Barkley: I'm better than Malone

[QUOTE]Utah played at the 6th fastest pace in '88, and we saw many point guards throughout the 80's put up video game assist numbers becasuse of all the easy baskets in transition.[/QUOTE]
i actually have the jazz ranked 8th in terms of fastest pace, and pace adjustment is taken into consideration when ranking players, but i did not see anyone in the 80's rack up 13.8 assists per game besides one john stockton, and isiah thomas (thomas did it when his team had a top 2 pace).
[QUOTE]Stockton also had the power forward who ran the floor better than anyone at his position, and finished as well as anyone, which certainly didn't hurt his assist numbers on a running team.[/QUOTE]
to get assists you need players who can put the ball in the basket, this is elementary.
[QUOTE]And as far as team success, well there was Karl Malone of course, but equally important is that Utah was the best defensive team in the league, but only the 16th best offensive team out of 23 teams. So how much of Utah's team success can be attributed to Stockton? Some certainly, but he wasn't carrying this team, he was a fine defensive point guard, but he wasn't anchoring that defense, Mark Eaton was. [/QUOTE]
stockton was accounting for 43.7 of the jazz 108.5 points in the regular season or 40% of the teams offense in the regular season, and then 51.2 of the jazz 103.4 points in the playoffs or 49% of the teams offense in the regular season.
no sure about this offensive rating and defensive rating bs, but i know the jazz shot the ball at a higher clip than any team not named celtics, lakers, or pistons.
[QUOTE]In fact, Barkley's Sixers were a much better offensive team than Utah.

The game isn't all about stats, but Barkley averaged 28.3 ppg, 11.9 rpg, 3.2 apg, 1.3 spg, 1.3 bpg, 58.7 FG%, 66.5 TS%.[/QUOTE]
offensive rating bs. the sixers shot the 8th worst field goal percentage in the entire league. in any case, what is the point of being ranked among the top in offensive rating if you couldn't break 40 wins and sniff the playoffs? i'm sure they will say at the end of the season, hey who cares about the playoffs? we were ranked high in offensive rating..and thats all that matters :rolleyes:

nice numbers by karles lovely there, but did he make the playoffs?
[QUOTE]Isiah was too streaky to be compared with Barkley. He shot 46.3% in the regular season and 43.7% in the playoffs. Barkley as you know shot 58.7%.[/QUOTE]
thats ok, i'd take 46% and 44%fg and a game 7 of the nba finals appearance over 59% and not participating in the playoffs due to winning only 36 games.
[QUOTE]And how much of Detroit's success was due to their top 2 defense and the fact that they outrebounded opponents by 3 rpg?[/QUOTE]
isiah thomas was that teams best player by a country mile. as you will know the teams best player will get alot of the praise that comes with winning, as well as a teams best player will get alot of the flak that comes with losing..and rightfully so. as nice it is to have defense and rebounding, that roster will be lucky if it scraped into the playoffs with no isiah thomas.
[QUOTE]Or the team's depth? Isiah's cast was Adrian Dantley, Dennis Rodman, Joe Dumars, Bill Laimbeer, Vinnie Johnson, James Edwards, Rick Mahorn and John Salley.[/QUOTE]
they definately had depth. depth that would be swept in the first round if they were lucky if thomas hadn't been there.
[QUOTE]I'm not sure why beating Chicago is that significant. They did not have much surrounding Jordan.[/QUOTE]
the pistons only won 4 more games during the regular season. beating the worlds greatest player isn't significant? the pistons made jordan seem human, a feat that no other team could achieve. meanwhile thomas averaged 20.4ppg, 4rpg, 10.4apg, and 2 steals and was the best and most valuable player of the series. the pistons average winning margin was 15 in the 4-1 demolition job.
[QUOTE]Detroit beat Boston because they didn't have a bench and Bird shot 35%.[/QUOTE]
the celtics had the best record in the east with 57 wins, and were coming off a finals appearance. thomas averaged 23ppg, 5.2rpg, 8.3apg, and 2.7spg as was the best and most valuable player of the series.
[QUOTE]Fat was also not an elite player. The numbers had a lot to do with Denver's unbelievable pace when they played for Doug Moe, and the rebounding was not only helped by the pace, but also the fact that Denver was a pathetic rebounding team.[/QUOTE]
fat was the best player on a team with the second best record in the west. denver did lead the league and pace and this was considered, but his play just could not go without recognition. denver's playoff record proves how much he meant to the team
without fat: 0-4 (the 4 games were lost by an average of 12 points)
with fat: 5-2
in the conference semifinals: nuggets up 2-1 before he went down, then proceded to lose the next 3 games
[QUOTE]I wouldn't say that a guy who averaged 18.9 ppg and 7.8 apg on 47.3% shooting on a team with the fastest pace has any case over a legend who was approaching or entering his prime.[/QUOTE]
if one of them won 54 games and played well in the playoffs and the other one only won thirty something i would definately say the loser has no case. winning games matters to me afterall.
[QUOTE]Lever didn't have any devastating moves, he didn't seem like an elite shooter, and he didn't seem to stand out as one of the best passers in the league.[/QUOTE]
yet he was his teams best player in the regular season and playoffs, and they won 54 games in the regular season, and had a 5-2 record with him in the playoffs
[QUOTE]Worthy was the Lakers second best player in both the regular season and playoffs[/QUOTE]
he was third after the regular season and second after the playoffs
[QUOTE]He always did step up big in the playoffs, hence the nickname "Big Game James"[/QUOTE]
lol thanks for the info
[QUOTE]but being fortunate enough to play on a stacked team with a top 10 player of all time in his prime, who got him a lot of easy baskets doesn't make him a better player than Barkley.[/QUOTE]
james worthy won finals mvp over that same top 10 player of all time, which alone makes him a better player than lovely.
[QUOTE]Even when Barkley wasn't motivated like in '92, he was much better than Love could dream of being. Love isn't elite at getting his own shot, and doesn't have to be doubled constantly like Barkley, Love doesn't shoot 55%, and Love is an even worse defender than Barkley. Plus, Love hasn't even won 35 games.[/QUOTE]
love was ranked 17 this year and barkley was ranked 16 in 1992. :rockon:
[QUOTE]What happened to the Sixers after Barkley left? They had the same players plus an excellent addition Jeff Hornacek and a solid rookie Clarence Weatherspoon, but they dropped to 26-56.[/QUOTE]
well jeff hornacek wasn't as good as charles barkley, i'll give you that... they just wanted to get rid of him at any cost, thats how much they hated him, so they took hornacek (who was gone a year later). but key contributers armon gilliam and johnny dawkins also had large drop offs in production. gilliam went from 17/8/2 to 12/6/2 and dawkins went from 12/3/7 to 9/2/5. with the team tanking they still manage to only win 9 less games than they did the previous year.
[QUOTE]I can drop Barkley due to him being unmotivated and causing problems with trade demands and trashing teammates, but there's a limit. He's obviously behind Jordan, Ewing, Malone, Robinson, Hakeem and you could argue that dropped below Pippen.[/QUOTE]
yeh pippen. also drexler, stockton, larry nance, horace grant, brad daugherty, larry bird, kevin johnson, tim hardaway, and reggie lewis.
[QUOTE]Pippen didn't sacrifice all that much, when he improved and entered his prime, he was capable of putting up similar numbers when he was winning titles in '92, '96 and '97 as he was when Jordan was gone in '94 and '95.[/QUOTE]
pippen was in his peak in 1991, better than any other year. who knows what kind of numbers he would've put up given a situation where he was the best player.
[QUOTE]Barkley got to the finals as the best player on his team, something Robinson never did.[/QUOTE]
so 1 year is the result of being a much better offensive player? :oldlol:
[QUOTE]Barkley wasn't one of the top 5 players in '86, and he did get significantly better after that, he was raw in '86 compared to his prime. He was at his best from '88-'93. And Barkley is considered one of the all time greats.[/QUOTE]
if you consider top 35 in the all-time greats. and barkley's '86 was his second best season in the league.
[QUOTE]Stockton almost never carried the team. He was either too reluctant to take over a game or incapable. He had just 11 games in the regular season where he scored 30 or more points, and never more than 34. And in the playoffs he had just two, 34 points and 30 points. And not surprisingly, they were both vs Nelson's Warriors in losses.[/QUOTE]
who cares how many times he scored 30 points? that wasn't his role in the offense to take the most shots and score the most points. how many times did ben wallace score 30 points? oh he never did? must mean he was trash.
[QUOTE]I can't see Stockton being in a better situation for his game and mentality.[/QUOTE]
we will never know :(
[QUOTE]I don't think the regular season gap is massive, but I don't have a problem with anyone taking Stockton. That's why I said I don't think the gap is big.[/QUOTE]
i will take stockton
[QUOTE]Which just says that they underachieved.[/QUOTE]
:lol
[QUOTE]That's only one series. For the entire season Hawkins averaged 22.1 ppg, 3.9 rpg, 3.7 apg, 2.7 TO, 2.2 spg on 47.2 FG%/59.2 TS%, while Dumars averaged 20.4 ppg, 2.3 rpg, 5.5 apg, 2.4 TO, 1.1 spg on 48.1 FG%/55.2 TS%[/QUOTE]
yes so hawkins was not only much more dominant facing the chicago bulls in the playoffs, but all throughout the regular season too...this was the point you are trying to make isn't it?

[QUOTE=Shep]i actually have the jazz ranked 8th in terms of fastest pace, and pace adjustment is taken into consideration when ranking players, but i did not see anyone in the 80's rack up 13.8 assists per game besides one john stockton, and isiah thomas (thomas did it when his team had a top 2 pace).[/QUOTE]

I'm not saying that what Stockton did was easy, just that the pace helped those numbers.

[QUOTE]stockton was accounting for 43.7 of the jazz 108.5 points in the regular season or 40% of the teams offense in the regular season, and then 51.2 of the jazz 103.4 points in the playoffs or 49% of the teams offense in the regular season.
no sure about this offensive rating and defensive rating bs, but i know the jazz shot the ball at a higher clip than any team not named celtics, lakers, or pistons.[/QUOTE]

The reason their offensive wasn't as effective as their FG% suggests is because they were average/mediocre in 3s and free throws, and only 3 teams turned the ball over more often.

