How Does a Top 5 GOAT Let Two Roleplayers at His Position Win Finals MVP?

[eliteballer]

Iggy and Kawaii ain't scrubs, but in the context of "top 5-10 all time players", they are.

Can you see Shaq, Bird, MJ, Russell, Kobe, Magic, Kareem etc. allowing guys at their position to do this?

Answer...LeBron ain't top 5. Period. Hell he's not better than Hakeem in my opinion. Hakeem at his peak in 94 and 95 was better than James at his peek.

[SouBeachTalents]

Bird lost out on Finals MVP to Cedric Maxwell, the only Finals MVP to never be inducted into the HOF

[illmaticone]

Of course he's not top 5 and of course he's below Hakeem. LeBron is locked in at #11

[iTare]

It's not like they out played him. It just so happens that the award goes to the winning team. Also the award for having to deal with LBJ is getting the FMVP.

[Rocketswin2013]

Yes, not top 5. Not better than peak Hakeem. Hell of an insult.

[Ne 1]

It's not like they out played him.


Sorry, but LeBron was clearly outplayed by Leonard in the two biggest games of the series, on Bron's home court too, he was a defensive role player but looked like a perennial All-Star in games 3-5 with LeBron defending him.

LeBron's 2014 Finals were actually a lot like Durant's 2012 Finals. Yeah, his efficiency was great and his stats look pretty good on paper, but the rest of the game just wasn't there. His defense was mediocre, his play-making wasn't the same, and he was a turnover machine. LeBron was pretty inconsistent throughout the series outside of that great game 2. His lack of a killer instinct and passiveness in moments when the team needed him to step up was clearly an issue as well.

[Fire Colangelo]

Shows how good LeBron is when you get FMVP for "holding" him to a 35/10/8 or whatever the hell he averaged series.

[COnDEMnED]

None of the top 5 Goats were even in the LEAGUE when Iggy and Kawaii won their FMVP's.

[HOoopCityJones]

Sorry, but LeBron was clearly outplayed by Leonard in the two biggest games of the series, on Bron's home court too, he was a defensive role player but looked like a perennial All-Star in games 3-5 with LeBron defending him.

LeBron's 2014 Finals were actually a lot like Durant's 2012 Finals. Yeah, his efficiency was great and his stats look pretty good on paper, but the rest of the game just wasn't there. His defense was mediocre, his play-making wasn't the same, and he was a turnover machine. LeBron was pretty inconsistent throughout the series outside of that great game 2. His lack of a killer instinct and passiveness in moments when the team needed him to step up was clearly an issue as well.

You don't even have to explain yourself bruh. These ****** won the FMVP specifically while out playing him. Repped tho.

[SHAQisGOAT]

Bird lost out on Finals MVP to Cedric Maxwell, the only Finals MVP to never be inducted into the HOF

Doubt very much that Iggy makes the HoF...

And what do you mean, "lost out"? :rolleyes: ***** was on his team :lol
Bird was champion as a sophomore leading the team, after completely turning around a messed-up franchise, only main addition by then being a not-viewed-as-much Parish, who replaced Cowens.

Plus, tbh, Larry should've been named FMVP...

Dude was extremely aloof those days, no-****s-given attitude towards the media, and back then you wouldn't even see individual assists/rebounds in most boxscores.

Bird almost grabbed as many rebounds as a prime Moses Malone, EASILY leading his team there.
He was the clear-cut best playmaker in the series, leading everyone in assists by a comfortable margin.
He also led everyone in steals, playing great defense everywhere too.
Dude was hustling all out, phyisical af in one of the most physical series you'll ever see... Defense and physicality were through the roof on that one.

Nobody EVER averaged 15+/15+/7+ for a Finals series, except for Larry...

Yea, he wasn't consistent with his scoring/shooting as opposite to Maxwell, but Larry still was the 3rd best scorer in the series, still came through plenty of times, killed it everywhere else throughout...
And LB was easily getting the most attention (after a terrific ECF vs a better team), setting up Cornbread for numerous "easy" buckets.

He even played 5 more minutes per game than Cedric (important) but ya know you wouldn't see no stat-padding from Larry when a game was already done...

He was very clutch, closing the series with a 27/13/5 on 11/20 FG game6, including 9 of the team's 11 in the decisive late run.

^FMVP right there, imo... If those Finals were to happen at least 5 years later on, Bird would've gotten it.

Big-time, now classic games from Bird on that one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoXOAs4Gz5A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDk9y0Vul5A

[ArbitraryWater]

Doubt very much that Iggy makes the HoF...

