The Last Dance

[golden]

Are you talking now with today's rule or back then when Jordan played? This isn't an easy question to answer, it is not a no brainer because the game is very different today. You have the same goal: score more than the other guy but... How you do that is different. How you can stop it is different. Different rules work for different styles of play and different strengths. There are guys playing today and putting up big numbers who wouldn't back in Jordan's day. There are guys from back then who put up big numbers who wouldn't today. This is what I'm saying, its not an apples to apples comparison. KD got the MVP and then got a Chip by riding someone else's coattails (yeah he did, he jumped to a championship team who whooped his ass). But how would that go if he was getting slammed to the ground or shoved, grabbed, poked, etc. every play or every other play? Is he going to preserver? Is that frail looking frame gonna hold up with Rodman doing a mid court take down? Who knows. Apples and oranges. If I could put my money down though I'd bet on KD not performing as well back then unless he hit the gym hardcore and added a lot of weight and played a little differently.

Are there actually people who think that Jordan didn't receive preferable treatment from the refs in his era? lol. David Stern knew that Jordan was the NBA's meal ticket and did everything in his power to tilt the playing field towards MJ. Stern and MJ basically laid out the 'separate rules for NBA poster boys' blueprint, which was subsequently applied to: Kobe, Lebron, Wade, KD & Curry, etc...

And people somehow pretend that refs calling ticky-tack fouls started started less than 10 years ago. That's a lot more myth than fact. Have a look at this:

Could Today's Stars Survive the Old School NBA?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPBz3_Jgd-U

[G__Deane]

Jordan played in the Pre-SuperFriends Era, so I discount those 6 chips. MJ never had to face anything close to what Lebron had to go through vs. the Warriors, for example:

KD: best all-around scorer in the game. perennial MVP
Steph: best shooter of all time. ridiculous ball-handler. perennial MVP
Klay: 2nd best shooter of all-time. perennial all-defense team
Draymond: perennial DPOY.
Iggy: 6th man candidate. Starter on most teams.

All of the above, in their primes, plus a forward thinking coach, Kerr, who is a winner (MJ should know). Show me a team that MJ beat that even comes close to holding the jockstraps of that Warriors team.

Jordan played in the Pre-SuperFriends Era

True and lebron won at least one of his chips by stacking a team in the "super-friend" era so take that one away

I think lebron is a helluva player, I just can't stand his game politics, GM impersonation and contract tampering (Kawhi while under contract, Anthony Davis while under contract) making him no better than Ballmer's tampering ....

[Apollo]

Are there actually people who think that Jordan didn't receive preferable treatment from the refs in his era? lol. David Stern knew that Jordan was the NBA's meal ticket and did everything in his power to tilt the playing field towards MJ. Stern and MJ basically laid out the 'separate rules for NBA poster boys' blueprint, which was subsequently applied to: Kobe, Lebron, Wade, KD & Curry, etc...

And people somehow pretend that refs calling ticky-tack fouls started started less than 10 years ago. That's a lot more myth than fact. Have a look at this:

Could Today's Stars Survive the Old School NBA?

So what are you saying, that what Jordan endured in the 90's was no more violent than what the current stars endure today? No chance. Some regular fouls back then are flagrant now. Jordan wasn't drawing flagrants for regular 90's fouls.

[S.R.]

Some good discussion here. A few points:

