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Cavs vs. Celtics


Sidney Sherman

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9 hours ago, Llogg said:

Jordan was an exceptional on ball defender. No need to suggest otherwise.

He was a good defender, but he wasn't the best defender on that team. His defensive prowess stopped after the number 2 position. People act as though he could hold his own on the block, which he couldn't.

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Jay Williams said yesterday that LeBron is better than Jordan. Maybe. But that doesn’t make him greater than MJ, which by definition does not make him the GOAT. First off, if MJ was born in 1985 and had all of LeBron’s advantages then he’d have been a better player to begin with. It shouldn’t be a huge surprise that the GOAT contender who came 20 years after him is arguably a better basketball player. But the GOAT debate is about greatness, and greatness is going 6-0 in the Finals, particularly when it’s 6 consecutive titles *in seasons where MJ started the season on the Bulls. Greatness is winning Finals MVP six times. People love to say “using LeBron’s Finals record isn’t fair”, except that yes it is when discussing greatness. MJ is the GOAT.

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1 minute ago, Goo Punch said:

Jay Williams said yesterday that LeBron is better than Jordan. Maybe. But that doesn’t make him greater than MJ, which by definition does not make him the GOAT. First off, if MJ was born in 1985 and had all of LeBron’s advantages then he’d have been a better player to begin with. It shouldn’t be a huge surprise that the GOAT contender who came 20 years after him is arguably a better basketball player. But the GOAT debate is about greatness, and greatness is going 6-0 in the Finals, particularly when it’s 6 consecutive titles *in seasons where MJ started the season on the Bulls. Greatness is winning Finals MVP six times. People love to say “using LeBron’s Finals record isn’t fair”, except that yes it is when discussing greatness. MJ is the GOAT.

   That's shortsighted. That kinda statistic should only apply in golf, not in a sport that requires teammates to also be good. I look at it like this. Jordan's Bulls were simply better than their opponents. They never beat anyone they weren't supposed to beat. When Jordan's Bulls ran up against better teams they got beat. Simple as that. Jordan may have never had a 2011 Dallas moment, but he also never had an 07 Cavs moment either. We only call that Pistons team old because Lebron went through them, but they were a superior team to those Cavs. We only say Boston was washed up because Lebron dropped 45 in game six when they were on the edge of death, but they were every bit as solid as that year's Heat Squad. Those teams were one other-worldy Lebron James performance away from making it back to the finals. The 2016 Cavs did beat the Warriors. To simply use the Finals record is not logical when you know good and well that scrappy 07 team wasn't beating the all time great Spurs, or a Kyrie and Love-less Cavs squad wasn't beating that 2015 GSW squad. Jordan didn't have to play the 17' Warriors, with 4 All Stars on it, and a person who will likely go down as one of the most prolific scorers of all time.

  

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Any time someone talks about LeBron facing better teams than MJ it’s in the NBA Finals, which is because the East has been trash during his time in the league. Take his already inferior Finals record and go ahead and make it even worse if he had to play any teams with a pulse more than once in a blue moon during the playoffs. His Eastern Conference playoff dominance with mediocre teams does not support his case, it illustrates how easy his his cake walk through the EC has been more often than not.

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4 minutes ago, Goo Punch said:

Any time someone talks about LeBron facing better teams than MJ it’s in the NBA Finals, which is because the East has been trash during his time in the league. Take his already inferior Finals record and go ahead and make it even worse if he had to play any teams with a pulse more than once in a blue moon during the playoffs. His Eastern Conference playoff dominance with mediocre teams does not support his case.

  Still waiting for someone to tell me who the Bulls beat that they probably shouldn't have.

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Just now, Thatguy said:

  Still waiting for someone to tell me who the Bulls beat that they probably shouldn't have.

Because that’s the be-all, end-all of the argument? When MJ was young his Bulls lost to better teams. Then he grew and spearheaded the dynastic team of his era, and arguably the greatest team of all time. They no longer played teams they shouldn’t beat because they were the best, which sounds pretty great if you ask me. 

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3 minutes ago, Goo Punch said:

Because that’s the be-all, end-all of the argument? When MJ was young his Bulls lost to better teams. Then he grew and spearheaded the dynastic team of his era, and arguably the greatest team of all time. They no longer played teams they shouldn’t beat because they were the best, which sounds pretty great if you ask me. 

  No, those better teams faded away. There were no teams as good as the Celtics or Lakers in the 90's. None. Not even close.