And what do you mean, "lost out"? :rolleyes: ***** was on his team :lol
Bird was champion as a sophomore leading the team, after completely turning around a messed-up franchise, only main addition by then being a not-viewed-as-much Parish, who replaced Cowens.

Plus, tbh, Larry should've been named FMVP...

Dude was extremely aloof those days, no-****s-given attitude towards the media, and back then you wouldn't even see individual assists/rebounds in most boxscores.

Bird almost grabbed as many rebounds as a prime Moses Malone, EASILY leading his team there.
He was the clear-cut best playmaker in the series, leading everyone in assists by a comfortable margin.
He also led everyone in steals, playing great defense everywhere too.
Dude was hustling all out, phyisical af in one of the most physical series you'll ever see... Defense and physicality were through the roof on that one.

Nobody EVER averaged 15+/15+/7+ for a Finals series, except for Larry...

Yea, he wasn't consistent with his scoring/shooting as opposite to Maxwell, but Larry still was the 3rd best scorer in the series, still came through plenty of times, killed it everywhere else throughout...
And LB was easily getting the most attention (after a terrific ECF vs a better team), setting up Cornbread for numerous "easy" buckets.

He even played 5 more minutes per game than Cedric (important) but ya know you wouldn't see no stat-padding from Larry when a game was already done...

He was very clutch, closing the series with a 27/13/5 on 11/20 FG game6, including 9 of the team's 11 in the decisive late run.

^FMVP right there, imo... If those Finals were to happen at least 5 years later on, Bird would've gotten it.

Big-time, now classic games from Bird on that one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoXOAs4Gz5A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDk9y0Vul5A


who cares about '15+/15+/7+' ? dafuq? get more arbitrary mater.. Bird had b2b 8 pt games and just wasn't impressive.. get over it.


To OP, yeah, Iggy is probably like Billups level.. Kawhi has a chance to do some all-time shit, though... not like Bron guarded Iggy, either.

[Ne 1]

Shows how good LeBron is when you get FMVP for "holding" him to a 35/10/8 or whatever the hell he averaged series.

LeBron played right into the Warriors game plan. Dare him to shoot and let him beat you 1 on 1 with difficult drives to the basket and have him worn out in the 4th. Since he doesn't command a double team JR, Shump, and Delly were not getting open looks. 40%+ usage rate with a 5 foot cushion and on 1 on 1 coverage the entire series and he shoots 39% from the field and 28% outside 5 feet because his jumper is broken.

If you play Curry like that, he'll go for nearly 50 a game. Curry however was doubled HARD off the PNR to the point where Mozgov and Tristan T were at times like 35 feet away from the basket. This thoroughly broke down the Cavs D and created a far more efficient Warriors offense.
There's a reason why Green, Iggy, Barnes and Klay (who was very quiet this series and I'm not sure if he played better than JR) etc. had wide open shots and driving lanes to the basket throughout the series.

But nobody seems to give Curry credit for creating the Warriors offense. He probably had more hockey assists than points. Delly actually defended Curry about as well you could fighting through screens and he still got torched outside of game 2. I'm honestly shocked he didn't even receive a single FMVP vote. They gave it to Iggy basically because he defended LeBron so well and the Warriors looked a lot better with him in the starting line up. But without Curry's scoring and running, the Warriors offense where he was creating open looks for Barnes, Iggy, and Green, the Warriors would've been dead. He became content that he would be double teamed and traped most of the nigh, so he spread that ball around well causing the Cavs to get out of defensive balance and the rest of his team thrived. When the game got a little close and Steph saw daylight he hit them up for two crucial threes followed by an assist for another three which effectively broke the Cavaliers back. Lebron needed to have a hot shooting night and he didn't come through yet again, especially in the 4th and the clutch.

[Kblaze8855]

Ive never had him top 5 but thats a completely ridiculous reason for it.

We are talking two guys hitting largely uncontested jumpers and making timely drives on teams that were likely to win no matter what. Leonard had like 17 points total the first two games of the finals. Game 3 he scored 6 points on Lebron(two threes kinds in his face). Game 4...his second field goal was a putback dunk up 22 points.

Watching his game 5 production now. Spurs up 22 and hes scored 2 points on Lebron so far. I turned it off. Maybe he does something later but either way....hes got like 20 points max on Lebron in the entire series.

The way people talk you would think he was going to town on him....or that Iggy wasnt hitting uncontested corner 3s.