[QUOTE]offensive rating bs. the sixers shot the 8th worst field goal percentage in the entire league. in any case, what is the point of being ranked among the top in offensive rating if you couldn't break 40 wins and sniff the playoffs? i'm sure they will say at the end of the season, hey who cares about the playoffs? we were ranked high in offensive rating..and thats all that matters :rolleyes: [/QUOTE]

FG% doesn't factor in turnovers, 3s and free throws which are all relevant in putting up points. They made more free throws than any other team, were 7th in 3 pointers made, and while they were also a high turnover team, they didn't turn the ball over as much as Utah.

Charles needed a team to make the playoffs, both Charles and Stockton impacted the game primarily at the offensive end, and Charles was on the better offensive team. The Sixers missed the playoffs because of defense, and while Barkley can make your interior defense weaker, I don't see them having that problem if they have Mark Eaton in the paint like Stockton did.

[QUOTE]thats ok, i'd take 46% and 44%fg and a game 7 of the nba finals appearance over 59% and not participating in the playoffs due to winning only 36 games.[/QUOTE]

And I'll take Isiah's team over Barkley's team in a heartbeat.

[QUOTE]isiah thomas was that teams best player by a country mile. as you will know the teams best player will get alot of the praise that comes with winning, as well as a teams best player will get alot of the flak that comes with losing..and rightfully so. as nice it is to have defense and rebounding, that roster will be lucky if it scraped into the playoffs with no isiah thomas.[/QUOTE]

Detroit's teams were always known for their depth and talent, the '88 team wasn't as good as '89 and '90, but Isiah was one of the more fortunate players in the league when it comes to his supporting cast.

[QUOTE]they definately had depth. depth that would be swept in the first round if they were lucky if thomas hadn't been there.[/QUOTE]

Maybe, who knows? We both know that Isiah helped his team a lot, but I also know that his team was miles beyond what Charles was playing with. And even having a team that will make the playoffs without you is pretty damn good for a star.

[QUOTE]the pistons only won 4 more games during the regular season. beating the worlds greatest player isn't significant? the pistons made jordan seem human, a feat that no other team could achieve. meanwhile thomas averaged 20.4ppg, 4rpg, 10.4apg, and 2 steals and was the best and most valuable player of the series. the pistons average winning margin was 15 in the 4-1 demolition job.[/QUOTE]

The Bulls won 50 games because Jordan was basically a 1 man show with some help from Oakley. A cast of Oakley, Dave Corzine, Sam Vincent, John Paxson, Brad Sellers, and Pippen and Grant in their rookie years isn't too formidable

[QUOTE]the celtics had the best record in the east with 57 wins, and were coming off a finals appearance. thomas averaged 23ppg, 5.2rpg, 8.3apg, and 2.7spg as was the best and most valuable player of the series.[/QUOTE]

Again, Bird's 35% shooting and Boston's lack of a bench had a lot to do with it.

[QUOTE]fat was the best player on a team with the second best record in the west. denver did lead the league and pace and this was considered, but his play just could not go without recognition. denver's playoff record proves how much he meant to the team
without fat: 0-4 (the 4 games were lost by an average of 12 points)
with fat: 5-2
in the conference semifinals: nuggets up 2-1 before he went down, then proceded to lose the next 3 games[/QUOTE]

That's nice, but you can't always point to one player for a team's success. Particularly when this player is just not in the same tier as Barkley.

[QUOTE]if one of them won 54 games and played well in the playoffs and the other one only won thirty something i would definately say the loser has no case. winning games matters to me afterall.[/QUOTE]

Winning does matter, but not if the players are on completely different levels. All this tells me is that Charles wasn't playing on a good team, and Fat Lever was on a good team.

[QUOTE]yet he was his teams best player in the regular season and playoffs, and they won 54 games in the regular season, and had a 5-2 record with him in the playoffs[/QUOTE]

Alex English had a case, he was averaging 25 ppg for them.

[QUOTE]he was third after the regular season and second after the playoffs[/QUOTE]

You think Byron Scott was better than Worthy in the regular season?

[QUOTE]james worthy won finals mvp over that same top 10 player of all time, which alone makes him a better player than lovely.[/QUOTE]

Finals MVP was questionable, and guys like Dumars, Jo Jo White, Billups, Cedric Maxwell and Tony Parker have been voted finals MVP.

And who is "lovely"? :wtf:

[QUOTE]love was ranked 17 this year and barkley was ranked 16 in 1992. :rockon: [/QUOTE]

Love's ranking seems to be in the correct range, but Barkley? Abour 8-9 spots too low.

[QUOTE]well jeff hornacek wasn't as good as charles barkley, i'll give you that... they just wanted to get rid of him at any cost, thats how much they hated him, so they took hornacek (who was gone a year later). but key contributers armon gilliam and johnny dawkins also had large drop offs in production. gilliam went from 17/8/2 to 12/6/2 and dawkins went from 12/3/7 to 9/2/5. with the team tanking they still manage to only win 9 less games than they did the previous year.[/QUOTE]

The players may have performed worse because they didn't have teams focusing their defense on Barkley every night.

[QUOTE]yeh pippen. also drexler, stockton, larry nance, horace grant, brad daugherty, larry bird, kevin johnson, tim hardaway, and reggie lewis.[/QUOTE]

Horace Grant? :wtf: He was a solid power forward who defended well, rebounded well, was a great finisher and ran the floor very well, but he was more or less a guy who would score by being set up around the basket or hitting an open jumper. He wasn't a very good post player and couldn't really get his own offense. He was maybe one level above role player status.

Lewis was a very nice player, but not better than even an unmotivated Barkley. Same with Nance. Daugherty was great, but not there either. KJ was relatively close, and Stockton and Tim Hardaway probably weren't that far off, but that's still a stretch.

Larry Bird missed 37 games and could barely play in the playoffs. He has no case over Barkley in '92.

I'll give you Drexler, but only for that particular year.

[QUOTE]pippen was in his peak in 1991, better than any other year. who knows what kind of numbers he would've put up given a situation where he was the best player.[/QUOTE]

He wasn't even close to his peak. His peak was '94, would've probably been '96 if not for the injuries in the second half of the season.

He improved basically every aspect of his game after '91. His outside shot improved a lot, he became a smarter, even better defensive player, he became a better rebounder, he became a better facilitator who did an excellent job in the point forward role from '92 and beyond, and he added a post game later.

He was pretty close by '92. He was the team's primary facilitator by that point and doing an excellent job, his outside shot was much more consistent, and his overall play was more consistent.

[QUOTE]so 1 year is the result of being a much better offensive player? :oldlol:[/QUOTE]

That was the only year that Barkley had a contending team in his prime. They were starting to put together a nice team around him in Philly in '90, but that team quickly fell apart.

[QUOTE]if you consider top 35 in the all-time greats. and barkley's '86 was his second best season in the league.[/QUOTE]

Not even close. It wasn't even top 5. He was better every year from '87-'95 at least, might even say '96.

[QUOTE]who cares how many times he scored 30 points? that wasn't his role in the offense to take the most shots and score the most points. how many times did ben wallace score 30 points? oh he never did? must mean he was trash.[/QUOTE]

Nobody is comparing Wallace to Barkley. And Utah could've used more scoring from Stockton at times. See the 1st round loss to Phoenix in '90, the loss to Portland in '92, the loss to Seattle in '93, the elimination game vs Houston in '95, and the Seattle series in '96.

The point is that Stockton didn't show the ability to take over games like a true superstar and top 5 caliber player. The elite point guards who were also MVP-caliber plays did show that ability.

[QUOTE]yes so hawkins was not only much more dominant facing the chicago bulls in the playoffs, but all throughout the regular season too...this was the point you are trying to make isn't it?[/QUOTE]

Hawkins was definitely not better throughout the regular season.

Barkley is better.. Replace Malone with prime Barkley in those 97,98 stacked Jazz team and there's no doubt they will beat the bulls and won the championship.. Then replace Barkley with Prime Malone in 93 and they're lucky to even make it to wcf at worst 1st round exit..

Barkley > Malone...

What a joke, the bulls were a better team when utah faced them in the finals then when they faced pheonix

I'd take Malone over Barkley.

Reasons why:

Malone has a huge longevity edge.
Barkley was considerably worse as a defender.
Barkley's peak stats came in a higher pace era, advanced stats which elimate that factor suggests their peaks were identical. Without a superior peak (or statistical peak, and then add D in) there is little case for Barkley.
Barkley's conditioning was considered to be an issue, perhaps not throughout his career but certainly on entering the league, and at Phoenix (and Pippen's later shots at him suggest problems in the Houston years too). Barkley was also considered a negative influence on Oliver Miller (this from Rick Barry's Annual Scouting Handbooks "Basketball Bible"). Obviously Malone wasn't a picnic to get along with but his work ethic was legendary (for example [url]http://sports.jrank.org/pages/2988/Malone-Karl-Malone-Inspiration.html)[/url].
Despite excellent passing ability Barkley could be a ball stopper.

To some specific arguments I've seen here, why would you isolate 2 point% unless the argument is specifically about shooting 2s. Charles took dumb threes which hurt his teams. That's part of who he was.

It's not a huge gap (for example I don't see them trading places making much difference, though Sloan coaching Barkley could have been interesting) but for me it has to be Malone.

[QUOTE=I LUV KOBE]Then replace Barkley with Prime Malone in 93 and they're lucky to even make it to wcf at worst 1st round exit..

Barkley > Malone...[/QUOTE]


Remember the Suns lost the first 2 games to the Lakers in the first round. With Malone, no way are they getting past the Lakers. Malone would have folded.

[B]Karl in the Play-Offs shot ONLY 46.3% FG on 19.3 FGAs PG

Thats "Like a SG" =Allen Iverson etc.... NOT a GREAT INSIDE POST PLAYER.

