Gator03 said:

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The '94 Bulls lost in 7 to the knicks, who lost in 7 to the champion rockets. They were a good team but Pippen acted like a baby during the semifinals.

If you read Jordan Rules or watch Hoop Dreams you'll remember that circa 1990 MJ was considered by many to be a selfish player who took too many shots.

The Bulls got an all-time great coaching staff in place and a great team around him (even without MJ the '90s Bulls would've competed for eastern conference championships in my opinion).

But Lebron has played in a terrible conference, that is absolutely true. Big advantage for him.

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Good Post....but I am going to take an issue with the bolded.

In many online debates a coaching staff is used as a detriment to said player's legacy. For years I've seen people on NBA boards try to say that the only reason Tim Duncan was more successful than Kevin Garnett was the Spurs coaching staff.
That argument can be made in football.....it falls short in basketball.

I will paraphrase one of my favorite John Wooden quotes:

Someone once asked Wooden what were the characteristics of other top coaches he had seen, and he responded that the biggest characteristic that he saw in other great coaches was they coached great players.

Point being is that Michael Jordan made that coaching staff in Chicago great....not the other way around.

No one would consider Phil Jackson or that Bulls coaching staff an all time great if they built their team around Mark Agguire or Clyde Drexler rather than Michael Jordan.

While it's true that Phil Jackson would not have won anything without the best players, you have to consider that Jordan won nothing before Phil Jackson came along. Would he have won anyway once he hit his prime? There really is no way to know.

Everyone of those players are far better than Pippen was on the offensive end.

Wade and Bosh were in the midst of their primes when Lebron took his talents to South beach.

Love was in his prime and Kyries had just begun.

All of these players' numbers drop when playing with Lebron. Pippen's numbers dropped when playing without Jordan.

claym711 said:

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Everyone of those players are far better than Pippen was on the offensive end.

Wade and Bosh were in the midst of their primes when Lebron took his talents to South beach.

Love was in his prime and Kyries had just begun.

All of these players' numbers drop when playing with Lebron. Pippen's numbers dropped when playing without Jordan.

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Exactly.

There are a lot of narratives with Lebron fans...but one of them is to try and downplay his supporting cast.

All the Lebron teammates the other poster listed are future Hall of Famers and Franchise Caliber players.

Scottie Pippen is the only player Jordan played with on that level....and I wouldn't really consider Scottie Pippen to be a true franchise level player.

The downplay of Kevin Love, Chris Bosh, Dwayne Wade and Kyrie is actually one of my problems with Lebron.

If you have Lebron James on your team you must play the Lebron James system. Where everything is run through him and it is designed to maximize Lebron's stats.

All of his teammates stats will suffer. As great as Lebron is...he has never really been on a team that I would consider to be historically great.

The problem with the Lebron James system is that once he plays a team with a better system(typically from the Western Conference) they usually lose. See the Mavericks, Spurs and Warriors.

On paper...the teams Lebron was on should have smoked Dallas, San Antonio and Golden St....but the games are not played on paper.

Is Lebron great and an all time talent? Sure he is.

But its gets sorta old watching Lebron and the Lebron James system dominate a very weak Eastern Conference, only to get whupped in the Finals.

The 2011 and 2018 Eastern Conference playoffs were competitive, and what Lebron just accomplished over the last 6 weeks is impressive and cannot be downplayed.

I can totally downplay what Lebron and his teams did in the East between 2012-2017. Lebron was on the most talented team in the East for every one of those seasons. His teams did not play an elite team until the Finals.

The narrative that he is soo much better than Kobe, Duncan or Shaq always rings kinda hollow when those gus were competing in a monstrous Western conference for most of their careers.

claym711 said:

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All of these players' numbers drop when playing with Lebron. Pippen's numbers dropped when playing without Jordan.

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Lol look at 93-95... now you are just vomiting drivel for your argument.

drewbie08 said:

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Kevin Love and Chris Bosh are hall of fame players?

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Love is a franchise player but Pippen is only a borderline frachise player? Love is a stat-stuffer on a mediocre team but only a nice supporting piece on a good team. Pippen is far and way a much better player than Love.

If it wasn't for Hakeem, Pippen probably would have won the MVP in the 1993-94 season.

claym711 said:

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Everyone of those players are far better than Pippen was on the offensive end.

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This is false. The only player clearly above Pippen offensively was pre-knee issue (and therefore pre-Lebron) Wade. Irving scored more but inefficiently. Love scored more but only when he was stat stuffing on a bottom feeder. Bosh didn't score more. And that's without the supposedly ferocious 90s defenses.