People have put in work on Lebron before. But not these two. They played him tough and made him work hard for all he got while few teammates showed up at all.

They hardly game 7 Pierced him.

[Mr. Jabbar]

trick question; hes top 30

[BlakFrankWhite]

But remember when Billups MURDERED kobe in '04 finals.

Don't get me wrong...Billups went on to have a good career...but he was a nobody before the finals...and he abused a top 20 all time player..the entire series

[SHAQisGOAT]

who cares about '15+/15+/7+' ? dafuq? get more arbitrary mater.. Bird had b2b 8 pt games and just wasn't impressive.. get over it.


To OP, yeah, Iggy is probably like Billups level.. Kawhi has a chance to do some all-time shit, though... not like Bron guarded Iggy, either.

Figures someone would say that :rolleyes:
3 of the 5 main statistical categories right there, more than 60 NBA Finals... Only player who ever averaged 15+/15+/7+? Larry freaking Bird... I guess that says nothing at all, huh? :confusedshrug:
BTW, Larry's also the only player to have ever averaged a triple-double in a Finals series, when you round-up the numbers (24/10/10 in '86)... Guess that's not impressive either :rolleyes:

Just wasn't impressive? Yea, I'm sure you've watched those series :rolleyes:
Just says you're a major boxscore watcher, and even so, apart from his usual scoring/shooting numbers during those days, his all-around numbers were still great, especially taking in the "context" of the series...

1st one of those 8-point games, Larry also had 13 rebounds, 10 assists, 5 steals and 2 blocks, playing a great all-around game apart from his scoring/shooting while the Celtics won in a blow-out and no Celtic even had what you'd call a great game scoring-wise...
What would you know about that though?
Guess he should've stayed in to pad them scoring numbers, kinda like LeBron, huh? :lol

The other 8-point game was most likely his worse '81 Finals game, yea, while Cornbread scored 24 but they still lost...

Once again, those Finals were one of the most physical you'll ever see, with big-time D being played, won by defense, hustle and rebounding...
Celtics scored 96.5 PPG on 47% FG, Rockets scored 86.7 on 38%...

Look at how intense it was, with Bird physical af, with a 18/21/9 game1, for the victory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDk9y0Vul5A

Like I've said, Bird almost rebound as much as a prime Moses Malone, he led everyone in assists and steals, 3rd best scorer in the series.

And, in the previous series, the "real" Finals vs Philly who had the best record that year, Bird KILLED IT vs the MVP, led them from a 3-1 deficit.
So, as it should be, most of the attention was on Larry for those Finals, and he was setting up Cornbread for plenty of bunnies...

And, yes, Bird wasn't as good and as consistent with his scoring/shooting as Cedric but shot better from the FT line, take into consideration the paragraph above too, he rebounded better than Maxwell, playmaked much better, played better overall defense and wasn't even that far in terms of scoring.

Bird just more impactful than Cornbread, and was the one who finished the series.

How about Larry being the one to close out the series, easily being the best in the final game6...
Putting up 27/13/5 on 11/20 FG, including 9 of the team's 11 in the decisive late run, very clutch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoXOAs4Gz5A

Faced with that ^ and my previous post, tell me though... Why shouldn't Larry have been named FMVP?
Larry WAS the "true" FMVP, get over it...

Main reasons he wasn't named FMVP was because he had a bad relationship with the media during those days, and also, most boxscores didn't have single/total assists and rebounding numbers...
I think someone even posted something about all of that a while ago...

Now g'ahead and throw out a small phrase saying basically nothing as to why Bird wasn't the FMVP :rolleyes:


Iggy's not even Billups' "level"... I can see Chauncey making the HoF, for example, not Andre.

[nzahir]

trick question; hes top 30
Top 30 can still mean #1; like how jordan is top 30.
But I guess your brain couldnt comprehend it

[HOoopCityJones]

http://tophat-imc.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/post-23071-I-was-in-the-pool-gif-George-C-RtxV.gif

[Mr. Jabbar]

Top 30 can still mean #1; like how jordan is top 30.
But I guess your brain couldnt comprehend it

dont hate the messenger, hate lebald

[nzahir]

Shows how good LeBron is when you get FMVP for "holding" him to a 35/10/8 or whatever the hell he averaged series.
36 13 and 9 on 40% shooting(well 39.8 or 39.9; but that gets rounded up)

[nzahir]

dont hate the messenger, hate lebald
That doesnt make any sense. I still know that you dont understand the concept of top 30. Of course lebron is top 30; because he is number 6-8 all time right now. When its all said and done though he will be top 5 easy, just wait some years buddy

[Mr. Jabbar]

That doesnt make any sense. I still know that you dont understand the concept of top 30. Of course lebron is top 30; because he is number 6-8 all time right now. When its all said and done though he will be top 5 easy, just wait some years buddy

no1 uses "top x" literally :facepalm , everyone knows ppl are reffering to the upper limit of that range being mentioned. which is the reason no1 says top 20 or top 30 when talking jordan for example.

you see, this expresion is never used literally, only a literally stupid person would do it.