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   Listen, I am in my 40's. When my mom passed in December she still had all my Jordan playing Cards(probably worth something), and all my Jordan VHS tapes from when I used to record on the slowest setting all day to catch the games because it was the only way you could do it back then. I was and still am a huge Jordan fan. However, the problem is when it comes to Jordan any objective thought goes out the window. ANY. We are no longer able to think rationally or logically. As far as most are concerned, Jordan ran through the greatest teams of all time, and everyone that Jordan played was better than anyone Lebron is seeing now. Forget the fact that we are in the midst of the Lebron era, and who knows what will be the final tally for guys like Oladipo, George, Wall and Beal, Simmons and Imbiid, Jimmy Butler, and all the other guys on teams that Lebron played. At the time we looked at that 2012 OKC victory as MEH, but seeing the career trajectories of those three players is looking more and more like a solid victory. Some of these players will turn out to be every bit as good as the guys Jordan was playing against in the 90's, and a lot of these victories will look better down the road. In my opinion, the 90's were a lot like what we are seeing now if you took away the 4 All Star GSW, a bunch of mediocre to good teams.

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At what point did Jordan become the best modern day player? The debate used to be between Bird and Magic. Then at some point Jordan took the title.

LeBron is amazing but he needs a PR manager. Whether or not Jordan is the GOAT on the court can be debated, but his marketing blows LeBron out of the water. Can you imagine Jordan doing "the decision"? People STILL buy Jordan shoes.

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2 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

Jay Williams said yesterday that LeBron is better than Jordan. Maybe. But that doesn’t make him greater than MJ, which by definition does not make him the GOAT. First off, if MJ was born in 1985 and had all of LeBron’s advantages then he’d have been a better player to begin with. It shouldn’t be a huge surprise that the GOAT contender who came 20 years after him is arguably a better basketball player. But the GOAT debate is about greatness, and greatness is going 6-0 in the Finals, particularly when it’s 6 consecutive titles *in seasons where MJ started the season on the Bulls. Greatness is winning Finals MVP six times. People love to say “using LeBron’s Finals record isn’t fair”, except that yes it is when discussing greatness. MJ is the GOAT.

MJ is my favorite player of all time, but this is regarded.  Lebron could be making 7 consecutive finals, getting better (personally) every single year.  The 'W' in the final series is not an end-all/be-all.  If they would have the balls to give the finals-MVP to someone on the losing team, Lebron could easily have more.

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14 minutes ago, ernest_t_bass said:

MJ is my favorite player of all time, but this is regarded.  Lebron could be making 7 consecutive finals, getting better (personally) every single year.  The 'W' in the final series is not an end-all/be-all.  If they would have the balls to give the finals-MVP to someone on the losing team, Lebron could easily have more.

I do always wonder how differently LeBron would be viewed if he was 3-0 in the Finals (or maybe 3-1 with that '07 team looked at as quite the accomplishment) with still a few years to win a couple more. How is that better than 3-5? But you know that some people would view it that way.

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1 hour ago, Thatguy said:

  No, those better teams faded away. There were no teams as good as the Celtics or Lakers in the 90's. None. Not even close.

Well, Jordan's first championship was over Magic's Lakers soooo

And you are greatly discounting the quality of the Knicks and Jazz during the years the Bulls dominated them. Your argument boils down to thinking that because the Bulls were so much better than other teams, those other teams were trash. Nope. Those were good teams with historically good players. The other teams just didn't have Jordan. Full stop.

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4 minutes ago, Llogg said:

Well, Jordan's first championship was over Magic's Lakers soooo

And you are greatly discounting the quality of the Knicks and Jazz during the years the Bulls dominated them. Your argument boils down to thinking that because the Bulls were so much better than other teams, those other teams were trash. Nope. Those were good teams with historically good players. The other teams just didn't have Jordan. Full stop.

That was by far the worst Laker team of their peak period.   Magic really should have been MVP for just getting that team to the Finals.

 

As for that Knicks team, please stop.   I don't think one team has been more overrated the further we get away from them.

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Look, as weak as the 2000’s were, nobody disputes that the 90’s and the 20-teens have been great eras in the annals of NBA history. This whole trying to compare Eastern teams from then to those of today is pointless- the game has changed so drastically, and players and their development has changed so drastically, that there’s no point comparing the teams from different eras.