• Jordan was a competitive asshole who wasn't fun to play with. I thought the series did a great job showing that, even though it was 90% MJ propaganda puff piece, it was also still all primarily true. MJ was a pain in the ass to play with and he was arguably the basketball GOAT. Both things can be true (basically the argument of the series).
• I compared the regular season W/L records of MJ's and LBJ's Finals opponents for their careers and guess what? Almost exactly the same. 62 win Finals opponents as an overall average. I think MJ's opponents are underrated, he played some very, very good 60+ win teams in the Finals. The fact that he would beat them felt so certain at the time, personally I think that's more a reflection of MJ's greatness than the quality of his opponents. This dude would just beat you. Fuck all the stats.
• Lebron does end up getting criticized for dragging sorry ass rosters to the Finals. He's great enough (and the East was weak enough) for Lebron to take an otherwise lottery-bound team right to the 4th round. You know how MJ & LBJ Finals opponents both averaged 62 wins? Lebron's teams averaged 8 fewer wins than MJ's. That MJ's Bulls were better teams than most of Lebron's Finals teams is just straight facts. I don't hold that against Lebron - I guess aside from the fact that Lebron meddled with his own rosters (ahem Tristan Thompson payout ahem) and got his own coaches fired, so there's some blood on his hands for the relatively crappy teams he ended up with.
• Lebron is an amazingly productive overall basketball player who can basically do everything at the highest level, I don't think anyone in the GOAT conversation is like him in that way. Magic's probably closest. But in his prime Lebron could basically play 5 positions at both ends and be your best offensive and defensive player and absolutely stuff the box score. He can run your offence as a point guard and he could also play in the post all night if he wanted to. He's nuts.
• That said, the production stats don't do MJ justice. This guy was capable of leading the league in scoring and winning DPOY at the same time. He reigned some of his individual production in as he matured to play with the team and...just win. And the prime of his career was exactly that. No more scoring titles but his teams won - a lot. They dominated. When push came to shove, MJ would just beat you. He could have tried to score 50 a night like James Harden if he wanted to, but instead he did whatever needed to be done to win. And you saw that in 6-0 in the Finals with 6 Finals MVPs. MJ just steps on your throat and wins. I've 100% got the bias of not really watching pre-80's NBA, but I've got MJ as the GOAT.
• Jerry Krause did a great job pulling that roster together, he also sabotaged it in the end. I mean who tf announces at the start of a season, after b2b rings, that you're going to fire your coach and want to rebuild? Who does that? Man had a petty ego and was dysfunctional in the end. NBA stars can be notoriously difficult to keep happy and keep on board, but it's hard to imagine anyone doing today what Krause did then.
• That was a great docu-series. Just great.

[Apollo]

Krause could do it because he already knew he wasn't getting the green light to re-sign a bunch of dudes ready for big paydays. It was unprofessional and someone else taking the high road would have kept that knowledge private, even to the players and coaches but he was out there loud about it and so because of it he gets the brunt of the blame. They wanted MJ back and everyone else gone. Where was his incentive in helping the Bulls rebuild at age 35?

I also thought it was a pretty entertaining production with perfect timing. Its good to keep in mind where its coming from but like SR said, there are no lies being told.

[slaw]

Compared to the KD Warriors? MVPs + All-NBA players at their absolute peaks. Which team was that?

Without disparaging the Warriors, an absolutely great all-time team, you are selling short teams like the Jazz, Blazers, Sonics and even the Knicks. Those teams were constructed differently then because of the style of play but combinations like Stockton/Malone, Payton/Kemp, Johnson/Barkley were incredibly potent in that era. Keep in mind, too, that Lebron also had a "super team" that lost to the Mavs (no super team there) and the last gasp Spurs. You could also argue that the Lebron-led Cavs teams had much weaker competition getting out of the East than the Bulls did.

I have no dog in this fight cause I've never personally cheered for either player and don't particularly like either man. The stain on Lebron's legacy is going to end up being in Miami where that team should probably have won 4 titles and only got two (and one of those by the skin of their teeth).

[The Great One]

Jordan played in the Pre-SuperFriends Era, so I discount those 6 chips. MJ never had to face anything close to what Lebron had to go through vs. the Warriors, for example:

KD: best all-around scorer in the game. perennial MVP
Steph: best shooter of all time. ridiculous ball-handler. perennial MVP
Klay: 2nd best shooter of all-time. perennial all-defense team
Draymond: perennial DPOY.
Iggy: 6th man candidate. Starter on most teams.

All of the above, in their primes, plus a forward thinking coach, Kerr, who is a winner (MJ should know). Show me a team that MJ beat that even comes close to holding the jockstraps of that Warriors team.

Jordan is so great that the only naysayers excuse is that "he didn't play against "superteams" lol. I mean, great players teaming up wasn't a thing back then.