Barkley Shot 51.1% FG for 23.0 PPG (1 Bucket or 2 FTs Less) on 15.9 FGAs PG

*Won`t Go Into The 2-Point FG% and PPG on 2-Point FGs: Charles Was SHAQ-LIKE:

Barkley Was a Better Post Player & Pure Scorer
Barkley Was a Better Mid Range Shooter
Barkley Was a Better Rebounder
Barkley Was a Better Passer
Barkley Was a Better Creator
Barkley Was a Better Stealer
Barkley Was a Better Shot Blocker
Barkley Was Doubled WAY MORE in His Prime
Barkley Was a Better Team Defender
Barkley Was a Better Ballhandler
Barkley Had More Skills
Barkley Was Clutcher
etc

Barkley Top 10 PER All Time (Season and Play-Offs)
Barkley Top 10 EFF All Time
Barkley Top 5 All Time in +/-
Barkley Top 4 All Time in Shot Made/Missed Diferential
Barkley 2nd To Magic as Higher ORT Per High Usage & Ball Possesion All Time
etc etc

Barkley was Better than Malone[/B]

[QUOTE]I'm not saying that what Stockton did was easy, just that the pace helped those numbers.[/QUOTE]
ofcourse it is easier to put up more numbers in a high paced environment rather than a slow paced environment, this always is taken into consideration when ranking players
[QUOTE]The reason their offensive wasn't as effective as their FG% suggests is because they were average/mediocre in 3s and free throws, and only 3 teams turned the ball over more often.[/QUOTE]
:confusedshrug:
[QUOTE]FG% doesn't factor in turnovers, 3s and free throws which are all relevant in putting up points. They made more free throws than any other team, were 7th in 3 pointers made, and while they were also a high turnover team, they didn't turn the ball over as much as Utah.[/QUOTE]
so the sixers were a better offensive team, so they should've won more games, but they ended up with a paltry 36 wins instead.
[QUOTE]Charles needed a team to make the playoffs, both Charles and Stockton impacted the game primarily at the offensive end, and Charles was on the better offensive team. The Sixers missed the playoffs because of defense, and while Barkley can make your interior defense weaker, I don't see them having that problem if they have Mark Eaton in the paint like Stockton did.[/QUOTE]
barkley would have been less effective on the offensive end with eaton clogging the paint and barkley would most likely get him traded because he was preventing him from scoring 25 points.
[QUOTE]And I'll take Isiah's team over Barkley's team in a heartbeat.[/QUOTE]
yeh. but barkley and his ego would not fit on that roster, so no point putting him there.
[QUOTE]Detroit's teams were always known for their depth and talent, the '88 team wasn't as good as '89 and '90, but Isiah was one of the more fortunate players in the league when it comes to his supporting cast.[/QUOTE]
excuses. how far a team goes will depend on their best player. championships matter, and people are judges by what they acheive. nobody cares about people who don't acheive, and excuses will not be made for why they did not acheive. you play the game to win.
[QUOTE]Maybe, who knows?[/QUOTE]
exactly. who knows. nobody knows, so they will be judged by what they achieved.
[QUOTE]We both know that Isiah helped his team a lot, but I also know that his team was miles beyond what Charles was playing with. And even having a team that will make the playoffs without you is pretty damn good for a star.[/QUOTE]
pretty damn good. which is why barkley was drafted to a team 1 season removed from a championship and he still didn't win. barkley then forced a trade to a team that made it to the conference semi finals and was expected to win it all..he didn't. he then forced another trade to a team 1 year removed from winning a championship and was expected to win it all..and you guessed it he still didn't. barkley was handed multiple rosters to win it all on a silver platter and he just could not get it done.
[QUOTE]The Bulls won 50 games because Jordan was basically a 1 man show with some help from Oakley. A cast of Oakley, Dave Corzine, Sam Vincent, John Paxson, Brad Sellers, and Pippen and Grant in their rookie years isn't too formidable[/QUOTE]
the pistons won only 4 more regular season games than the bulls, and they destroyed them 4-1 with the average winning margin of 15 points.
[QUOTE]Again, Bird's 35% shooting and Boston's lack of a bench had a lot to do with it.[/QUOTE]
the celtics still were heavily favoured and that supposed lack of bench did not restrict them in the regular season
[QUOTE]That's nice, but you can't always point to one player for a team's success. Particularly when this player is just not in the same tier as Barkley.
[/QUOTE]
agreed, lever is on a higher tier than barkley
[QUOTE]Winning does matter, but not if the players are on completely different levels. All this tells me is that Charles wasn't playing on a good team, and Fat Lever was on a good team.[/QUOTE]
agreed, lever is on a much higher level to barkley. barkley would have clashed with alex english over who was taking the most shots every night, hence causing a trade and the nuggets languishing at the bottom of the league.
[QUOTE]Alex English had a case, he was averaging 25 ppg for them.
[/QUOTE]
english has no case at all here. english was a nice scorer, a top 5 small forward, and not much else. lever was superb all-round, second team all-defense, and the second best shooting guard in the nba.
[QUOTE]You think Byron Scott was better than Worthy in the regular season?[/QUOTE]
yes, byron scott was the lakers second best player in the regular season.
[QUOTE]Finals MVP was questionable, and guys like Dumars, Jo Jo White, Billups, Cedric Maxwell and Tony Parker have been voted finals MVP.[/QUOTE]
questionable or not, to even be anywhere close to a top 10 all time level player on the biggest stage of them all speaks volumes of his impact on that particular series.
[QUOTE]And who is "lovely"?[/QUOTE]
karles lovely :D
[QUOTE]Love's ranking seems to be in the correct range, but Barkley? Abour 8-9 spots too low.[/QUOTE]
:oldlol:
[QUOTE]The players may have performed worse because they didn't have teams focusing their defense on Barkley every night.[/QUOTE]
or perhaps all motivation is lost. their star player just dissed the franchise and up and left for a team that was already in the conference semi finals without him.

[QUOTE]Horace Grant? He was a solid power forward who defended well, rebounded well, was a great finisher and ran the floor very well, but he was more or less a guy who would score by being set up around the basket or hitting an open jumper. He wasn't a very good post player and couldn't really get his own offense. He was maybe one level above role player status.[/QUOTE]
this is peak horace grant. the bulls had 3 good players, and grant was one of them. he helped the bulls to 67 wins, a 15-7 record in the playoffs, and a championship. in limited opportunities on offense he averaged 14.2ppg, led the bulls with 10.0rpg, 2.7apg, 1.2spg, 1.6bpg, and only 1.2topg, all on 58%fg. grant knew his role and he executed it perfectly.
[QUOTE]Lewis was a very nice player, but not better than even an unmotivated Barkley. Same with Nance. Daugherty was great, but not there either. KJ was relatively close, and Stockton and Tim Hardaway probably weren't that far off, but that's still a stretch.[/QUOTE]
all these players won games and participated in the playoffs. players are rewarded for winning games.
[QUOTE]Larry Bird missed 37 games and could barely play in the playoffs. He has no case over Barkley in '92.[/QUOTE]
games missed does not come into play when ranking players in single seasons. despite it being his last season and him being 35 years old, bird's impact was still much greater than barkley's. the celtics went only 20-17 in those missed games anyway, and 31-14 with him.
[QUOTE]He wasn't even close to his peak. His peak was '94, would've probably been '96 if not for the injuries in the second half of the season.
[/QUOTE]
'94? :oldlol: his peak season's rank like this: '91, '92, '96, '97, '93/'98, '94.
[QUOTE]He improved basically every aspect of his game after '91. His outside shot improved a lot, he became a smarter, even better defensive player, he became a better rebounder, he became a better facilitator who did an excellent job in the point forward role from '92 and beyond, and he added a post game later.[/QUOTE]
he improved on offense so much huh? howcome he never shot the ball better?
howcome he never played better in the playoffs? 21.6ppg, 8.9rpg, 5.8apg, 2.5spg, 1.1bpg
howcome he never played better in the finals? 20.8ppg, 9.4rpg, 6.6apg, 2.4spg, 1.0bpg, including a monster close out game 5 in which he recorded 32points, 13rebounds, 7assists, and 5steals, all while guarding magic johnson at the other end for most of the finals.
[QUOTE]He was pretty close by '92. He was the team's primary facilitator by that point and doing an excellent job, his outside shot was much more consistent, and his overall play was more consistent.[/QUOTE]
yeh he was close to his '91 self in '92, but his play in the '91 playoffs separates the two seasons.
[QUOTE]That was the only year that Barkley had a contending team in his prime. They were starting to put together a nice team around him in Philly in '90, but that team quickly fell apart.[/QUOTE]
robinson never had a contending team in his prime..infact he had the worst supporting cast of any of the top 10 players in the league every season.
[QUOTE]Not even close. It wasn't even top 5. He was better every year from '87-'95 at least, might even say '96.[/QUOTE]
:roll:
[QUOTE]Nobody is comparing Wallace to Barkley[/QUOTE]
you are comparing a primary scorer on a team to a primary playmaker on a team
[QUOTE]And Utah could've used more scoring from Stockton at times. See the 1st round loss to Phoenix in '90, the loss to Portland in '92, the loss to Seattle in '93, the elimination game vs Houston in '95, and the Seattle series in '96.[/QUOTE]
i could say the same about barkley, except barkley was the primary scorer on these teams so it was more important for him to score the ball than it was stockton.
1987 - loses in the first round, cheeks steps up more than barkley, as do erving and hinson. in the series deciding game 5 barkley ends up with another paltry game: 12 points, 13 rebounds, 1 assist, 0 steals, 0 blocks, 4 turnovers, 5-16fg
1988 - does not make the playoffs, should have contributed more.
1989 - swept in the first round. gets outplayed by cheeks.
1990 - again doesn't step up the most. hawkins and dawkins both step up more in the po's, only 17 points in the elimination game.
1992 - did not make the playoffs, should have contributed more.
1995 - kj and green step up more, suns lose a 3-1 lead to the rockets. barkley shoots 7-16 and is outscored by danny ainge in game 7. kj goes for 46 and 10 assists.
1997 - shoots 43% in the playoffs. again does not step up while others around him are.
[QUOTE]The point is that Stockton didn't show the ability to take over games like a true superstar and top 5 caliber player. The elite point guards who were also MVP-caliber plays did show that ability.[/QUOTE]
you have no point here
[QUOTE]Hawkins was definitely not better throughout the regular season.[/QUOTE]
he was still better, it was alot closer in the regular season..but hawkins tore up the playoffs and as a result was easily better overall. dumars was top 4 shooting guard tho.

