Who'd be consensus GOAT if you can't pick Jordan, Lebron and Kareem?

[iamgine]

Who do you think it is?

[SouBeachTalents]

Wilt or Russell

[Im Still Ballin]

Big Willie Russell.

[John8204]

Magic Johnson

[sdot_thadon]

Russell or Wilt

[StrongLurk]

No one else from the 3-point era stands clearly above the rest in my opinion.

Shaq, Duncan, Kobe, Magic, Bird all provide very different things to the table, but all clearly GOAT-type players. It would factually boil down to team comp/needs with these 5.

Out of currently active players, I would pick Jokic to add to this list.

[Manny98]

https://i.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPTc5MGI3NjExdmNjZzA5Zmw3M3VzOXk2eDY1MjRvZmx uYTFtYXpsaDV2MndxZGVjNCZlcD12MV9pbnRlcm5hbF9naWZfY nlfaWQmY3Q9Zw/xT9DPDoWMicL4nU3NC/giphy.gif

[hold this L]

Magic.

[Wally450]

Bill Russell then John Havlichek

[StrongLurk]

No one else from the 3-point era stands clearly above the rest in my opinion.

Shaq, Duncan, Kobe, Magic, Bird all provide very different things to the table, but all clearly GOAT-type players. It would factually boil down to team comp/needs with these 5.

Out of currently active players, I would pick Jokic to add to this list.

If I had to choose, I would go with Shaq or Duncan. I think they have the most impactful two way games out of the bunch.

[Axe]

Scottie pippen.

[1987_Lakers]

Russell

[Kblaze8855]

Remove those people as options Kobe would probably win a popular vote depending on the methodology. Consensus doesn’t necessarily mean true.

[Patrick Chewing]

It's definitely Wilt. On stats alone it should be Wilt.

[LAL]

Remove those people as options Kobe would probably win a popular vote depending on the methodology. Consensus doesn’t necessarily mean true.

Not truly worth the 4th spot for Kobe you say? Just a "popular" vote?

Who tf gave lebum the second place? popular votes and OP, that's not Consensus.

[tontoz]

Consensus isn't the right word. If you take out those top 3 i don't think there is anyone that has really separated themselves to that degree.

If you took a poll with 10 possible players to vote for i doubt any of them would get over 40% of the vote.

[Carbine]

If Lebron MJ and Kareem didn't exist I think Magic would be that guy.

[WhiteKyrie]

Wilt or Russell

Probably this

[Soundwave]

With the general public? It would probably be Kobe. He has as many titles as Magic but is more of a scorer and that's what the general public wants.

[Carbine]

That would mean the general public thinks he's the #4 goat right now. I don't see that at all in the media, Reddit or message boards. The only people that would probably say he was the best were his contemporaries in the NBA, which is such a low percentage of population that it wouldn't even factor into the equation

[Soundwave]

That would mean the general public thinks he's the #4 goat right now. I don't see that at all in the media, Reddit or message boards. The only people that would probably say he was the best were his contemporaries in the NBA, which is such a low percentage of population that it wouldn't even factor into the equation

Kobe's ranking gets a bit borked because he has to directly share with Jordan who is the overwhelming GOAT in the general public's view.

If you couldn't pick Jordan, then I think public sentiment would strongly shift to Kobe.

Like Magic he has 5 rings, but is more of a dominant scorer which is what fans tend to look for first in these kinds of debates (not just basketball but other sports too) and he would benefit more from recency bias than Magic.

[Naero]

I'm not sure we'd have any clear-cut consensus.

Wilt and Russell would faraway be the best choices based on the conventional criteria. The problem is most fans don't appreciate those legends' era—the same disdain most older athletes deal with. Babe Ruth is one of the exceptions, but people won't iconize Wilt and Russell that way for various reasons: the NBA's relative lack of popularity back then, Wilt's underwhelming championship hardware (by GOAT standards), Russell's one-dimensionality.

Some even outright discount the pre-3PT era, and who'd be considered the GOAT in that case? Too many to choose from if you're excluding Jordan, LeBron, and Kareem. As others have said, all the other modern players haven't truly separated themselves from the pack. The discussion might get as pointlessly subjective and fickle as, say, your favorite movie of all time.

Would it still be a hot topic for that matter? Probably not. Maybe it'd just turn into the BOAT discussion, as it was during the Golden Era—before the GOAT acronym even went viral.

[90sgoat]

Larry Bird because he played in the modern age.

Should be Russell.