[Heavincent]

Ive never had him top 5 but thats a completely ridiculous reason for it.

We are talking two guys hitting largely uncontested jumpers and making timely drives on teams that were likely to win no matter what. Leonard had like 17 points total the first two games of the finals. Game 3 he scored 6 points on Lebron(two threes kinds in his face). Game 4...his second field goal was a putback dunk up 22 points.

Watching his game 5 production now. Spurs up 22 and hes scored 2 points on Lebron so far. I turned it off. Maybe he does something later but either way....hes got like 20 points max on Lebron in the entire series.

The way people talk you would think he was going to town on him....or that Iggy wasnt hitting uncontested corner 3s.

People have put in work on Lebron before. But not these two. They played him tough and made him work hard for all he got while few teammates showed up at all.

They hardly game 7 Pierced him.

The Warriors have a very real chance of losing this series without Iguodala...just look at Bran's atrocious FG% when guarded by him.

[Indian guy]

How is LeBron "allowing" anything? He didn't even guard Iggy. Cleveland either had a big or their weakest perimeter defender on the floor on him all series. And even they weren't guarding him much. The game plan was to overplay Curry and Klay and leave everybody else, particularly Iggy, open all series. I just went through Iggy's highlights in all 6 games of the Finals and I counted no more than 3 shots he made on LeBron all series. 3, with 1 of 'em coming in transition.

As far as Kwahi goes, for 1) he's a flat out stud and 2) Spurs are a complete anomaly in the sense that they don't rely on any 1 player. Whoever's going to win MVP on that team, their volume numbers won't be anything to write home about. But I don't think that negates the fact that Kwahi is one of the best players in the NBA. The Finals were simply his coming out party.

And btw, it's not like either of these 2 players actually outplayed or outproduced LeBron. Statistically, it's not even a comparison. LeBron was spectacular in both series' and his production blows 'em away. OP has no point to make here.

And most importantly, the only reason why Kwahi and Iggy's wins are even relevant is because the Finals actually award an MVP. What if every round did, then imagine the less than stellar names top players would be losing the MVP to in some of their lost series'. To judge any great player's all-time standing on the basis of who won MVP in their lost series' is retarded.

[nzahir]

no1 uses "top x" literally :facepalm , everyone knows ppl are reffering to the upper limit of that range being mentioned. which is the reason no1 says top 20 or top 30 when talking jordan for example.

you see, this expresion is never used literally, only a literally stupid person would do it.
:facepalm
You are smart(DONT TAKE IT LITERALLY THOUGH)

[Psileas]

How is LeBron "allowing" anything? He didn't even guard Iggy. Cleveland either had a big or their weakest perimeter defender on the floor on him all series. And even they weren't guarding him much. The game plan was to overplay Curry and Klay and leave everybody else, particularly Iggy, open all series. I just went through Iggy's highlights in all 6 games of the Finals and I counted no more than 3 shots he made on LeBron all series. 3, with 1 of 'em coming in transition.

As far as Kwahi goes, for 1) he's a flat out stud and 2) Spurs are a complete anomaly in the sense that they don't rely on any 1 player. Whoever's going to win MVP on that team, their volume numbers won't be anything to write home about. But I don't think that negates the fact that Kwahi is one of the best players in the NBA. The Finals were simply his coming out party.

And btw, it's not like either of these 2 players actually outplayed or outproduced LeBron. Statistically, it's not even a comparison. LeBron was spectacular in both series' and his production blows 'em away. OP has no point to make here.

And most importantly, the only reason why Kwahi and Iggy's wins are even relevant is because the Finals actually award an MVP. What if every round did, then imagine the less than stellar names top players would be losing the MVP to in some of their lost series'. To judge any great player's all-time standing on the basis of who won MVP in their lost series' is retarded.