Malone was slightly better on offense and way better on d, has mote credentials 2nd points allstars all nba 1sts all d's mvp's, MALONE>>>> BARKLEY

[QUOTE=joeyjoejoe]Malone was slightly better on offense and way better on d, has mote credentials 2nd points allstars all nba 1sts all d's mvp's, MALONE>>>> BARKLEY[/QUOTE]

:roll: :oldlol: :applause: :bowdown: [B]To...The Idiot.[/B]

[B]Slightly Better On Offense?

He Scored 1 More Bucket or 2 FTs Per Game More than Barkley on 46.3% FG. While Barkley Shot 51%. [U]Play-Offs[/U]: An Area Where [I]Malone ALWAYS DECLINED[/I].

[I]*Barkley Shot Almost 9% Better 2-Point FG in the Play-Offs ( Common Great SG 45% and a Great PF 54%)[/I]

[U]2-Point FG: Post Game & Mid Range Game[/U]

[U]Season:[/U]

[COLOR="Blue"]Barkley shot 58.13% Two-Point FG at 21.6 PPG on 12.9...Two Point FGAs Pg [/COLOR]

Malone shot [COLOR="red"]51.9% Tw-Point FG[/COLOR] at 24.7 PPG on [COLOR="red"]17.5...Two-Point FGAs PG [/COLOR]

[U]Play-Offs: Where Malone ALWAYS DECLINED[/U]:

[COLOR="blue"]Barkley shot 55.13% FG at 22.5 PPG on 14.5 ...Two-Point FGAs PG[/COLOR]

Malone shot [COLOR="Red"]46.6% Two-Point FG [/COLOR] at 24.6 PPG on [COLOR="red"]19.3...Two-Point FGAs PG [/COLOR]

Better Offensive Player? What Are You On Cocaine? Acids? Mushrooms?
[COLOR="blue"]
-Barkley Was the Better Offensive Player (Mid Range and Post): Play-Offs Especially
-Barkley Was the Better Rebounder
-Barkley Was the Better Passer and Creator
-Barkley Was Doubled More: "The Zone Buster"
-Barkley Was the More Skilled Player: Shooting, Dribbling, Fundamentals..etc
-Barkley Was the Better Shot Blocker: Avg 1.5 BPG at One Time
-Barkley Was the Better Stealer
-Barkley Was the Better Full Court Defender and Team Defender
-Higher ORT; Higher PER; Higher EFF, Higher +/-, Higher Shot Made/Missed Diferential...
etc[/COLOR]

[COLOR="Red"]Only Thing Malone Was Better than Barkley is FT Shooting, Having Stockton and Post D: Which Wasn Great Either[/COLOR]...He is No Garnett or Duncan.[/B]:sleeping

So yes better on offense ever so slightly, way better on d, longevity and awards there ya go would ya look at that

[IMG]http://www.slamonline.com/online/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/john_stockton_game_6.jpg[/IMG]

Its really difficult to compare this two though, the difference is by a hair.

[B]Some People Just Can`t Handle the Evidence[/B] :sleeping

[QUOTE=Kiddlovesnets]Its really difficult to compare this two though, the difference is by a hair.[/QUOTE]

Neither player has hair. Which makes it even more difficult

[QUOTE=BallsOut]Neither player has hair. Which makes it even more difficult[/QUOTE]

In his prime, Karl's hair was clearly more fuller-bodied and stylish than sir premature baldness's.

[IMG]http://i.cdn.turner.com/sivault/multimedia/photo_gallery/1003/rare.charles.barkley.photos/images/charles-barkley-243179.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i.cdn.turner.com/si/multimedia/photo_gallery/1008/karl.malone.rare.photos/images/malone-weights.jpg[/IMG]

[QUOTE=Shep]
so the sixers were a better offensive team, so they should've won more games, but they ended up with a paltry 36 wins instead.[/QUOTE]

Defense was the problem. And it still would have been the problem if Stockton was on the Sixers.

[QUOTE]barkley would have been less effective on the offensive end with eaton clogging the paint and barkley would most likely get him traded because he was preventing him from scoring 25 points.[/QUOTE]

Barkley in his 2nd year averaged 20 with Moses Malone.

[QUOTE]yeh. but barkley and his ego would not fit on that roster, so no point putting him there.[/QUOTE]

How do you know? He played with a lot of talent in Phoenix, and Houston.

[QUOTE]excuses. how far a team goes will depend on their best player. championships matter, and people are judges by what they acheive. nobody cares about people who don't acheive, and excuses will not be made for why they did not acheive. you play the game to win.[/QUOTE]

Detroit weren't a team that relied on 1 or 2 stars every night to the extent later championship teams like the Bulls, Rockets and Lakers did.

[QUOTE]exactly. who knows. nobody knows, so they will be judged by what they achieved.[/QUOTE]

They should be judged on the level they played at, since their teams aren't remotely comparable.

[QUOTE]pretty damn good. which is why barkley was drafted to a team 1 season removed from a championship and he still didn't win. barkley then forced a trade to a team that made it to the conference semi finals and was expected to win it all..he didn't. he then forced another trade to a team 1 year removed from winning a championship and was expected to win it all..and you guessed it he still didn't. barkley was handed multiple rosters to win it all on a silver platter and he just could not get it done.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, he was drafted to one, didn't have that team in his prime, they fell apart quickly as players aged and retired or were traded.

He got to Phoenix in '93, and took them all the way to the finals.

The '94 and '95 Suns should have won, but age and injuries clearly took him down a little from his prime level.

Charles turned 34 before the '97 playoffs and was clearly past his prime.

[QUOTE]the pistons won only 4 more regular season games than the bulls, and they destroyed them 4-1 with the average winning margin of 15 points.[/QUOTE]

Because they were deep, not a 1 man team.

[QUOTE]the celtics still were heavily favoured and that supposed lack of bench did not restrict them in the regular season[/QUOTE]

I didn't read any predictions about the series so I don't know if they were favored, but I did watch all 6 games, and I don't remember it being referred to as an upset. And considering Detroit almost beat Boston the previous year, it wouldn't make that much sense.

Their bench may have not held them back in the regular season, but most agreed that it clearly had them tired. Boston was coming off of 3 consecutive deep playoff runs to the finals.

Boston didn't have one notable bench player. Detroit had Vinnie Johnson, Dennis Rodman, James Edwards and John Salley on their bench. Players who could start.

[QUOTE]agreed, lever is on a higher tier than barkley[/QUOTE]

:oldlol:

[QUOTE]agreed, lever is on a much higher level to barkley. barkley would have clashed with alex english over who was taking the most shots every night, hence causing a trade and the nuggets languishing at the bottom of the league.[/QUOTE]

On that Denver team, there were plenty of shots to go around. They had kiki Vandeweghe and English both averaging 25-30 points on the same team a few years earlier.

[QUOTE]english has no case at all here. english was a nice scorer, a top 5 small forward, and not much else. lever was superb all-round, second team all-defense, and the second best shooting guard in the nba.[/QUOTE]

I don't think either player was all that great, so I don't care much to argue about one over the other.

[QUOTE]questionable or not, to even be anywhere close to a top 10 all time level player on the biggest stage of them all speaks volumes of his impact on that particular series.[/QUOTE]

Not really, Cedric Maxwell had a nice series, and the voters robbed Bird. Didn't make me overly impressed with Maxwell.

[QUOTE]karles lovely :D [/QUOTE]

Still don't really get it, or why you're calling Charles "Karles".

[QUOTE]or perhaps all motivation is lost. their star player just dissed the franchise and up and left for a team that was already in the conference semi finals without him.[/QUOTE]

And that has nothing to do with Barkley's ability as a basketball player.

[QUOTE=Shep]this is peak horace grant. the bulls had 3 good players, and grant was one of them. he helped the bulls to 67 wins, a 15-7 record in the playoffs, and a championship. in limited opportunities on offense he averaged 14.2ppg, led the bulls with 10.0rpg, 2.7apg, 1.2spg, 1.6bpg, and only 1.2topg, all on 58%fg. grant knew his role and he executed it perfectly.[/QUOTE]

Grant had limited opportunities on offense because his offense was pretty much limited to hitting open mid-range jumpers and finishing around the rim.

I appreciate what Grant did. He was a strong rebounder, a very good defender, a reliable mid-range shooter, a strong finisher, he ran the floor well, he was a smart player, and he was a good passer.

Pretty much an ideal complementary player, but you also don't want him to be more than your 3rd best player if you expect to contend. Top 15 players should at least be first or second option type players,

[QUOTE]all these players won games and participated in the playoffs. players are rewarded for winning games.[/QUOTE]

Because they had teams. Nance was the 3rd best player on the Cavs. How is winning as the 3rd best player comparable to being the best player?

[QUOTE]games missed does not come into play when ranking players in single seasons. despite it being his last season and him being 35 years old, bird's impact was still much greater than barkley's. the celtics went only 20-17 in those missed games anyway, and 31-14 with him.[/QUOTE]

I'm not going to tell you what your criteria should be, but I don't rank players who don't play at least 50 games between regular season and playoffs. But I'm not sure how you can compare what a player did in 45 games to what another did in 75.

[QUOTE]'94? :oldlol: his peak season's rank like this: '91, '92, '96, '97, '93/'98, '94.[/QUOTE]

Pretty much everyone including Pippen himself called '94 his best year. Led them to 55 wins without Jordan and a pretty limited cast. They went 51-21 with Pippen, and 44-16 with Pippen and Grant. Scottie added a 3 point shot, improved his scoring, stepped up his defense and rebounding, and took the Ewing/Riley Knicks to 7 who had challenged the Bulls even with Jordan the past 2 years. And even as a Knick fan, I can acknowledge that they got screwed on the Hue Hollins call.

