a 22-24 ppg with 6-RBs 6 ***. guy because of the fact wade and bosh were on par to carry the load. But through those 4 years bron became a better more efficient scorer along with the overall game. Then you add his improvement defensively in Miami...then he brought that all to Cleveland. That 6-7 year stretch in my opinion put him ahead of magic imo. If he wins a ring in LA as the lead guy he cements himself along side Jordan as the best non bigs to ever play. My list assumes he will

Non big top 5
1a MJ
1b Bron
2 magic
3 Kobe
4 bird
5A KD (nipping at birds heels tho)
5b Giannis( if he gets a jumper and rings, could surpass Kobe at 3 imo)

Not one doubt MJ is the best 6'6 player ever. I'm not so big on the ring thing. If Bird didn't play for Boston Magic wins 5 or 6. If Magic doesn't play for LA Bird wins 5-6. When I try to compare players I try to put them back in the 80's because that was by far the toughest time to play. The the league was not wattered down yet. Loads of big guys that would have given James a harder time compared to today. The big guys really did beat players up. lol Would he have even lasted as long without injury? Who knows. You also have to remember there was no 3 point shooting in college when Bird and Magic played so they never practiced it. Bird said he never practiced 3 point shooting before his rookie year when they started it. Bird was a great 3 point shooter specially when the game was on the line.

My first pick would always be Jabbar though, he was a game changer in the middle. He made people change their shots on D at his peak like only a few could. I've never seen a player that could stop his sky hook. I've seen him make that **** from the foul line and he did it for many, many seasons beyond his peak. Once he started his signature move backing his *** into the defender it was over. Look at the top centers he's going up against, all 7 ft plus guys. With todays rules he'd be unstoppable.
 
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This is the weakest era of defense in the history of the nba AND Lebron got to play in the pathetic weakstern conference for his entire career and Jordan still has better advanced stats lol...again Jordan has twice as many titles and finals mvps AND better advanced stats. That warriors series kills me 😂 that was not an all time great warriors team....it’s getting overhyped because of the win totals, Warriors with Durant haven’t touched 73 wins so far does that mean the 73 win warriors team is better than the Durant warriors ? Dirk beating the Heatles without a single all star next to him is a better accomplishment (and he didn’t need a suspension in a key game) than Lebron beating that overrated warriors team (the one that was 2 minutes away from losing to OKC in 6). “More complete player” lol Jordan was Complete...putnup 33-8-8 with 7 straight triple doubles just to shut up dummies who claimed he was just a scorer, then he went back to doing what he does best and let Scottie take more of a playmaking role for the better of the team not because he can’t do it....lakers
Record would be a lot better if Lebron didn’t insist so much on stuffing the entire stats sheet to prove he’s this all around genius and just took over games scoring wise but no he would rather go 27-12-9 instead of 45-5-5....and don’t forget Lebrons advanced stats will continue to go down as he gets older. Jordan absolutely
More skilled than Lebron not
Even close.
He was a genius posting up stopping on a dime crazy layups at the rim better dribbler etc Lebron puts his head
Down and charges into the lane. And yes lebrons competition in the finals has been better than Jordan’s but Jordan never had more than one all star next to him ... Lebron has had two all stars next to him in every final except 2. And his competition in the east has been an abomination. First year in the west and his team is in 11th place lmao.
He’s the second best player imo and the only one (along with Wilt) who’s even in the same
Stratosphere as jridan inmdvanced stats. “Titles is such a lazy argument” again Jordan also has
More MVPs and better advanced stats in case you forgot. Lebron has “he’s 6’8” and “he’s more complete” idk about you but I’ll take the one with twice as many titles more
Mvps (despite playing less years) and better advanced stats (while playing in a much tougher conference with much lower scoring across the league)
Ohhhh ok.. whole lot of typing but not saying anything. 1st year new LA The team is 11 because of injuries. That is a fact
 
It happened all the time late in close games because of hack a shaq
Please..show me those games. Yes teams went to hack of shaq..but in the playoffs show me where it actually works...funny thing is teams used this strategy But it never worked
 
Just say "I don't know jack and or shlt about basketball unless it's UNC basketball whoooooooooooooo(Ric Flair voice) " next time....


Ok, Ike.... I think Sabonis could have been a 20-10-5 guy.... Maybe like Jokic is today for Denver..
 
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This is the weakest era of defense in the history of the nba AND Lebron got to play in the pathetic weakstern conference for his entire career and Jordan still has better advanced stats lol...again Jordan has twice as many titles and finals mvps AND better advanced stats. That warriors series kills me 😂 that was not an all time great warriors team....it’s getting overhyped because of the win totals, Warriors with Durant haven’t touched 73 wins so far does that mean the 73 win warriors team is better than the Durant warriors ? Dirk beating the Heatles without a single all star next to him is a better accomplishment (and he didn’t need a suspension in a key game) than Lebron beating that overrated warriors team (the one that was 2 minutes away from losing to OKC in 6). “More complete player” lol Jordan was Complete...putnup 33-8-8 with 7 straight triple doubles just to shut up dummies who claimed he was just a scorer, then he went back to doing what he does best and let Scottie take more of a playmaking role for the better of the team not because he can’t do it....lakers
Record would be a lot better if Lebron didn’t insist so much on stuffing the entire stats sheet to prove he’s this all around genius and just took over games scoring wise but no he would rather go 27-12-9 instead of 45-5-5....and don’t forget Lebrons advanced stats will continue to go down as he gets older. Jordan absolutely
More skilled than Lebron not
Even close.
He was a genius posting up stopping on a dime crazy layups at the rim better dribbler etc Lebron puts his head
Down and charges into the lane. And yes lebrons competition in the finals has been better than Jordan’s but Jordan never had more than one all star next to him ... Lebron has had two all stars next to him in every final except 2. And his competition in the east has been an abomination. First year in the west and his team is in 11th place lmao.
He’s the second best player imo and the only one (along with Wilt) who’s even in the same
Stratosphere as jridan inmdvanced stats. “Titles is such a lazy argument” again Jordan also has
More MVPs and better advanced stats in case you forgot. Lebron has “he’s 6’8” and “he’s more complete” idk about you but I’ll take the one with twice as many titles more
Mvps (despite playing less years) and better advanced stats (while playing in a much tougher conference with much lower scoring across the league)