[Jasper]

robert Horry

[tpols]

From what I've seen ability wise? I'd take Jokic over all of them even if they weren't excluded. I get he doesn't have the resume, but from a pure whose the best @ basketball perspective I've never seen a better player than Yolk.

Lebron is apparently a GOAT candidate and Jokic has completely wiped the floor with him H2H. We've all seen it here in real time. Just because somebody is juiced up and plays longer doesn't mean they're better. Jokic is one of the few players along with Luka that you can tell is on 0 PEDs. Just dominating with skill and IQ solely.

[SouBeachTalents]

From what I've seen ability wise? I'd take Jokic over all of them even if they weren't excluded. I get he doesn't have the resume, but from a pure whose the best @ basketball perspective I've never seen a better player than Yolk.

Lebron is apparently a GOAT candidate and Jokic has completely wiped the floor with him H2H. We've all seen it here in real time. Just because somebody is juiced up and plays longer doesn't mean they're better. Jokic is one of the few players along with Luka that you can tell is on 0 PEDs. Just dominating with skill and IQ solely.
This will be one of tpols talking points going forward, and it's a guarantee he will never once mention LeBron was nearly 40 years old in these series in question :lol You're no better than people bringing up Bird being 6-0 against young Jordan.

[tpols]

This will be one of tpols talking points going forward, and it's a guarantee he will never once mention LeBron was nearly 40 years old in these series in question :lol You're no better than people bringing up Bird being 6-0 against young Jordan.


Nah that's B.S. because:

1) Lebron is still averaging his prime playoff averages to this day so it's not like he's a shell of himself and...

2) unlike 80s MJ, current Lebron has more help playing with prime AD while Jokic has Murray. It's not like Jokic has more help like Bird did... he actually had less and was more or less still sweeping Lebron.

[Carbine]

Lebron is not a shell of himself yet but it's clear to anyone with eyes he's not anywhere close to his '18 version. Some people think '09 is his peak and Jokic was 14 years old at that time. He was 17 and 18 when LeBron was in his other "peak" of 2012 and 2013.

It's a dumb assertion to make that lacks any logic which is par for the course when it comes to trollypols

[SouBeachTalents]

Nah that's B.S. because:

1) Lebron is still averaging his prime playoff averages to this day so it's not like he's a shell of himself and...

2) unlike 80s MJ, current Lebron has more help playing with prime AD while Jokic has Murray. It's not like Jokic has more help like Bird did... he actually had less and was more or less still sweeping Lebron.
LeBron is still phenomenal for his age, but he's a decade older than Jokic who's at his absolute peak right now, so bringing up these series, series where Jokic was the 1 seed both times while the Lakers were the 7/8 seed btw, as evidence Jokic is better than LeBron is just inane, 3ball level trolling.

I wouldn't even disagree with someone saying Jokic is better than LeBron peak for peak, he really is that good, but this argument is frankly a retarded way to go about it.

[HylianNightmare]

Wilt or Russell

This

[Wally450]

LeBron is still phenomenal for his age, but he's a decade older than Jokic who's at his absolute peak right now, so bringing up these series, series where Jokic was the 1 seed both times while the Lakers were the 7/8 seed btw, as evidence Jokic is better than LeBron is just inane, 3ball level trolling.

I wouldn't even disagree with someone saying Jokic is better than LeBron peak for peak, he really is that good, but this argument is frankly a retarded way to go about it.

I had to do a double take reading his original post. Absolutely asinine.

[Full Court]

Jordan's been the only consensus basketball GOAT. Before, it was split between Wilt and Russell, and then split with them and Kareem.

If you take away Jordan, there is no consensus GOAT, as this thread clearly demonstrates. Just goes to show how transcendant Jordan was in this sport.

[TheMan]

If I had to choose, I would go with Shaq or Duncan. I think they have the most impactful two way games out of the bunch.

Two way big men, you're forgetting Hakeem, a beast on both ends.

[Phoenix]

Unless we're discounting the 60's I'm not sure why it wouldn't be Russell.

[Carbine]

Jordan's been the only consensus basketball GOAT. Before, it was split between Wilt and Russell, and then split with them and Kareem.

If you take away Jordan, there is no consensus GOAT, as this thread clearly demonstrates. Just goes to show how transcendant Jordan was in this sport.

If just Jordan didn't exist it would be overwhelmingly Lebron. Like 90 to 95 percent for him and the other 10 percent the majority for Kareem and a couple percentage points for others like Russell.

[StrongLurk]

If you take away just Jorden, then Lebron is easily the GOAT.

[Wardell Curry]

Tim Duncan is the GOAT if you can pick anyone so who cares?