[QUOTE]he improved on offense so much huh?[/QUOTE]

The Bulls won 67 games compared to 61 in '91. Pippen had more responsibility as the team's point forward, improved his outside shot noticeably and became a much more consistent player. Went from 17.8 ppg to 21 ppg while his shooting percentage only fell from 52% to 51%, but his free throw shooting went from 71% to 76% which makes up for that. His rebounding went up a little despite the Bulls becoming a better rebounding team. His assists went up from 6.2 per game to 7 per game, the most ever in the triangle offense, and the Bulls beat better competition in the playoffs. Pippen was a monster in the closeout games. 31/8/5 with 2 blocks on 12/23 shooting and 7/8 from the line to close out Miami. A triple double of 17/11/11 with 3 steals on 7/11 shooting to close out the Knicks in a game 7 no less. One of Pippen's class games to close out the Cavs in 6 with 29/12/5 with 4 steals and 4 blocks. Pippen was arguably the MVP of that series. And 26/5/4 on 9/17 shooting with 2 threes and 6/6 free throw shooting including the huge comeback to close out the Blazers in game 6. he was the second best player in the finals behind Michael Jordan.

Jordan guarded Magic in most of the '91 finals too. Pippen was only the primary defender on Magic in game 2 after Jordan got in foul trouble. And Pippen's '92 finals were better than '91.

And Pippen's '92 finals and playoffs were better than '91.

[QUOTE]robinson never had a contending team in his prime..infact he had the worst supporting cast of any of the top 10 players in the league every season.[/QUOTE]

Well, I'd call '93-'96 his prime, but he was already very good as a rookie and he had quite a bit of talent around him in Terry Cummings, who was as much of the 1st option as Robinson and led them in playoff scoring, Willie Anderson, Rod Strickland, and Sean Elliott. With that being said, that was one of the years I thought Robinson played well in the playoffs.

His '93 team wasn't bad either, though. But that was the other year I thought he played well in the playoffs.

His team in '95 was good. '96 team was the same minus Rodman, but Elliott and Johnson stepped up and had career years.

[QUOTE]i could say the same about barkley[/QUOTE]

You're right about that game 5, but he was only in his 3rd year. He played great in the '88 season. He was fine in '89, iirc, have to re-watch that series, but Cheeks did not outplay him. Agreed on '92, he had a subpar year. '95? He was 32 and injured in the Houston series. He was disappointing in the '90 series outside of the two 30/20 games, and they should have definitely won game 4.

Charles was a much better playoff performer and a more dominant player than Stockton, though, that's for sure.

[QUOTE]you have no point here[/QUOTE]

Of course I do, Stockton was never a top 5 player due to his inability to take over games. It's a reason why the Jazz didn't win a championship.

[B]ShaqAttack3234

Shep is a Barkley Hater and Cockloving Jazz-Fan of Stockton-to-Malone
Shep brings in "[I]Opinions[/I]" NOT FACTS or EVIDENCE...Save that For Me...

Its A Waste of Time To Discuss With Him...He Put`s Barkley as a Top 10-15 Player from 85 to 95 when he was clearly Top 2 and 3 after MJ and Late Hakeem from 87-95

Barkley on Bad Teams Shot 60% FG and 62-65% Two-Point FG on Over 23-24 PPG for 4-5 Years...That is While Doubled More than Any Other Player NOT NAMED SHAQ and Was the TOTAL FOCUS off the Offense on Bad Teams.

Barkley from 1985-86 to 1994-95 Was Better Than Malone In His Whole Stat Padding Career

OH, and Others Barkley Haters can`t Handle the Evidence I Put. They Just Hate to Remember how a 6`4 3/4 PF Just Took a Dump and Every Other PF and Let Them Know It Too.[/B]

[QUOTE]Defense was the problem. And it still would have been the problem if Stockton was on the Sixers.[/QUOTE]
but stockton was much better than barkley, so that would have made them a more successful team as a result.
[QUOTE]Barkley in his 2nd year averaged 20 with Moses Malone.[/QUOTE]
yeh but barkley in his 2nd year was better than any other year besides '93
[QUOTE]How do you know? He played with a lot of talent in Phoenix, and Houston.[/QUOTE]
because this was barkley at his most selfish. he would refuse to play defense, be put on the bench because of this, and then most likely force a trade. i can see a similar drop off of production to that of mark aguirre's when he joined the pistons, except aguirre accepted his lesser role..barkley would not.
[QUOTE]Detroit weren't a team that relied on 1 or 2 stars every night to the extent later championship teams like the Bulls, Rockets and Lakers did.[/QUOTE]
isiah thomas was the only star on that roster, and they did rely on his production greatly.
[QUOTE]They should be judged on the level they played at, since their teams aren't remotely comparable.[/QUOTE]
nobody remembers losers for a reason
[QUOTE]Yeah, he was drafted to one, didn't have that team in his prime, they fell apart quickly as players aged and retired or were traded.[/QUOTE]
you don't regard a players second best year as part of his prime? they should have won a championship in 1985 barkley's rookie season. their team consisted of a top 2 center, a top 4 power forward, a top 2 small forward, and a top 5 point guard. how much more help could you possibly wish for? in '86 they still had a top 4 center, a top 2 power forward, and a top 4 point guard. they didn't go anywhere.
[QUOTE]He got to Phoenix in '93, and took them all the way to the finals.[/QUOTE]
well you would expect him to..considering they had been conference semifinalists the previous season.
[QUOTE]The '94 and '95 Suns should have won, but age and injuries clearly took him down a little from his prime level.[/QUOTE]
:cry:
[QUOTE]Charles turned 34 before the '97 playoffs and was clearly past his prime. [/QUOTE]
he was still a top 2 power forward. houston also had a top 2 center, and a top 2 shooting guard.
[QUOTE]Because they were deep, not a 1 man team.[/QUOTE]
they were deep in the regular season too, and only won 4 more games.
[QUOTE]I didn't read any predictions about the series so I don't know if they were favored, but I did watch all 6 games, and I don't remember it being referred to as an upset. And considering Detroit almost beat Boston the previous year, it wouldn't make that much sense.[/QUOTE]
i would definately refer to it as an upset considering the celtics had home court advantage, the best record in the eastern conference, and had been to the nba finals every year since 1983 (4 consecutive years).
[QUOTE]Their bench may have not held them back in the regular season, but most agreed that it clearly had them tired. Boston was coming off of 3 consecutive deep playoff runs to the finals.[/QUOTE]
aww they were tired were they :( :sleeping
[QUOTE]Boston didn't have one notable bench player. Detroit had Vinnie Johnson, Dennis Rodman, James Edwards and John Salley on their bench. Players who could start.[/QUOTE]
they made up for that with one of the best starting 5's in nba history.
[QUOTE]On that Denver team, there were plenty of shots to go around. They had kiki Vandeweghe and English both averaging 25-30 points on the same team a few years earlier.[/QUOTE]
that team was a much faster team than the '88 nuggets
[QUOTE]I don't think either player was all that great, so I don't care much to argue about one over the other.[/QUOTE]
lever was great. top 7 overall infact.
[QUOTE]Not really, Cedric Maxwell had a nice series, and the voters robbed Bird. Didn't make me overly impressed with Maxwell.[/QUOTE]
the difference here is that worthy stepped up just as much as magic throughout the playoffs, where as bird stepped up alot more than any other celtic in terms of the playoffs as a whole in 1981.
[QUOTE]Still don't really get it, or why you're calling Charles "Karles".
[/QUOTE]
hybrid of kevin love and charles barkley since their games are similar
[QUOTE]And that has nothing to do with Barkley's ability as a basketball player.[/QUOTE]
but it has to do with barkley's legacy and what he meant to franchises
[QUOTE]Grant had limited opportunities on offense because his offense was pretty much limited to hitting open mid-range jumpers and finishing around the rim.

I appreciate what Grant did. He was a strong rebounder, a very good defender, a reliable mid-range shooter, a strong finisher, he ran the floor well, he was a smart player, and he was a good passer.

Pretty much an ideal complementary player, but you also don't want him to be more than your 3rd best player if you expect to contend. Top 15 players should at least be first or second option type players,[/QUOTE]
all players need to be on the same page if a team is expected to contend. grant perfected his role on offense and defense and was an integral part of a 67 win team that only lost 7 games on its way to a championship romp. once again winning plays a huge part in rankings, and no other player outside that top 14 could have done what grant did without disrupting chemistry and still had the same results.

[QUOTE]Because they had teams. Nance was the 3rd best player on the Cavs. How is winning as the 3rd best player comparable to being the best player?[/QUOTE]
nance was actually the cavs best player
[QUOTE]I'm not going to tell you what your criteria should be, but I don't rank players who don't play at least 50 games between regular season and playoffs. But I'm not sure how you can compare what a player did in 45 games to what another did in 75.[/QUOTE]
thats fine..and cut off in rankings is different from player to player. if a player only plays 45 games and has minimal impact then i will not rank him, but if he has a major impact like larry bird did i will definately rank him accordingly.
[QUOTE]Pretty much everyone including Pippen himself called '94 his best year. Led them to 55 wins without Jordan and a pretty limited cast. They went 51-21 with Pippen, and 44-16 with Pippen and Grant. Scottie added a 3 point shot, improved his scoring, stepped up his defense and rebounding, and took the Ewing/Riley Knicks to 7 who had challenged the Bulls even with Jordan the past 2 years. And even as a Knick fan, I can acknowledge that they got screwed on the Hue Hollins call.[/QUOTE]
pippen also called lebron the greatest player of all time before he had won a championship.
bj armstrong stepped up and was an all-star in '94. horace grant had a career year in points, rebounds, and assists, and then they had toni kukoc come and and be one of the best 6th men in the entire league.
you expected pippen to put up more numbers with no mj around..but he had even less of an impact. they almost went .500 while pippen was injured so the roster wasn't even that bad. he also had minimal impact on the playoffs averaging almost 4 turnovers and 43%fg and then there was that decision to take himself out of the game in the final moments and sulk because a play wasn't run for him.
[QUOTE]The Bulls won 67 games compared to 61 in '91. Pippen had more responsibility as the team's point forward, improved his outside shot noticeably and became a much more consistent player. Went from 17.8 ppg to 21 ppg while his shooting percentage only fell from 52% to 51%, but his free throw shooting went from 71% to 76% which makes up for that. His rebounding went up a little despite the Bulls becoming a better rebounding team. His assists went up from 6.2 per game to 7 per game, the most ever in the triangle offense, and the Bulls beat better competition in the playoffs. Pippen was a monster in the closeout games. 31/8/5 with 2 blocks on 12/23 shooting and 7/8 from the line to close out Miami. A triple double of 17/11/11 with 3 steals on 7/11 shooting to close out the Knicks in a game 7 no less. One of Pippen's class games to close out the Cavs in 6 with 29/12/5 with 4 steals and 4 blocks. Pippen was arguably the MVP of that series. And 26/5/4 on 9/17 shooting with 2 threes and 6/6 free throw shooting including the huge comeback to close out the Blazers in game 6. he was the second best player in the finals behind Michael Jordan.