That is because hand checking has been made illegal around 2004. If the old school defensive greats played now they would also give up tons of points or foul out.
 
“Detroit smoke him” lol one series went 6 and the other went 7 with pippen missing game 7....smoking is what Jordan did
To the pistons in 91 (sweep). Once pippen turned into an all star and Jordan finally had ONE all star next to him it was a wrap for the league

Not smoke like Boston use to do to him, I just meant they beat him. Ya it was a rap for the league once the good players retired or were old. Why does everyone forget one of the greatest rebounders and defensive players ever. NBA.com: Dennis Rodman Career Stats. Honors: NBA champion (1989, '90, '96, '97, '98); Defensive Player of the Year (1990, '91); All-NBA Third Team (1992, '95); All-Defensive First Team (1989, '90, '91, '92, '93, '95, '96); Two-time NBA All-Star (1990, '92). Without him Jordan probably wouldn't have won 6. In many games Rodman had 20 plus rebounds a ton of times, games over 25, he was a force. Always took the hardest player to guard, it surely wasn't Jordan. Rodman was a killer on both offense and defensive boards. Pippen was with Chicago in 87, Bird was still beating them in 89 with a broken back. lol Rodman was a powerhouse rebounder. https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/trb_game.html
 
So the Lakers win 3rings..shaq is the Mvp all 3 series. But Kobe was better..ok gotchu. Shaq was averaging close to 40 ppg in all those series

If you were starting a team would you take Shaq or Koby? I take Shaq every single time before Koby. That's what I mean, a great big man is greater than a great small man almost every time. Shaq at peak was a force.
 
Not smoke like Boston use to do to him, I just meant they beat him. Ya it was a rap for the league once the good players retired or were old. Why does everyone forget one of the greatest rebounders and defensive players ever. NBA.com: Dennis Rodman Career Stats. Honors: NBA champion (1989, '90, '96, '97, '98); Defensive Player of the Year (1990, '91); All-NBA Third Team (1992, '95); All-Defensive First Team (1989, '90, '91, '92, '93, '95, '96); Two-time NBA All-Star (1990, '92). Without him Jordan probably wouldn't have won 6. In many games Rodman had 20 plus rebounds a ton of times, games over 25, he was a force. Always took the hardest player to guard, it surely wasn't Jordan. Rodman was a killer on both offense and defensive boards. Pippen was with Chicago in 87, Bird was still beating them in 89 with a broken back. lol Rodman was a powerhouse rebounder. https://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/trb_game.html
Rodman was also 35-37 years old during his time with the bulls lol ....as soon as pippen became an all star it was s wrap for the league. Pistons weren’t old isiah was 29 when Jordan swept him , Laimbeer was about the same , Rodman was even younger and so was dumars. Yea very old
 
That is because hand checking has been made illegal around 2004. If the old school defensive greats played now they would also give up tons of points or foul out.
Teams just don’t give a duck anymore, they’ll let you get a two just to get a three on the other end...overall possessions are way up. Offensive stats are very inflated nowadays (very similar to QB stats)
 
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Teams just don’t give a duck anymore, they’ll let you get a two just to get a three on the other end...overall possessions are way up. Offensive stats are very inflated nowadays (very similar to QB stats)

Yes, BECAUSE hand checking is now illegal. It completely changed the game. Its not like coaches are just saying. WELLLLL we could play good defense, but I would rather let you blow by me so we can get another possession. You will LITERALLY get called for playing defense the old school way. You could take a lock down defender from the 80s and place them in todays game and they aren't going to be shutting down guys like they used to.
 
Yes, BECAUSE hand checking is now illegal. It completely changed the game. Its not like coaches are just saying. WELLLLL we could play good defense, but I would rather let you blow by me so we can get another possession. You will LITERALLY get called for playing defense the old school way. You could take a lock down defender from the 80s and place them in todays game and they aren't going to be shutting down guys like they used to.
Yea I agree... the point is though it’s much easier to score nowadays every team is averaging 110
 
I guess you didn't get to see Magic and Bird play, both had that same hunger and when the game was on the line they beat Jordan all the time. Boston beat Jordan 17 times in a row and swept him twice in the playoffs. Jordan didn't dominate until 91, even Detroit smoked him. I think some of you guys just want to forget what Jordan did in the 80's.
You guess really poorly. I did see them play. In person. Neither of them was jordan, and neither of them would claim otherwise if you asked them. But go on thinking you know better. As for the ‘80s, in some other discussion, we can go through it. Jordan was the goat from the get go. Magic played with Kareem, worthy, nixon, cooper, wilkes and many others. Jordan spent his first years with granville waiters and reggie theus. Anyhow, guess again.
 
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