 

Mike played against the best from his era and he dominated like nobody else in history save names like Milan, Wilt, and Russell. LeBron has played the East from his era and he too has dominated them ruthlessly. And while there’s no doubt that LeBron’s East has been considerably weaker than MJ’s, the thing that really separates the two is the ring count. When you get to the very top of the mountain and you’re sitting hairs trying to decide which one of two guys is the Greatest Of All Time, I’m sorry, but there’s no may I’m taking the guy who was 3-5 over the guy who was 6-0 with 6 Finals MVP’s. I don’t see how you get around that.

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24 minutes ago, aggie08 said:

I do always wonder how differently LeBron would be viewed if he was 3-0 in the Finals (or maybe 3-1 with that '07 team looked at as quite the accomplishment) with still a few years to win a couple more. How is that better than 3-5? But you know that some people would view it that way.

Always better to lose early than in the finals.

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17 minutes ago, d2o said:

That was by far the worst Laker team of their peak period.   Magic really should have been MVP for just getting that team to the Finals.

 

As for that Knicks team, please stop.   I don't think one team has been more overrated the further we get away from them.

That’s weird, because the further we get away from the more I see people like you discounting them completely. It’s so en vogue right now to trash the East of the 90’s and in particular the Knicks. I get it- a lot of y’all hate Anthony Mason, Larry Johnson, Charles Oakley, Patrick Ewing, and John Starks, but the fact is that Knicks were a good team back then, and so were plenty other teams in the East. New York averaged 55 wins per season during Jordan’s run; Cleveland has averaged 53 wins per season in the 4 years since Bron returned. Kind of hard to paint the old Knicks teams as trash in that light.

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3 hours ago, Thatguy said:

He was a good defender, but he wasn't the best defender on that team. His defensive prowess stopped after the number 2 position. People act as though he could hold his own on the block, which he couldn't.

He was a great defender but when they needed stops the most they went to Pip.   Quietly Pip could make a claim to MVP of the first title.   Switching MJ off Magic and putting Pip on him picking up full court after the gm 1 loss flipped the series.  He finished the series off with 32/13/7 and 5 stls in the closeout gm 5

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2 hours ago, d2o said:

That was by far the worst Laker team of their peak period.   Magic really should have been MVP for just getting that team to the Finals.

 

As for that Knicks team, please stop.   I don't think one team has been more overrated the further we get away from them.

Portland was the favorite to get out of the west that year (1991).  The issue in the Finals was Byron Scott and Worthy got hurt and then there was nobody but Magic in the last 2 games..... Lakers weren't nearly as competitive as they could have been if healthy, but that's the luck you sometimes get.  Magic had a triple double in the elimination game but Scottie had 32 and MJ had 30 and 10 assists.  In 20 years most folks won't remember that Cleveland was extremely banged up in 2015 and the Draymond suspension/Bogut and Curry injuries in 2016. 

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3 hours ago, d2o said:

That was by far the worst Laker team of their peak period.   Magic really should have been MVP for just getting that team to the Finals.

 

As for that Knicks team, please stop.   I don't think one team has been more overrated the further we get away from them.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-best-nba-teams-of-all-time-according-to-elo/

That dogshit Knicks team is a top 100 team of all time. And two of the Jazz teams that Jordan killed were top 20 of all time. LBJ has a legit argument, the one being made here about the competition Jordan faced just isn't a part of it.

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7 minutes ago, Llogg said:

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-best-nba-teams-of-all-time-according-to-elo/

That dogshit Knicks team is a top 100 team of all time. And two of the Jazz teams that Jordan killed were top 20 of all time. LBJ has a legit argument, the one being made here about the competition Jordan faced just isn't a part of it.

cmon man.  88th?   and we are calling them a great team?   The Jazz I never really disputed.   The Knicks, yeah they are not in this conversation.

 

Moreover, this proves what has been said all along, the Bulls never faced a team better than them.  Contrarily, LBJ's Heat and Cavs faced better teams multiple times.   And this chart doesnt even include the 73 win Warrior team that the Cavs beat which would surely rank higher than any team the Bulls beat and actually better than most of the Bulls teams.  So thanks.