Jordan guarded Magic in most of the '91 finals too. Pippen was only the primary defender on Magic in game 2 after Jordan got in foul trouble. And Pippen's '92 finals were better than '91.

And Pippen's '92 finals and playoffs were better than '91.[/QUOTE]
'92 pippen was better in the regular season, but he was easily better in the playoffs in '91.

the knicks, 76ers, pistons, and lakers are much tougher than
the heat, knicks, cavs, and blazers

19.7ppg, 8.7rpg, 5.0apg, 3.3spg, 1.3bpg, 50%fg in a 3-0 sweep of the knicks

23.4ppg, 9.4rpg, 6.0apg, 1.6spg, 0.6bpg, 57%fg in a 4-1 win over the sixers

22.0ppg, 7.8rpg, 5.3apg, 3.0spg, 2.0bpg, 48%fg in a 4-0 sweep over the defending champion pistons

20.8ppg, 9.4rpg, 6.6apg, 2.4spg, 1.0bpg, in a 4-1 domination over the defending western conference champion lakers
[QUOTE]Well, I'd call '93-'96 his prime, but he was already very good as a rookie and he had quite a bit of talent around him in Terry Cummings, who was as much of the 1st option as Robinson and led them in playoff scoring, Willie Anderson, Rod Strickland, and Sean Elliott. With that being said, that was one of the years I thought Robinson played well in the playoffs.

His '93 team wasn't bad either, though. But that was the other year I thought he played well in the playoffs.

His team in '95 was good. '96 team was the same minus Rodman, but Elliott and Johnson stepped up and had career years.[/QUOTE]
avery johnson and sean elliott are d-leaguers without david robinson. johnson was cut by about 5 teams, and just look at what elliott did with the pistons when he was traded and how quickly he came crying back.
[QUOTE]Charles was a much better playoff performer and a more dominant player than Stockton, though, that's for sure[/QUOTE]
howcome barkley had teammates step up more than he did with regularity?
[QUOTE]Of course I do, Stockton was never a top 5 player due to his inability to take over games. It's a reason why the Jazz didn't win a championship.[/QUOTE]
stockton was a top 5 player in '88, and '91. the same amount of years barkley was a top 5 player.

[QUOTE=Shep]but stockton was much better than barkley, so that would have made them a more successful team as a result.[/QUOTE]

The Sixers would get worse, and a point guard isn't changing a terrible defensive team to a good one.

[QUOTE]yeh but barkley in his 2nd year was better than any other year besides '93[/QUOTE]

How can you watch a game from '86 and see Barkley so raw without the same short/mid-range jumper, with more questionable decision making(hence the high turnovers), without as good ball-handling ability, or all of the same moves and determine that he was better in his 2nd year than he was in his prime? And none of the numbers back this up either.

[QUOTE]because this was barkley at his most selfish. he would refuse to play defense, be put on the bench because of this, and then most likely force a trade. i can see a similar drop off of production to that of mark aguirre's when he joined the pistons, except aguirre accepted his lesser role..barkley would not.[/QUOTE]

Where is this coming from? Barkley didn't seem selfish, and he got along well with Moses, and fine with Dr. J.

Detroit nearly won a title with Adrian Dantley, and he was more selfish than Barkley.

[QUOTE]isiah thomas was the only star on that roster, and they did rely on his production greatly.[/QUOTE]

They were among the teams that won and relied on a star the least due to their depth and balance. Dantley was a star too even though I think he's overrated.

[QUOTE]nobody remembers losers for a reason[/QUOTE]

People still remember great players even if they don't win a title.

[QUOTE]you don't regard a players second best year as part of his prime? they should have won a championship in 1985 barkley's rookie season. their team consisted of a top 2 center, a top 4 power forward, a top 2 small forward, and a top 5 point guard. how much more help could you possibly wish for? in '86 they still had a top 4 center, a top 2 power forward, and a top 4 point guard. they didn't go anywhere.[/QUOTE]

I do consider Barkley's 2nd best year his prime, of course, that year occurred sometime between '89-'93. I've rarely seen players who are in their prime in their 2nd season.

Barkley was a rookie in '85 averaging 14/9 in 29 mpg, I'm not going to judge a superstar based on what he did when he wasn't even an all-star.

I hold that against their best player Moses Malone.

Regarding '86, that top 4 center was out for the playoffs.

[QUOTE]well you would expect him to..considering they had been conference semifinalists the previous season.[/QUOTE]

Regardless, he had a great season and playoff run in Phoenix, plus KJ missed 33 games and he was limited compared to previous years.

[QUOTE]he was still a top 2 power forward. houston also had a top 2 center, and a top 2 shooting guard.[/QUOTE]

I thought Barkley played fine, and regardless of how good he was, he was a shell of his former self and old for basketball at 34.

[QUOTE]they were deep in the regular season too, and only won 4 more games.[/QUOTE]

The Bulls overachieved because Jordan had developed into arguably the best player in the league already, but they clearly didn't have the talent to win when it mattered.

[QUOTE]i would definately refer to it as an upset considering the celtics had home court advantage, the best record in the eastern conference, and had been to the nba finals every year since 1983 (4 consecutive years).[/QUOTE]

It's not hard to see Why Detroit beat them. Boston was a phenomenal offensive team, but not a great defensive team by that point. While Detroit was elite defensively, and they had more than enough weapons to be very good offensively. They were deeper and more well rounded by that point.

[QUOTE]they made up for that with one of the best starting 5's in nba history.[/QUOTE]

Detroit had a very formidable starting 5 themselves in addition to the great bench.

[QUOTE]that team was a much faster team than the '88 nuggets[/QUOTE]

The '84 Nuggets were significantly faster, but not only did they have Vandeweghe averaging over 29 and English averaging over 26, but there were still enough shots for Dan Issel to average almost 20.

[QUOTE]hybrid of kevin love and charles barkley since their games are similar[/QUOTE]

They aren't similar when you watch them, just compare their offensive ability.

[QUOTE]all players need to be on the same page if a team is expected to contend. grant perfected his role on offense and defense and was an integral part of a 67 win team that only lost 7 games on its way to a championship romp. once again winning plays a huge part in rankings, and no other player outside that top 14 could have done what grant did without disrupting chemistry and still had the same results.[/QUOTE]

Very solid complementary player as I said, but he wasn't a legitimate all-star, much less bordering on superstar level, which most players who are top 15 are.

[QUOTE=Shep]nance was actually the cavs best player[/QUOTE]

Nance was very good, but he wasn't as good as Daugherty or Price.

[QUOTE]bj armstrong stepped up and was an all-star in '94. horace grant had a career year in points, rebounds, and assists, and then they had toni kukoc come and and be one of the best 6th men in the entire league.[/QUOTE]

BJ did have a good season, but he was one of the most questionable all-stars I can think of. And that had to be one of, if not the weakest all-star teams in the East that year.

Grant did have a very good year, but I don't expect a team to contend like the Bulls did with Grant as their second best player and BJ Armstrong as the 3rd best player. Not unless you have an exceptionally deep team and 5-6 players at least close to that level, which the Bulls did not.

Pippen himself wasn't a big scorer, he was a good scorer, but limited in some regards. Good for 22 ppg, but Grant isn't a second option type player, and BJ was a good offensive player, but more of a shooter than anything. Kukoc was their second most talented offensive player, but he was often too 1 on 1 oriented for the triangle. They had a few decent role players after that.

I expect a team like that to make the playoffs, but even Phil Jackson only expected them to drop off by at least 15 games.

[QUOTE]you expected pippen to put up more numbers with no mj around..but he had even less of an impact. they almost went .500 while pippen was injured so the roster wasn't even that bad. he also had minimal impact on the playoffs averaging almost 4 turnovers and 43%fg and then there was that decision to take himself out of the game in the final moments and sulk because a play wasn't run for him.[/QUOTE]

4-6 is not good. Pippen raised his scoring while he also shot about the same percentage. In fact, his scoring average not only went up from 18.6 ppg to 22 ppg, but his shooting % went up from 47% to 49%, and that's while making almost 1 three per game, while he had never made a noticeable amount before then, so his eFG% was 51.5% compared to 48.2% in '93 and 51.1% in '92. It was higher at 52.9% in '91, but Pippen was scoring 4.2 extra ppg, Chicago's pace had slowed down so less transition opportunities for one of the best open court players, and there was no Michael Jordan around to receive most of the defensive attention anymore.

[QUOTE]'92 pippen was better in the regular season, but he was easily better in the playoffs in '91.[/QUOTE]

Nah he impressed me more in the '92 playoffs, only series he struggled in was the Knicks series, but he didn't face a defense like that in '91. Detroit was the closest. The 2 playoff runs were close, though. But Pippen not only had better season in '92, he was an improved player.

[QUOTE]the knicks, 76ers, pistons, and lakers are much tougher than
the heat, knicks, cavs, and blazers[/QUOTE]

Most of the series are debatable(though the Cavs and Blazers put up much tougher fights than the Pistons and Lakers(both had key injuries). But the '92 Knicks were much tougher than the '91 Sixers.

[QUOTE]avery johnson and sean elliott are d-leaguers without david robinson. johnson was cut by about 5 teams, and just look at what elliott did with the pistons when he was traded and how quickly he came crying back.[/QUOTE]

Avery Johnson knew how to run the offense, was a tough guard, and while he wasn't a scorer, he did make himself decent since he could penetrate and make those hook type shots, and had worked on his 15-18 foot jumper until he could knock them down when he was wide open(though Robinson had a part in getting him open looks). He ended up among the leaders in assists some years.

Elliott was a good outside shooter, he was productive when they iso'd him in the mid-post area, a good defender, and an athletic player with excellent size for his position who excelled in the open court. He was definitely a solid player, and he made 2 all-star teams.

