[OhCanada-Participant]

Can we discuss this a bit. Why is noone talking about how ridiculous it is that this dude is 40 years old with a 40 inch vert and no signs of slowing down after nearly 2000 NBA and Olympic games. I mean they bring up his age all the time but its unheard of what hes doing.. Not to mention hes played one of the most athletic and physical brands of basketball of all time theres never really been a player thats taken as many bumps. Nobody’s been fouled more. You could probably say Shaq or Mobley but Lebrons defenitely had to deal with more moving screens which seems to be one of the biggest sources of injuries in todays game. But hes fine.

And they tell us that you he spends a millon dollars a year on conditioning, okay… That doesn’t explain how he’s defying actual age. Then theres the people claiming hes taking HGH or other types of performance enhancing drugs but that wouldn’t explain it either. We’ve never ever seen Lebron show any signs of “roid rage” or whatever you wanna call it plus thoe drugs really only help with your bodies recovery time and allows you to build more mass. Youd still break down.

So whats actually going on here? Is This guy actually just a 1 in a billion athlete?

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

One in a multibillion athlete.

[HitsterParticipant]

A few guys played beyond 40 but not even MJ and Kareem were anywhere near as good as LBJ still is. ESPN did the best ballers aged 14 to 40 a couple of days back. KD was rated better than Steph as the 36 year old but I can see Steph’s game really holding up well given his elite shooting.

LBJ the greatest baller bar MJ.

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

Interesting… I think you can make a case for several to be the greatest. All mentioned have theirs of course…

[HitsterParticipant]

I have MJ then LBJ as my top two. I’d have to think very carefully who I’d put next.

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

Interesting takes, so what year is MJ your GOAT? What year would you put up as LeBron’s top year? Does Longevity matter in that kind of measurement? Just curious.

[OhCanada-Participant]

Probably Bird for me…Theres tons of options there and everyones list seems to be different.

[HitsterParticipant]

I put MJ as the GOAT for having the best ever PPG career average before his 2nd retirement. The fact that he came back after his first retirement and won 3 more titles. Also he is 6-0 in NBA finals.

LBJ the greatest ever points scorer, 4 NBA titles. and has done it over 20 plus seasons.

MJ had longevity but not like LBJ or Kareem. But I don’t count super longevity of the later two above what MJ did over a dozen or so years.

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

Does it matter that Jordan didn’t make the finals for his first 6 years (5 if you discount his short season)?
Not that I disagree about Jordan, but there are guys that made it to the finals more. And if you debate that factor of 6-0 for finals appearances, suddenly Bill Russell has a ton of merit… Where would you rank him? What year was Jordan’s best? In a vacuum I’d pick his 90/91 season… but that’s very debatable in itself. I’d take that season over any Bill Russell’s though.
How is that better than Kareem’s first championship with the Bucks? He did just as good as any player in history that year and one can say was the reason that team could be considered amongst others as the greatest team of all time.
I like LeBron, but I wouldn’t put him as the 2nd best player of all time based on that criteria. There’s a lot to consider and it’s all perspective to me. Not sure 1986 Larry Bird is lower than 2013 LeBron. That’s a tough one. 1987 Magic is a high standard too. You get it…

[OhCanada-Participant]

The way I see it is Jordan is the greatest NBA player ever. Lebron’s kinda the greatest how to I put this…face for the league? Hes been around 20 years as the face of the league and really has not dont anything you can show your kids and say he’s a bad guy. He has some hot takes, political stances etc. But youve never seen him break character as the leagues spokesman, never seen him committ a crime, never got caught into any external traps. He’s squeaky clean averaging 27, 7 and 7 for 20 years. Its nuts.

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

If longevity matters, yeah you can definitely consider LeBron the face of the NBA. If peak year matters, probably Jordan – but Kareem you can debate is a good case for doing both… but yeah, everyone’s list is different for sure.

[OhCanada-Participant]

Meant to say Malone as well in the first post not Mobley.

[HitsterParticipant]

Wilt’s 50 ppg season or in a more modern time when MJ averaged 37ppg you could argue were their peaks.

A lot of star players took several years to win a title – MJ 7seasons, Shaq 8 seasons spring to mind. LBJ actually took 9 seasons but he’d started in the NBA earlier than the other two. Steph won one within 6 seasons. Giannis had to wait 8 seasons, KD 10 seasons and Jokic 8 seasons.

[NorrinRaddParticipant]

Yes, you could, I tend to pick the years that a player has won the MVP and the Finals MVP too. Wilt’s best year to me was 1966/1967 season. He won the title that year. I’d take a Jordan title year over a year where he didn’t get past the Cavs though too. Playoffs matter a lot in these contexts for all time comparisons. Everything is in the eye of the beholder though. But I get it with stats… Jordan was averaging ridiculous numbers before winning titles. By peak numbers Jordan is the greatest. By peak year Jordan is the man. But I’d rather have the version of Jordan before that short stint where the 3 point line was moved in… it’s bad for statistical comparison matters. And I’d rather have a hungry version of Jordan – like the one that had to beat Magic… and I’d want a championship version of him that would know how to play with others on a team that can win at least 60 games in the season. That seems to check all boxes for me. His stats were good while winning.

[HitsterParticipant]

MJ only hit 12 three pointers the season he hit 3000 regular season points. Imagine if he had developed a 3 point range like a good current NBA player then he’d have been even more scary!

[OhCanada-Participant]

It really comes down to how bad you want to win. If theres a will theres a way. Skill wise pretty much every player in the NBA today has Jordan’s package. But if MJ was playing in this time you know because of his personality he would have developed everything he wouldve needed to win and be the greatest in the league. Thats why I hate comparing era’s. Nowadays athletes have way more resources. We cant have a cookoff if you dont even give me a stove.

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