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Yr

Opponent

All-Time Ranking

 

All-Time Ranking

90-91

Lakers

#99

Bulls

#11

91-92

Blazers

#85

Bulls

#9

92-93

Suns

#92

Bulls

#31

95-96

Sonics

#46

Bulls

#2

96-97

Jazz

#18

Bulls

#3

97-98

Jazz

#20

Bulls

#10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

06-07

Spurs

#39

Cavs

#289

10-11

Mavericks

#50

Heat

#57

11-12

Thunder

#36

Heat

#47

12-13

Spurs

#37

Heat

#14

13-14

Spurs

#15

Heat

#146

14-15

Warriors

#5

Cavs

#119

15-16

Warriors

#4

Cavs

#26

16-17

Warriors

#1

Cavs

#104

Edited by d2o
Found to latest rankings
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3 hours ago, d2o said:

cmon man.  88th?   and we are calling them a great team?   The Jazz I never really disputed.   The Knicks, yeah they are not in this conversation.

 

Moreover, this proves what has been said all along, the Bulls never faced a team better than them.  Contrarily, LBJ's Heat and Cavs faced better teams multiple times.   And this chart doesnt even include the 73 win Warrior team that the Cavs beat which would surely rank higher than any team the Bulls beat and actually better than most of the Bulls teams.  So thanks.

Top 100 team in NBA history is a pretty fucking good team, man. C'mon. Also, what is the value of the observation "Bulls never faced a team better than them"? Yeah, they had Michael Jordan. No one was better than them and they made sure that was obvious. Put MJ on those Knicks teams and you don't think they win at least one championship? I'm still not seeing the argument that the Bulls played scrubs. Total nonsense.

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1 hour ago, Llogg said:

Top 100 team in NBA history is a pretty fucking good team, man. C'mon. Also, what is the value of the observation "Bulls never faced a team better than them"? Yeah, they had Michael Jordan. No one was better than them and they made sure that was obvious. Put MJ on those Knicks teams and you don't think they win at least one championship? I'm still not seeing the argument that the Bulls played scrubs. Total nonsense.

Nah, top 100 really isn't.  According to the rankings the Knicks were a notch below title contender level in their very best season (92-93).   When we are comparing them to all time teams that isn't anything special.

 

And seriously if the chart I provided doesn't give you an illustration of the difference in opponents and the matchups each faced then nothing will and there really is no need to discuss it further.    You posted the link and still don't understand what it shows.

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31 minutes ago, d2o said:

Nah, top 100 really isn't.  According to the rankings the Knicks were a notch below title contender level in their very best season (92-93).   When we are comparing them to all time teams that isn't anything special.

 

And seriously if the chart I provided doesn't give you an illustration of the difference in opponents and the matchups each faced then nothing will and there really is no need to discuss it further.    You posted the link and still don't understand what it shows.

LOL. You are the one arguing that a team ranking that shows every title team with Jordan was a top 10 all time team means that Jordan wasn't as impactful as LBJ. The team included MJ. That's why they were so much better than everyone. The data argues AGAINST your point.

 

If you want to make a cogent argument, at least look at win shares. LBJ leads MJ in that category. But of course that stat would put Karl Malone above both of them, so ...

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4 minutes ago, Llogg said:

LOL. You are the one arguing that a team ranking that shows every title team with Jordan was a top 10 all time team means that Jordan wasn't as impactful as LBJ. The team included MJ. That's why they were so much better than everyone. The data argues AGAINST your point.

 

If you want to make a cogent argument, at least look at win shares. LBJ leads MJ in that category. But of course that stat would put Karl Malone above both of them, so ...

yeah that wasnt the point I made............at all!!!   Again if you cant see it in the chart you never will so let's move on.

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14 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

Any time someone talks about LeBron facing better teams than MJ it’s in the NBA Finals, which is because the East has been trash during his time in the league. Take his already inferior Finals record and go ahead and make it even worse if he had to play any teams with a pulse more than once in a blue moon during the playoffs. His Eastern Conference playoff dominance with mediocre teams does not support his case, it illustrates how easy his his cake walk through the EC has been more often than not.

The bottom line is that Jordan beat all comers in the Finals. Lebron.....not so much

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11 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

That’s weird, because the further we get away from the more I see people like you discounting them completely. It’s so en vogue right now to trash the East of the 90’s and in particular the Knicks. I get it- a lot of y’all hate Anthony Mason, Larry Johnson, Charles Oakley, Patrick Ewing, and John Starks, but the fact is that Knicks were a good team back then, and so were plenty other teams in the East. New York averaged 55 wins per season during Jordan’s run; Cleveland has averaged 53 wins per season in the 4 years since Bron returned. Kind of hard to paint the old Knicks teams as trash in that light.