Quote:

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On paper...the teams Lebron was on should have smoked Dallas, San Antonio and Golden St....but the games are not played on paper.

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This is extremely revisionist. Probably true against Dallas, but San Antonio was a buzz saw in 2013 and 2014 while Wade's knees were disintegrating. Same with Golden State ever since, I'm not really sure how someone can think the Curry/Thompson/Green/Iguodala then /Durant weren't heavy favorites every time.

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I can totally downplay what Lebron and his teams did in the East between 2012-2017. Lebron was on the most talented team in the East for every one of those seasons. His teams did not play an elite team until the Finals.

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The east has definitely been weak compared to the west, but there have been some solid teams, enough that there's usually are least one that is a legitimate threat to make the finals. But then, you just argued that the Golden State Warriors aren't that talented, so I'm struggling to understand how you evaluate teams.

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Lol look at 93-95... now you are just vomiting drivel for your argument.

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Pippen's PER in 93-94 and 94-95 is only slightly higher than while playing with Jordan. Once Jordan is gone and Pippen goes to Houston and then Portland, he immediately falls off a cliff.

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Love is a franchise player but Pippen is only a borderline frachise player? Love is a stat-stuffer on a mediocre team but only a nice supporting piece on a good team. Pippen is far and way a much better player than Love.

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Offensively, thats simply not true.

Quote:

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If it wasn't for Hakeem, Pippen probably would have won the MVP in the 1993-94 season.

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Again, not true. Pippen was a distant third in the voting, although he did have a fantastic year though.

Quote:

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This is false. The only player clearly above Pippen offensively was pre-knee issue (and therefore pre-Lebron) Wade. Irving scored more but inefficiently. Love scored more but only when he was stat stuffing on a bottom feeder. Bosh didn't score more. And that's without the supposedly ferocious 90s defenses.

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All 4 of Lebron's super friends were better offensive players than Pippen. Stats prove you wrong.

Career PER:
Wade 23.91
Love 21.93
Irving 21.8
Bosh 20.56
Pippen 18.63

Quote:

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Quote:
On paper...the teams Lebron was on should have smoked Dallas, San Antonio and Golden St....but the games are not played on paper.

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Quote:

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This is extremely revisionist. Probably true against Dallas, but San Antonio was a buzz saw in 2013 and 2014 while Wade's knees were disintegrating. Same with Golden State ever since, I'm not really sure how someone can think the Curry/Thompson/Green/Iguodala then /Durant weren't heavy favorites every time.

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This Wade take is hot garbage. Guy maintained a PER of 24.48 during those years and played all but 1 game of every playoff run.

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The east has definitely been weak compared to the west, but there have been some solid teams, enough that there's usually are least one that is a legitimate threat to make the finals. But then, you just argued that the Golden State Warriors aren't that talented, so I'm struggling to understand how you evaluate teams.

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Which East team that made the conference Finals in the past 8 years was a championship caliber or capable team?

Ulrich said:

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claym711 said:

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Um, your argument is that Lebron hasn't played with great players. Well, you're wrong...

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So your rebuttal is "nuh-uh!" ...again. If it's so cut and dry, you should be able to easily disprove my points since they are specific and clear.

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Here you go

Career PER:
Jordan 27.91
Lebron 27.68
Wade 23.91
Love 21.93
Irving 21.8
Bosh 20.56
Pippen 18.63

So tell me again how Pippen was a better offensive player than these guys, and how terrible Lebron's teammates have been...

Goose said:

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claym711 said:

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Everyone of those players are far better than Pippen was on the offensive end.

Wade and Bosh were in the midst of their primes when Lebron took his talents to South beach.

Love was in his prime and Kyries had just begun.

All of these players' numbers drop when playing with Lebron. Pippen's numbers dropped when playing without Jordan.

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Discounting Scottie Pippen's contributions on the defensive end is a bit disingenuous. The guy is generally regarded as a top 10 or 15 defensive player in the history of the NBA. (On top of averaging 16/6/5 over 17 seasons).

And ignoring the contributions of Dennis Rodman for the '96, '97, and '98 championships is downright ludicrous.

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Did not discount his defense at all. Pippen was an elite defender.

Defensive Rating:
Duncan 95.30 (for reference)
Rodman 100.26 (ranked just below Joakim Noah and just above Manu Ginobili
Pippen 101.51 (ranked just above Paul George)
Jordan 102.83
Lebron 103.19
Wade 104.20
Bosh 105.31
Love 106
Irving 109


Others:
Durant 105
Curry 106
Klay 108

Ulrich said:

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That's a terrible attempt. You listed a crappy stat for their entire careers rather than evaluating their performance while they overlapped with Jordan/LeBron. All those years Pippen put up 10 ppg on the back end of his career are as irrelevant as the 25 ppg Wade was scoring before LeBron went to Miami.

