"One POSSIBLE future. From your point of view... I don't know tech stuff.".... Kyle Reese
Let me join the Jderf and tommy chorus here...two of the last 3 shots he hit were ridiculous. He is at the point where if he comes off a screen with an angle to the basket, even 20 feet away, and there is only one man between him and the basket and the weak side D is not ready to rotate, it is GAME OVER. Once is he faced up, no one can stay in front of him because he is too fast, too big and too strong. He doesn't even need a move. I am glad Miami is still in the hunt as the story of whether or not LBJ will get a title in South Beach is a key NBA plot line that gets more interesting as the stakes go up with each passing round.
A quick shout out for Shane. David West is 6'9" and 240 burly pounds of low post banging. Shane was giving him an inch and at least 20 pounds. West had 24, but a lot of those came early and Shane was bothering the heck out of him in the 4th, resulting in a West technical when he slapped Shane in the head on a late box out. Shane also had two big offensive plays in the last 5 minutes - a drive and dish to Joel Anthony for an and-1 dunk and a short banker in traffic. LBJ played 45 minutes last night, Wade 39 and Shane 40.
Yeah, LeBron James is the best player on the planet. Period. End of discussion. It isn't even close. He should really be in the discussion of greatest ever. And I say that as a Bulls fan who despises the Heat. He has the quickness, defensive ability and shooting touch of Jordan, the explosiveness and strength of Wilkins, the vision and passing ability of Magic, and the foot speed of Iverson.
It is a shame that he spent so many years carrying an AWFUL Cavs team and has thus earned the reputation of a guy who can't win the big one. But then he bungled what could have been a completely acceptable decision by handling it like a dumb-dumb (and continued to bungle it for the next year or more with stupid comments). The guy is just an absolute force in all aspects of the game, and none of the off-court stuff changes that.
It's just a matter of when he wins a championship (barring a freak injury) in my opinion. And that's just a matter of getting the guys around him to be good enough and willing enough to let him lead them to a title. The first part is possibly in place already (if Wade stays healthy, Bosh gets healthy, and the also-rans continue to hit enough shots). The second part seems to be developing (if Wade continues to be willing/able to play off of James).
Agree with all of this. I am a fellow Bulls fan, and had the misfortune of attending Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals last year. LeBron absolutely owned the fourth quarter in that game, and for much of the series. He hit a variety of shots against Deng (a very solid defender), had some nifty assists and completely bottled up Rose on defense. Rose was a desrving MVP last year in my view, but there was no doubt at all about who was the best player that night or throughout that series. Which only makes LBJ's performance against the Mavs that much more baffling.
And that is why we need the Heat in the Finals...can LBJ get to the mountaintop? Should the Celtics beat the 76ers tomorrow, they are a formidable foe that is very capable of beating Miami, even in their banged up state. Obviously, whomever emerges from the West will be even tougher to beat than whomever Miami faces in the Eastern Conference Finals.
I never need a break from watching basketball. We've got 2-3 more great weeks of NBA, followed by the Olympics, and then a short break to more NBA and the main event, the Duke Blue Devils. I love International Basketball Tournament years.
Even in that category, I'm not sure anyone else matches up. There's only way you can make the case that LeBron isn't the best player ever, and that's to make the rhetorical move of shifting the definition of "greatness" from "effectiveness on the court" to something like "number of championships won." But that then makes the argument about who had best career of all time, and not necessarily who was best player of all time.
Has there ever been a player that could influence a game at such a high level in so many different areas? LeBron has the unique capability, not only to take over a game (which is rare but obviously not unprecedented), but to take over every single aspect of a game -- which, as luvdahops points out, makes it all the more baffling when he doesn't. On a given night, he might be the game leader in three, four, or even five different stat categories. Ridiculous. I'll say it again, he's a transcendent talent.
Last edited by Jderf; 05-25-2012 at 12:24 PM.
Yeah, invariably these debates turn into "who has the most championships", which is a product of a player's teams as much as it is a product of the player's singular ability.
James has the legitimate ability to get a quintuple-double in a game (points, rebounds, assists, blocks, and steals). He can guard any position defensively, and do it well. He can shoot, he can create for others, he can rebound, he can steal the ball, he can drive to the basket. He's both dominant and unselfish. It's really crazy how good he is at everything.
And even the "LeBron can't get it done in the clutch" is overstated. Was he unclutch when he hit that game-winning 3 against Orlando in the playoffs a few years ago? Was he unclutch when he score like 25 points in the last 8 minutes of the game to beat Detroit in Detroit in the playoffs? At one point, I remember a statistical analysis that showed no player to be more effective in the final minutes of games than James.
If you look at the NBA site at www.sports-reference.com there are several statistical categories that might inform a "greatness" discussion ... stats like like "player efficiency rating" and "win shares" ... these are pure stats, not rhetorical moves, and in these categories Lebron (while great) still ranks behind Jordan.
I love LeBron, always have. But I mean, Jordan had that killer instinct to just absolutely rip your heart out and show it to you. To paraphrase Tupac, he Would. Not. Lose. Won't find that on a stat sheet, unless it's one recording number of championships.
First off, let me just say that I love this debate. It's just so interesting. (Probably why I subconsciously sought it out today. )
As to your point, Reilly, I think the ultimate validity of "highly-cumulative" stats, like win-shares, is very open to question. It is often very difficult to establish their exact meaning. I don't pretend to know the myriad calculations involved, but still, I think the issue is murky at best. For what it's worth, of the two you mentioned, MJ does in fact edge Lebron in both, although only barely.