It is true that Jordan didn’t face a team as good as KD's Warriors in the Finals but the reason the Warriors was created was because LeBron created them by going to Miami. He made superteams cool and now he's reaping what he sowed.

But anyways, ok, take out the the 2 losses against KD's Warriors. So LeBron is 3-4 in the Finals. Happy? LeBron btw played on a SUPERTEAM in Miami and that Heat team went 2-2 in the Finals. Should've been 1-3 if not for Ray Allen's late 3. The two losses were against a Spurs team with a washed up Tim Duncan and a young player in Kawhi. And the other was against the Mavs with one great player in Dirk.

Now let's look at LeBron's 3 championships:

2012 Thunder - against a young KD, Harden and Westbrook.
2013 Spurs - against a washed up Duncan, Parker and Ginobilil.
2016 Warriors - 73 win Warriors team. This was by far the most impressive of the three.

Now let's compare it to MJ's 6 championships:

1991 Lakers - against a top 5 player of all time in Magic Johnson
1992 Blazers - against a top 50 player of all time in Drexler
1993 Suns - against one of the greatest PF's of all time in Barkley
1996 Sonics - 64 win Sonics team led by an all time great PG in Payton and an all star in Kemp
1997 Jazz - Malone and Stockton
1997 Jazz - Malone and Stockton

[golden]

Some good discussion here. A few points:

• Jordan was a competitive asshole who wasn't fun to play with. I thought the series did a great job showing that, even though it was 90% MJ propaganda puff piece, it was also still all primarily true. MJ was a pain in the ass to play with and he was arguably the basketball GOAT. Both things can be true (basically the argument of the series).
• I compared the regular season W/L records of MJ's and LBJ's Finals opponents for their careers and guess what? Almost exactly the same. 62 win Finals opponents as an overall average. I think MJ's opponents are underrated, he played some very, very good 60+ win teams in the Finals. The fact that he would beat them felt so certain at the time, personally I think that's more a reflection of MJ's greatness than the quality of his opponents. This dude would just beat you. Fuck all the stats.
  
  > Regular season wins do not tell the story of opponent strength in the playoffs. Even less so by averaging out regular season wins. I think we all understand that you need legit superstars (like KD, Curry & Klay) to win championships... and KD & Klay are 2-way guys + Draymond's defense. Top seed 59-win Raptors teams got Lebronto'ed. Nuff said. Again, did MJ face anything even close to the KD Warriors? On the same line of debate ... what legit 2-way superstars did Lebron have as sidekicks? Lebron was short-changed twice.
  .
• Lebron does end up getting criticized for dragging sorry ass rosters to the Finals. He's great enough (and the East was weak enough) for Lebron to take an otherwise lottery-bound team right to the 4th round. You know how MJ & LBJ Finals opponents both averaged 62 wins? Lebron's teams averaged 8 fewer wins than MJ's. That MJ's Bulls were better teams than most of Lebron's Finals teams is just straight facts. I don't hold that against Lebron - I guess aside from the fact that Lebron meddled with his own rosters (ahem Tristan Thompson payout ahem) and got his own coaches fired, so there's some blood on his hands for the relatively crappy teams he ended up with.
  
  > Agreed. Lebron as GM was probably his own worst enemy, so in some ways you could argue that he probably deserves his fate as control freak. That said, if Lebron had Popovich and Buford as his coach & GM with the Cavs to start, then he doesn't need to be LeGM.
  .
• Lebron is an amazingly productive overall basketball player who can basically do everything at the highest level, I don't think anyone in the GOAT conversation is like him in that way. Magic's probably closest. But in his prime Lebron could basically play 5 positions at both ends and be your best offensive and defensive player and absolutely stuff the box score. He can run your offence as a point guard and he could also play in the post all night if he wanted to. He's nuts.
  
  > Lebron is probably the most versatile and overall talented player to play in the NBA. No argument there.
  .
• That said, the production stats don't do MJ justice. This guy was capable of leading the league in scoring and winning DPOY at the same time. He reigned some of his individual production in as he matured to play with the team and...just win. And the prime of his career was exactly that. No more scoring titles but his teams won - a lot. They dominated. When push came to shove, MJ would just beat you. He could have tried to score 50 a night like James Harden if he wanted to, but instead he did whatever needed to be done to win. And you saw that in 6-0 in the Finals with 6 Finals MVPs. MJ just steps on your throat and wins. I've 100% got the bias of not really watching pre-80's NBA, but I've got MJ as the GOAT.
  