He also had Dennis Rodman with those 2 guys on the '95 team. Dennis was the best rebounder in the league, and an excellent defender, though he sometimes slacked off by that point to get rebounds, particularly in the Houston series. Though he was still good enough to make the all-nba 3rd team despite missing 33 games, and the Spurs were on pace for 67 wins with him(40-9) and just a 55 win pace without him(22-11). Chuck Person was also an 11 ppg bench scorer in just 25 mpg and a dangerous shooter.

That's good support. The '93 team had Elliott in his first all-star year, Dale Ellis was still an elite shooter and another legit scoring threat on the perimeter. And they also had Antoine Carr who had averaged 20 ppg 2 years earlier when he got more minutes and was still giving them 13 in just 27 mpg. And they had some solid role players like Avery Johnson, Vinny Del Negro, Jr Reid ect.

[QUOTE]howcome barkley had teammates step up more than he did with regularity?[/QUOTE]

I don't agree that he did.

[QUOTE=Chalkmaze][IMG]http://www.slamonline.com/online/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/john_stockton_game_6.jpg[/IMG][/QUOTE]

I was rooting for the Jazz, but i still maintain former CBA player Matt Maloney cost the Rockets that series.

[QUOTE]The Sixers would get worse, and a point guard isn't changing a terrible defensive team to a good one.[/QUOTE]
aquiring a better player for a worse one will definately benefit your team. lets say stockton was the sixers starting point guard and cheeks and barkley weren't there and someone of equal value of cheeks was in barkley's spot. jack sikma for example. that would make the sixers best 5:
C Mike Gminski (16.9ppg, 10.5rpg, 1.8apg, 0.8spg, 1.8bpg)
PF Jack Sikma (16.5ppg, 8.6rpg, 3.4apg, 1.1spg, 1.0bpg)
SF Cliff Robinson (19.0ppg, 6.5rpg, 2.1apg, 1.3spg, 0.6bpg)
SG Gerald Henderson/David Wingate
PG John Stockton (14.7ppg, 2.9rpg, 13.8apg, 3.0spg)

now tell me this team would not win any more than 36 games :oldlol: i could see them easily making atleast fifth seed and possibly making the conference semifinals.
[QUOTE]How can you watch a game from '86 and see Barkley so raw without the same short/mid-range jumper, with more questionable decision making(hence the high turnovers), without as good ball-handling ability, or all of the same moves and determine that he was better in his 2nd year than he was in his prime? And none of the numbers back this up either.[/QUOTE]
barkley was at his defensive peak in 1986. in the limited energy he had he was able to spread it over both ends of the court, unlike later on in his career when he began to rest on defense. he was the best player on a 54 win team that was eventually eliminated to the higher seed milwaukee bucks in 7 games. barkley, for once, played exceptionally well in the playoffs while the sixers were without their number 1 scorer and top 4 center in moses malone throughout the playoffs. barkley recorded what would be his highest averages in his playoff career for rebounds and assists. and ended up with averages of 25.0ppg, 15.8rpg, 5.6apg, 2.3spg, and 1.3bpg.
[QUOTE]Where is this coming from? Barkley didn't seem selfish, and he got along well with Moses, and fine with Dr. J.

Detroit nearly won a title with Adrian Dantley, and he was more selfish than Barkley.[/QUOTE]
ask scottie pippen. barkley not playing defense because he wanted to conserve energy for offense is selfish personified.
[QUOTE]They were among the teams that won and relied on a star the least due to their depth and balance. Dantley was a star too even though I think he's overrated.[/QUOTE]
if dantley was a star then there were about 70 stars in the nba at that point. in any case the difference between thomas and the rest of the pistons was obvious in terms of star power..about as obvious as it was between magic and the rest of the lakers.
[QUOTE]People still remember great players even if they don't win a title.[/QUOTE]
they will be alot easier to remember if they win games.
[QUOTE]I do consider Barkley's 2nd best year his prime, of course, that year occurred sometime between '89-'93. I've rarely seen players who are in their prime in their 2nd season.[/QUOTE]
:oldlol:
[QUOTE]Barkley was a rookie in '85 averaging 14/9 in 29 mpg, I'm not going to judge a superstar based on what he did when he wasn't even an all-star.[/QUOTE]
in a team with that many people among the top at their position they should win regardless of rookies.
[QUOTE]I thought Barkley played fine, and regardless of how good he was, he was a shell of his former self and old for basketball at 34.[/QUOTE]
you are not old for basketball when you are top 2 in your position in the entire world. and his averages dipped from 19/14/5 and 48%fg to 18/12/3 and 43%
[QUOTE]The Bulls overachieved because Jordan had developed into arguably the best player in the league already, but they clearly didn't have the talent to win when it mattered.[/QUOTE]
because the isiah thomas led pistons made them look pedestrian
[QUOTE]It's not hard to see Why Detroit beat them. Boston was a phenomenal offensive team, but not a great defensive team by that point. While Detroit was elite defensively, and they had more than enough weapons to be very good offensively. They were deeper and more well rounded by that point. [/QUOTE]
detroid beat them because the isiah thomas led pistons made them look pedestrian
[QUOTE]Detroit had a very formidable starting 5 themselves in addition to the great bench[/QUOTE]
the celtics had the better starting 5 and the best record in the conference
[QUOTE]The '84 Nuggets were significantly faster, but not only did they have Vandeweghe averaging over 29 and English averaging over 26, but there were still enough shots for Dan Issel to average almost 20.[/QUOTE]
so yes, they were significantly faster
[QUOTE]They aren't similar when you watch them, just compare their offensive ability.[/QUOTE]
they both score and rebound well on pitiful teams.
[QUOTE]Very solid complementary player as I said, but he wasn't a legitimate all-star, much less bordering on superstar level, which most players who are top 15 are.[/QUOTE]
grant was definately bordering on superstar level in 1992. alot of these so called "superstars" would have to have their numbers drastically decrease to be able to fit in with chicago's schemes and not discrupt chemistry.
[QUOTE]Nance was very good, but he wasn't as good as Daugherty or Price.
[/QUOTE]
nance was better in the regular season and playoffs than both daugherty and price.
[QUOTE]BJ did have a good season, but he was one of the most questionable all-stars I can think of. And that had to be one of, if not the weakest all-star teams in the East that year.[/QUOTE]
thats ok, he was still an all-star

[QUOTE]Grant did have a very good year, but I don't expect a team to contend like the Bulls did with Grant as their second best player and BJ Armstrong as the 3rd best player. Not unless you have an exceptionally deep team and 5-6 players at least close to that level, which the Bulls did not.[/QUOTE]
you obviously underrated horace grant and bj armstrong then
[QUOTE]Pippen himself wasn't a big scorer, he was a good scorer, but limited in some regards. Good for 22 ppg, but Grant isn't a second option type player, and BJ was a good offensive player, but more of a shooter than anything. Kukoc was their second most talented offensive player, but he was often too 1 on 1 oriented for the triangle. They had a few decent role players after that.

I expect a team like that to make the playoffs, but even Phil Jackson only expected them to drop off by at least 15 games.[/QUOTE]
it was very fortunate that grant could sustain his play from the previous season, bj could show that massive improvement, and they could add a talented youngster such as kukoc along with nice role players such as longley and myers.
[QUOTE]4-6 is not good[/QUOTE]
the losses were all against powerful outfits, only 1 came against a sub .500 team and that was on the road.
[QUOTE]Pippen raised his scoring while he also shot about the same percentage. In fact, his scoring average not only went up from 18.6 ppg to 22 ppg, but his shooting % went up from 47% to 49%, and that's while making almost 1 three per game, while he had never made a noticeable amount before then, so his eFG% was 51.5% compared to 48.2% in '93 and 51.1% in '92. It was higher at 52.9% in '91, but Pippen was scoring 4.2 extra ppg, Chicago's pace had slowed down so less transition opportunities for one of the best open court players, and there was no Michael Jordan around to receive most of the defensive attention anymore.[/QUOTE]
c'mon the greatest scorer in nba history up and leaves and the best you can do is average 3 more points? as the second best player on the team he definately should have stepped up and scored atleast 25ppg on that roster that was so desperate for offense.
[QUOTE]Nah he impressed me more in the '92 playoffs, only series he struggled in was the Knicks series, but he didn't face a defense like that in '91. Detroit was the closest. The 2 playoff runs were close, though. But Pippen not only had better season in '92, he was an improved player.
[/QUOTE]
the bulls not only were alot more dominant in '91, they also faced tougher competition, and pippen was more productive. pippen also got better as the bulls progressed throughout, and asserted himself alot more.
[QUOTE]Most of the series are debatable(though the Cavs and Blazers put up much tougher fights than the Pistons and Lakers(both had key injuries). But the '92 Knicks were much tougher than the '91 Sixers.[/QUOTE]
they only put up tougher fights because the bulls were less dominant, jordan wasn't as good, and pippen wasn't as good.
[QUOTE]Avery Johnson knew how to run the offense, was a tough guard, and while he wasn't a scorer, he did make himself decent since he could penetrate and make those hook type shots, and had worked on his 15-18 foot jumper until he could knock them down when he was wide open(though Robinson had a part in getting him open looks). He ended up among the leaders in assists some years.[/QUOTE]
robinson made johnson. johnson was a journeyman until he ended up in san antonio. nobody wanted him. even the spurs didn't want him. they let him walk to the golden state warriors in 1993, then he came crying back in 1994 once he realised he sucked, and he would never see another nba paycheck if he didn't jump on robinson's coattails again.
[QUOTE]Elliott was a good outside shooter, he was productive when they iso'd him in the mid-post area, a good defender, and an athletic player with excellent size for his position who excelled in the open court. He was definitely a solid player, and he made 2 all-star teams.[/QUOTE]
elliott was more of the same. absolute filth without robinson. he was so valuable to san antonio that they traded him for a guy that never played a game for the spurs :roll: all you gotta do is look what sort of player he was in 1994 with no robinson in that 1 year with the pistons to realise that he was trash.
[QUOTE]He also had Dennis Rodman with those 2 guys on the '95 team. Dennis was the best rebounder in the league, and an excellent defender, though he sometimes slacked off by that point to get rebounds, particularly in the Houston series. Though he was still good enough to make the all-nba 3rd team despite missing 33 games, and the Spurs were on pace for 67 wins with him(40-9) and just a 55 win pace without him(22-11). Chuck Person was also an 11 ppg bench scorer in just 25 mpg and a dangerous shooter.
[/QUOTE]
oh yeh..another valuable piece..so valuable infact that they traded him for freakin will perdue in the offseason and only lost 3 more games. will freakin perdue.
[QUOTE]That's good support[/QUOTE]
destroyed
[QUOTE]The '93 team had Elliott in his first all-star year, Dale Ellis was still an elite shooter and another legit scoring threat on the perimeter. And they also had Antoine Carr who had averaged 20 ppg 2 years earlier when he got more minutes and was still giving them 13 in just 27 mpg. And they had some solid role players like Avery Johnson, Vinny Del Negro, Jr Reid ect.
[/QUOTE]
antoine carr and his 5.5 rebounds per game in 27 minutes was pretty good :oldlol: ellis is a one dimentional shooter..and the other guys are d-leaguers.
[QUOTE]I don't agree that he did.[/QUOTE]
lol ok :facepalm