PER: 27.9 to 27.2
Win share per 48: 0.25 to 0.233
If you look at some of the other advanced statistics (selected purely by my own biases ), LeBron ends up edging MJ in Assist %, Team Rebounding %, eFG%, and Block %. MJ tops LeBron in Steal %.
However, when it comes to statistics, the global differences between the two are very, very minor. I would call it a wash. However, the reason I still take LeBron on my team, all else being equal, is "after the jump."
But I think he would lose, and here's why. MJ was 6-6, 195 lbs. LeBron is 6-8, 240 lbs. MJ simply could not have D'ed up on LeBron the way LeBron would be able to D up on MJ. LeBron would bottle him up. Suffocate him. Severely hamper his game. But at the other end? LeBron could take MJ into the post consistently and with relative ease. LeBron is the better passer. LeBron is the better rebounder. LeBron's all-around game is simply "more all-around" than any player, ever. He would have an answer for MJ, and the inverse would not be true.
If we're playing 5-on-5 (or 3-on-3, or 1-on-1, doesn't really matter) I take LeBron as my small forward, no question.
Last edited by Jderf; 05-25-2012 at 02:11 PM.
I think that:
(i) you severely underestimate a immeasurable factor -- Jordan's ability to impose his will on the game, his team, the moment, the opponent is perhaps unrivaled in sports and has nothing to do with height, weight, etc.
(ii) we don't yet know what James may achieve -- sure, his cupboard is bare now, but he has a lot of time left to make his mark
"Just like you man. I got the shotgun, you got the briefcase." Omar Little
Jderf, you are making the rhetorical move of shifting the definition of greatness ...
I was mainly pointing out that your earlier point (earlier point: the *only* way Lebron is not the greatest of all time is to add some sort of not-totally-relevant criterion to the mix) was not true.
Looking at the stats that seem to be measuring the greatest of all time is *another* way to say that Lebron is not the greatest of all time.
I didn't know what I'd find when I went to sports-reference. Your post made me go there, as I was curious. Before looking at sports-reference, I would have characterized Jordan as the greatest of all time. Greatest I've ever seen. (I never saw the likes of Oscar Robertson or Bill Russell.) The stats made me give Lebron more credit than I might otherwise have; but he still doesn't displace Jordan, in my opinion. He still has time, as others note.
I actually think (and I've had this argument around here before) that the "will-to-win" is severely overestimated by people who have never competed in a sport at the national or international level. Either way, though, I don't think going down that road is particularly conducive to solid discussion. Really hard to argue one way or the other convincingly.
This straight-up made me smile. Nice play, sir. Nice play. And it's true, I did sort of shift the discussion to who would you take in a 5-on-5. And I'm not 100% sure if that rhetorical move is legitimate or not.
I do want to say that reasonable minds can most definitely differ on this issue. I do not claim apodictic certainty. Personally, I see LeBron as a unique player in the history of basketball, which is why I keep calling him a "transcendent talent." There have been players with similar overall games to Jordan (Kobe, a young Grant Hill, among others). I don't think the same can be said for Mr. James.
(I will try to stop hijacking the thread now )
You think he would lose what, though? Jordan wasn't a small forward, and the NBA isn't 1-on-1. (Though I do feel like Jordan would have figured something out.)
And not for nothing, I think LeBron's a fantastic defensive player. But you make it sound like if he was guarding Jordan in his prime, he'd have just throttled him, when literally nobody had an answer for Jordan. Nobody could check him, you just wanted to attempt to slow him down a bit.
Agreed. And I think Jordan in his prime would have acquitted himself pretty well defending LeBron, too. MJ played at around 220 in his prime, and could hold his own in the paint. And I doubt LeBron could have done much off the dribble against him. Jordan was the premier defensive of his era and referred to as "the Glove" for a reason.
But for my money these two do both stand apart from all others in NBA history in their ability to influence games at both ends of the floor, inside and on the perimeter. Maybe Kobe comes close. No one else comes readily to mind, though.
Last post. Promise. Can't help it.
Wait, are you sure?
You're both actually right to key in on that. Re-reading my post, I did get a bit carried away with my language, there. A more subtle point would be that LBJ would be able to defend MJ better than MJ could defend LBJ. Not by an wide margin, mind you, but by a margin nonetheless.
I'm a huge Bulls fan who definitely remembers watching Jordan in his prime. And I can say that I'd take LeBron over Jordan.
It's easy to think of Jordan as this cold-blooded killer in the clutch, but remember that he didn't win a title until his 7th NBA season (plus 3 years of college) at age 28. LeBron is in his 9th NBA season (no collegiate experience at age 27, and he has a reasonable chance to pick up a title this year. And it wasn't until his 4th seasons with Scottie Pippen and Horace Grant before Jordan finally broke through. Heck, Jordan didn't even lead his team to a .500 record until his 4th NBA season (LeBron did it in year 2, at age 20), and he didn't lead them to a high seed until his 5th year (LeBron did it in Year 3).
Prior to the 1991 season, Jordan was plagued with the same questions that LeBron is currently enduring ("he's not as good as Magic and Bird - look at how he folds in the playoffs!"). Jordan regularly struggled in the playoffs as tougher, more experienced teams like the Pistons and Celtics. He was considered by many to be the classic "me-first" player who "couldn't make his teammates better." People said all he could do was win scoring titles, but when it came to winning when it mattered, he fell short. Sound familiar?
I think James is every bit the player that Jordan was. Jordan never had to guard a guy with James' combination of size, skill, and athleticism (because there's never been anyone with James' combination of attributes before). Jordan would have a tougher time guarding James than vice versa.