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Haha, how far do you want to take this? Here, you're still wrong.

Wade's PER while playing with Lebron: 24.47
Wade's PER career: 23.91

Bosh's PER while playing with Lebron: 19.32
Bosh's PER career: 20.56

Love's PER while playing with Lebron: 20.32
Love's PER career: 21.93

Irving's PER while playing with Lebron: 21.4
Irving's PER career: 21.8

Pippen's PER while playing with Jordan: 18.67
Pippen's PER career: 18.63


Keep going?

You can base your opinion on algorithm stats like that if you want, but I'll base my opinion on what I've seen those players do live, then and now. And I'll take Pippen and Grant/Rodman over Wade and Bosh or Kyrie and Love every time.

I guess all you have left when the stats prove you wrong is to trash the stat and go with a gut feeling.

Agree with previous poster that in about 30 years from now (approximately 2045+), Jordan will have become the Bill Russell/Wilt/Kareem part of the conversation (super long ago player that many less people alive remember watching so he is mentioned less often), and LeBron will be in Jordan's place (a retired rich ex-player that the older segment of the population still remembers watching live).

And there will be the next new amazing 'generational' level player that will be wowing the current unborns and toddlers types, like some 7'0 300 lb Shaq size guy who shoots and dribbles like Steph Curry, and all the current folks on this thread will be their parents/grandparents arguing with them how LeBron is still the GOAT compared to that new guy.

Addendum to my previous post... VORP is still pretty box score dependent, so it may still under rate defense. However, it does factor in how much players play, which helps normalize players who miss a lot of games or play restricted minutes.

So Lebron played with better offensive teammates Jordan played with better defensive teammates? I agree.

drewbie08 said:

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Kevin Love and Chris Bosh are hall of fame players?

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Without a doubt. Both players will be First Ballot Hall Of Famers.

Basketball Hall of Fame is a lot easier to get in than the NFL

Ulrich said:

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claym711 said:

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Everyone of those players are far better than Pippen was on the offensive end.

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This is false. The only player clearly above Pippen offensively was pre-knee issue (and therefore pre-Lebron) Wade. Irving scored more but inefficiently. Love scored more but only when he was stat stuffing on a bottom feeder. Bosh didn't score more. And that's without the supposedly ferocious 90s defenses.

Quote:

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On paper...the teams Lebron was on should have smoked Dallas, San Antonio and Golden St....but the games are not played on paper.

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This is extremely revisionist. Probably true against Dallas, but San Antonio was a buzz saw in 2013 and 2014 while Wade's knees were disintegrating. Same with Golden State ever since, I'm not really sure how someone can think the Curry/Thompson/Green/Iguodala then /Durant weren't heavy favorites every time.

Quote:

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I can totally downplay what Lebron and his teams did in the East between 2012-2017. Lebron was on the most talented team in the East for every one of those seasons. His teams did not play an elite team until the Finals.

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The east has definitely been weak compared to the west, but there have been some solid teams, enough that there's usually are least one that is a legitimate threat to make the finals. But then, you just argued that the Golden State Warriors aren't that talented, so I'm struggling to understand how you evaluate teams.

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You are a liar. I didn't say that all.

You said that Cleveland should have "smoked" Golden State, which pretty strongly implies that Golden State isn't all that that good especially before they added a second MVP and fifth all-star. Regardless, misinterpreting your intent hardly makes me a liar.

Ulrich said:

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You said that Cleveland should have "smoked" Golden State, which pretty strongly implies that Golden State isn't all that that good especially before they added a second MVP and fifth all-star. Regardless, misinterpreting your intent hardly makes me a liar.

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Misrepresenting someones intent is lying.

It's pretty obvious you are dishonest person.

Ulrich said:

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Kellso said:

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Ulrich said:

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You said that Cleveland should have "smoked" Golden State, which pretty strongly implies that Golden State isn't all that that good especially before they added a second MVP and fifth all-star. Regardless, misinterpreting your intent hardly makes me a liar.

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Misrepresenting someones intent is lying.

It's pretty obvious you are dishonest person.

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You're taking the internet way too seriously, dude.

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Im just stating that its very obvious you are a dishonest poster. You've been insulting people on this thread, and even outright lying to try and make your arguments stronger.

Good Luck to all the Lebron fan boys. Hopefully he won't lose his 6th NBA Finals.