  > First off... despite all that competitive fire, MJ never beat anybody without Pippen & PJax. Secondly... DPOY is the most subjective NBA award there is. Kobe was getting All-Defense selections like 5 years after he deserved even being mentioned. That's what the NBA and their media machine does to prop up their poster boys.
  .
• Jerry Krause did a great job pulling that roster together, he also sabotaged it in the end. I mean who tf announces at the start of a season, after b2b rings, that you're going to fire your coach and want to rebuild? Who does that? Man had a petty ego and was dysfunctional in the end. NBA stars can be notoriously difficult to keep happy and keep on board, but it's hard to imagine anyone doing today what Krause did then.
  
  > That's where people are being mis-led. There is more than enough articles still on the internet quoting Phil himself that cast doubt as to whether it was Jackson who first told Krause he was leaving no matter what, rather than Krause edicting that PJax was a goner. Krause was simply the messenger.
• That was a great docu-series. Just great.

^^^^ Good points, SR. Your serve....

[The Great One]

Another excuse that I keep reading is how MJ played against a washed up Magic Johnson in the 91 Finals. Which again is not true. I mean, Magic Johnson won the MVP in 1990 but sure he's washed up lol. Magic had to retire in 1991 because of HIV not because he was washed up. And back then people thought HIV was contagious. Karl Malone made a comment back then that he didn't want to play against Magic because he might get the disease.

[MixxAOR]

Kareem is the GOAT and it's not even close

[KeonClark]

One thing we can't ignore is how many elite shooters exist in todays NBA compared to Jordan years. We can maybe say they would have adapted and learned to shoot from deep, but we don't know that forsure. Most of the highlights in the last dance were mid range jumpers that Ibaka makes in his sleep. The average score at the end of those games was like 90-82. That wasn't ALL lockdown defense. That was also (lack of) pace and space, and playing inside the arc.

[golden]

Kareem is the GOAT and it's not even close

That's probably even more true given that fact that Kareem was a big man with an unmarketable personality, so he didn't get the benefit of the refs to help him out. Similar argument could be made for Duncan... not GOAT status, but that he was seriously under-rated. The NBA has been moving consistently and purposefully towards giving smaller players an advantage to the point where Trey Young will be an MVP candidate at some point. That trend started with MJ.

[The Great One]

Kareem is the GOAT and it's not even close

Kareem has 6 championships in his resume. He had ONE before Magic arrived. People don't know that though. Magic won a title his rookie year. Transformed his team from day one. Lakers were just another team before he arrived. Never made the Finals with Kareem in the ‘70s.

Magic > Kareem

[KeonClark]

That's probably even more true given that fact that Kareem was a big man with an unmarketable personality, so he didn't get the benefit of the refs to help him out. Similar argument could be made for Duncan... not GOAT status, but that he was seriously under-rated. The NBA has been moving consistently and purposefully towards giving smaller players an advantage to the point where Trey Young will be an MVP candidate at some point. That trend started with MJ.

MJ supporters: "He's better than Lebron! LBJ can't compete with those tough old guys! They'd adapt to todays game, also, if they had to!"
Also MJ supporters: "he's better than Kareem and Wilt! Those old guys can't compete! The game changed too much!"

[MixxAOR]

That's probably even more true given that fact that Kareem was a big man with an unmarketable personality, so he didn't get the benefit of the refs to help him out. Similar argument could be made for Duncan... not GOAT status, but that he was seriously under-rated. The NBA has been moving consistently and purposefully towards giving smaller players an advantage to the point where Trey Young will be an MVP candidate at some point. That trend started with MJ.

Number 1 in scoring since 1989. Third in reboudning. Third in blocks. There were years when he led league in scoring and was like 2nd in field goal percentage. Underrated lol

6 x champ and 6 x MVP