This. It's not LeBron's fault that a player of the winning team is vastly favored for winning the Finals MVP regardless of whether or not he was the series' best player. The margin of performance between him and them was actually bigger (in favor of him) than the margin of performance between Kobe and Billups in 2004 (not even in Kobe's favor).
It shouldn't even just be a Finals thing. Had every series had an MVP, Jordan would have lost multiple ones to other inferior guards (Moncrief, Dumars, Thomas), Magic to another inferior guard (K.Johnson), Kareem to inferior centers (Thurmond, Sikma), etc.

[G0ATbe]

That sounds like something a top 50 player would do.

[red1]

lol. terrible thread

[Spurs5Rings2014]

Ive never had him top 5 but thats a completely ridiculous reason for it.

We are talking two guys hitting largely uncontested jumpers and making timely drives on teams that were likely to win no matter what. Leonard had like 17 points total the first two games of the finals. Game 3 he scored 6 points on Lebron(two threes kinds in his face). Game 4...his second field goal was a putback dunk up 22 points.

Watching his game 5 production now. Spurs up 22 and hes scored 2 points on Lebron so far. I turned it off. Maybe he does something later but either way....hes got like 20 points max on Lebron in the entire series.

The way people talk you would think he was going to town on him....or that Iggy wasnt hitting uncontested corner 3s.

People have put in work on Lebron before. But not these two. They played him tough and made him work hard for all he got while few teammates showed up at all.

They hardly game 7 Pierced him.

Yeah, neither deserved FMVP, really. These MVP awards are really losing their luster. They're just media and agenda awards at this point. Duncan and Curry are the leaders of their teams and deserve full credit for their titles. The media giving FMVP to some random roleplayer who wasn't guarded most of the time and scored like 3 times on LeBron when their team was up 20 doesn't mean a whole lot.

[PickernRoller]

But remember when Billups MURDERED kobe in '04 finals.


Lol what.....??? It's like these clowns just know Detroit and the Lakers played against each other so by default Billups ate Kobe's lunch?

Kobe's assignment during that whole series got locked down and shut down (hint: it was not Billups - go do some research). Clowns these days.

[LAZERUSS]

Iggy and Kawaii ain't scrubs, but in the context of "top 5-10 all time players", they are.

Can you see Shaq, Bird, MJ, Russell, Kobe, Magic, Kareem etc. allowing guys at their position to do this?

Answer...LeBron ain't top 5. Period. Hell he's not better than Hakeem in my opinion. Hakeem at his peak in 94 and 95 was better than James at his peek.

Easy. Blame the voters.

BTW, how does a player that puts up a 36-13-8 series lose to a guy who put up a 16-6-4 series?

[Ne 1]

Lol what.....??? It's like these clowns just know Detroit and the Lakers played against each other so by default Billups ate Kobe's lunch?

Kobe's assignment during that whole series got locked down and shut down (hint: it was not Billups - go do some research). Clowns these days.

He didn't even watch that series. :oldlol:

Kobe guarded Rip Hamilton, and actually did a very good job. Rip was Detroit's best offensive player during that playoff run as well.

It was Payton who got torched big time by Billups.

[plowking]

He didn't even watch that series. :oldlol:

Kobe guarded Rip Hamilton, and actually did a very good job. Rip was Detroit's best offensive player during that playoff run as well.

It was Payton who got torched big time by Billups.

So why does this thread come up for Bron?

He didn't guard Iggy at all bar a few possessions here and there in the game.
Even with Leonard, people can sit and pretend he did, but after game 3, Bron barely spent time on him.

[funnystuff]

Easy. Blame the voters.

BTW, how does a player that puts up a 36-13-8 series lose to a guy who put up a 16-6-4 series?
Pretty positive that having whoever guarded you best is always winning the FMVP then that is a great thing for Lebron.

People are reaching so far :lol

[LAZERUSS]

Pretty positive that having whoever guarded you best is always winning the FMVP then that is a great thing for Lebron.

People are reaching so far :lol

Especially when Lebron basically doubled his productivity in that series.

[funnystuff]

Especially when Lebron basically doubled his productivity in that series.
Its just laughable when people think its a knock on Lebron because Iggy won FMVP.

[TheCorporation]

Oh, I didn't know that LeBron "let them" win the Finals MVP. Here I was, thinking LBJ set some records during the Finals (Oh, you know, most points scored in first 3 games, and only player in NBA history to lead BOTH teams in the Finals in points, rebounds, and assists for an entire series). Hmm, all this time and now I know LBJ just "let" them win it :lol