   Were you even in double digits during that era? Because you clearly weren't watching how awful the basketball was. The Jordan-less Bulls won 55 games. Those mediocre teams at the top were just feasting on the dogshit teams at the bottom. There were two teams with 20 wins, one with 24, one with 25, and one with 32. There were 6 teams without winning records. There were 5 teams in the west without winning records, with the worst of them being the 13 win Mavs. Those teams from that era were absolute garbage, but you would know that if you watched it. There weren't all these bigs that can shoot. Europeans hadn't invaded the league yet. And the rules......the rules made one on one basketball easy as can be. Being able to stand four guys on one side of the court while your star player went iso and they couldn't do anything about it. Being able to back a guy down for 20 seconds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

That’s weird, because the further we get away from the more I see people like you discounting them completely. It’s so en vogue right now to trash the East of the 90’s and in particular the Knicks. I get it- a lot of y’all hate Anthony Mason, Larry Johnson, Charles Oakley, Patrick Ewing, and John Starks, but the fact is that Knicks were a good team back then, and so were plenty other teams in the East. New York averaged 55 wins per season during Jordan’s run; Cleveland has averaged 53 wins per season in the 4 years since Bron returned. Kind of hard to paint the old Knicks teams as trash in that light.

 

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52 minutes ago, 52-80 said:

1988

 

Jordan_vs_Bird_-_One_on_One_Coverart.png

It was more like 93 when he retired after the first 3 peat.   In 88 he was seen by most everyone as a scoring machine that could not play well within a system or with teammates and his style of play was not conducive to winning championships.

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4 hours ago, d2o said:

It was more like 93 when he retired after the first 3 peat.   In 88 he was seen by most everyone as a scoring machine that could not play well within a system or with teammates and his style of play was not conducive to winning championships.

After the first 3-peat the debate was just starting about whether he was better than Magic or Bird.  Jordan was also "retiring", so that was a big discussion point.

In '93 Magic had more titles (5x vs. 3x), more 1st team all-NBA (9x vs. 7x), same MVPs (3x vs. 3x), same Finals MVPs (3x vs. 3x)

In '93 Bird had the same titles (3x vs. 3x), more 1st team all-NBA (9x vs. 7x), same MVPs (3x vs. 3x), 1 less Finals MVP (2x vs. 3x)

Jordan also wasn't that far removed from getting owned by the bad-boy Pistons - something everyone at that time still remembered.

Also bear in mind that in 1993, we the same length of time (25 years) from Bill Russell's 11 championships as we are TODAY from Jordan's 6.  So people were much more likely to talk about Russell or Wilt being the all-time GOAT and for Magic or Bird being the "modern-day" GOAT. 

Personally I would say it wasn't until after the 2nd 3-peat that he was known as the unquestioned GOAT.  Then it has stuck since that time.

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6 minutes ago, HookEm said:

After the first 3-peat the debate was just starting about whether he was better than Magic or Bird.  Jordan was also "retiring", so that was a big discussion point.

In '93 Magic had more titles (5x vs. 3x), more 1st team all-NBA (9x vs. 7x), same MVPs (3x vs. 3x), same Finals MVPs (3x vs. 3x)

In '93 Bird had the same titles (3x vs. 3x), more 1st team all-NBA (9x vs. 7x), same MVPs (3x vs. 3x), 1 less Finals MVP (2x vs. 3x)

Jordan also wasn't that far removed from getting owned by the bad-boy Pistons - something everyone at that time still remembered.

Also bear in mind that in 1993, we the same length of time (25 years) from Bill Russell's 11 championships as we are TODAY from Jordan's 6.  So people were much more likely to talk about Russell or Wilt being the all-time GOAT and for Magic or Bird being the "modern-day" GOAT. 

Personally I would say it wasn't until after the 2nd 3-peat that he was known as the unquestioned GOAT.  Then it has stuck since that time.

Agree with most of this.   The question was when did he become the best modern day player.    Many moved him into that conversation between 92-93.   He was coming off the threepeat with the Dream Team domination mixed in there.    Despite not having as many credentials as Magic or Bird the tide was turning then.   It was accelerated with the first retirement.

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5 hours ago, Goo Punch said:

According to Magic it happened in Monte Carlo, summer of ‘92.

Yea, that's a great story.  But really it was after the 91' championship.  Magic was forced to retire, Bird was a shadow of himself, nobody else was better with only really Charles being close and Chuck had 0 rings or deep runs...

EDIT:  I meant best in the NBA.  He didn't get in the best of modern NBA until the 72-10 season and championship IMO.  

Edited by Patrick Bateman
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