[QUOTE=Shep]aquiring a better player for a worse one will definately benefit your team. lets say stockton was the sixers starting point guard and cheeks and barkley weren't there and someone of equal value of cheeks was in barkley's spot. jack sikma for example. that would make the sixers best 5:
C Mike Gminski (16.9ppg, 10.5rpg, 1.8apg, 0.8spg, 1.8bpg)
PF Jack Sikma (16.5ppg, 8.6rpg, 3.4apg, 1.1spg, 1.0bpg)
SF Cliff Robinson (19.0ppg, 6.5rpg, 2.1apg, 1.3spg, 0.6bpg)
SG Gerald Henderson/David Wingate
PG John Stockton (14.7ppg, 2.9rpg, 13.8apg, 3.0spg)

now tell me this team would not win any more than 36 games :oldlol: i could see them easily making atleast fifth seed and possibly making the conference semifinals.[/QUOTE]

Who is going to score on that team? Acquiring a better player than Barkley in '88 would help, unfortunately there were only 4 of them. Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Hakeem Olajuwon.

[QUOTE]barkley was at his defensive peak in 1986. in the limited energy he had he was able to spread it over both ends of the court, unlike later on in his career when he began to rest on defense. he was the best player on a 54 win team that was eventually eliminated to the higher seed milwaukee bucks in 7 games. barkley, for once, played exceptionally well in the playoffs while the sixers were without their number 1 scorer and top 4 center in moses malone throughout the playoffs. barkley recorded what would be his highest averages in his playoff career for rebounds and assists. and ended up with averages of 25.0ppg, 15.8rpg, 5.6apg, 2.3spg, and 1.3bpg.[/QUOTE]

Barkley was never a consistent game changer defensively anyway.

I do know that Barkley's only prime year averaging less than 25 ppg was 23 ppg in '92 while he averaged an even 20 ppg in '86. I also know that Barkley never averaged over 4 turnovers in his prime while he averaged 4.4 in '86. And aside from '88, he never averaged more turnovers than assists in his prime, while he averaged 0.5 more TO in '86. And you could argue that his prime was more '89-'93 anyway.

[QUOTE]ask scottie pippen. barkley not playing defense because he wanted to conserve energy for offense is selfish personified.[/QUOTE]

It's actually common for stars who are expected to carry the team offensively and play with limited talent. I remember the Scottie Pippen comments, that sh[SIZE="2"]i[/SIZE]t was hyped to no end, but why is that you disregard Pippen's opinion when it comes to his best season, but now cite his quote about Barkley?

[QUOTE]if dantley was a star then there were about 70 stars in the nba at that point. in any case the difference between thomas and the rest of the pistons was obvious in terms of star power..about as obvious as it was between magic and the rest of the lakers.[/QUOTE]

I'm no Dantley fan, but you think he wasn't even top 50? Supporting casts aren't all about star power. How many championship teams, or even finals teams since then can you name that relied on a star less than Detroit?

[QUOTE]in a team with that many people among the top at their position they should win regardless of rookies.[/QUOTE]

You can blame Moses for dropping from 24.6 ppg and 13.1 rpg on 46.9% shooting in the season to 18.2 ppg and 13.4 rpg on 40.5% shooting. Moses was the guy to blame for a Sixer team with probably the most talented team in the East, if not the league only managing 1 win vs a Celtic team with Bird limited by injuries and only averaging 20.8 ppg, 7.2 rpg and 6 apg on 41.9% shooting compared to his season averages of 28.7 ppg, 10.5 rpg and 6.6 apg on 52.2% in the season.

After all, Moses was the same leader of the '84 Sixers who not only failed to get back to the finals after being one of the greatest teams ever the previous year, but were upset in the 1st round with the most talented team in the East.

[QUOTE]you are not old for basketball when you are top 2 in your position in the entire world. and his averages dipped from 19/14/5 and 48%fg to 18/12/3 and 43%[/QUOTE]

34 is old for this sport. A player's prime usually ends between 30-32 years old.

[QUOTE]because the isiah thomas led pistons made them look pedestrian[/QUOTE]

Everyone thought Jordan's cast looked pedestrian.

[QUOTE]detroid beat them because the isiah thomas led pistons made them look pedestrian[/QUOTE]

Isiah had nothing to do with arguably the game's greatest player shooting 35%. Bird did play well from an all around standpoint, rebounded and passed extremely well as usual and both his individual defense on Dantley and help defense were very good. But he was also missing many shots he usually makes, and also rushing some shots and take a few uncharacteristic shots. He was just off, and it's tough to win when you get 30 ppg on 53/41/92 shooting for the season, and he drops 10 ppg and down to 35%.

[QUOTE]the celtics had the better starting 5 and the best record in the conference[/QUOTE]

Pistons were more complete.

[QUOTE][B]grant was definately bordering on superstar level in 1992[/B]. alot of these so called "superstars" would have to have their numbers drastically decrease to be able to fit in with chicago's schemes and not discrupt chemistry.[/QUOTE]

:facepalm

[QUOTE]nance was better in the regular season and playoffs than both daugherty and price.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol:

[QUOTE=Shep]you obviously underrated horace grant and bj armstrong then[/QUOTE]

Nah, BJ was a good shooter, and Grant was a very good all around power forward who teams would love to have as their 3rd best player.

[QUOTE]it was very fortunate that grant could sustain his play from the previous season, bj could show that massive improvement, and they could add a talented youngster such as kukoc along with nice role players such as longley and myers.[/QUOTE]

They were very fortunate that Pippen could raise his game to help a team with limited talent overachieve. They were very fortunate that Pippen was the best perimeter defender, became a better scorer and rebounder that season and was also such a smart player and good playmaker who knew the triangle offense so well. Because they had to rely on the triangle more with their limited offensive talent.

[QUOTE]the losses were all against powerful outfits, only 1 came against a sub .500 team and that was on the road.[/QUOTE]

Still a pretty small sample size to call them a good team.Pippen still kept them above .500 without Grant in both the '94 season for the stretch he was out, and the entire '95 season even before Jordan came back when grant was in Orlando. And the Bulls without Grant or Jordan were very limited with huge flaws.

[QUOTE]c'mon the greatest scorer in nba history up and leaves and the best you can do is average 3 more points? as the second best player on the team he definately should have stepped up and scored atleast 25ppg on that roster that was so desperate for offense.[/QUOTE]

Pippen wasn't really a 25 ppg scorer. That wasn't his game, that wasn't what made Pippen one of the great all around players. They overachieved as much as you could expect.

[QUOTE]the bulls not only were alot more dominant in '91, they also faced tougher competition, and pippen was more productive. pippen also got better as the bulls progressed throughout, and asserted himself alot more.[/QUOTE]

'91 Knicks and '92 Hear are virtually even. The '92 Knicks were much better than the '91 Sixers. The '91 Pistons with a healthy Isiah may have been better than the '92 Cavs, but because Isiah wasn't healthy, I'm going with the Cavs team that won 7 more games. And a healthy '91 Lakers were better, but with Worthy's injured from the WCF and Scott's injury, Portland was at least as tough, if not tougher in '92.

[QUOTE]they only put up tougher fights because the bulls were less dominant, jordan wasn't as good, and pippen wasn't as good.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol: No, Jordan was virtually the same player and played basically the same in the 3 seasons from '90-'92, and very close in '93. Pippen improved noticeably each year from '90-'92, same with Grant. Cartwright and Paxson fell off a bit, but Armstrong improved.

The Bulls went 67-15 and were not only more comfortable in the triangle from te start having played 2 years in it and Pippen having assumed the point forward role from the start making them an even better offensive team, but they stepped up their defense too. Pippen and especially Grant got better at that end, and Jordan had arguably his best defensive season in '92.

[QUOTE]robinson made johnson. johnson was a journeyman until he ended up in san antonio. nobody wanted him. even the spurs didn't want him. they let him walk to the golden state warriors in 1993, then he came crying back in 1994 once he realised he sucked, and he would never see another nba paycheck if he didn't jump on robinson's coattails again.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, Robinson walks on water, he turns water into wine. :oldlol:

[QUOTE]oh yeh..another valuable piece..so valuable infact that they traded him for freakin will perdue in the offseason and only lost 3 more games. will freakin perdue.[/QUOTE]

Look at their record in '95 when he was out compared to when he played, they lost 2 more games in 16 fewer games without him, and you're diminshing his imapct? And what about Person?

That's quite a few quality players, Del Negro was also a nice role player for your 6th best player or whatever.

[QUOTE]antoine carr and his 5.5 rebounds per game in 27 minutes was pretty good :oldlol: ellis is a one dimentional shooter..and the other guys are d-leaguers.[/QUOTE]

He still had 2 legitimate scoring options on the perimeter in Ellis and Elliott, in addition to a 3rd capable scoring option in Carr. How many scoring options does a team need? Ellis was one-dimensional, but he did that one thing extremely well. 17 ppg on 50% from the field and 40% on 3s as a 2nd/3rd option and 10th in made 3s is good.

[QUOTE]Who is going to score on that team? [/QUOTE]
4 out of 5 guys were averaging 15 points. any one of the 4 could step up and score 25 on any given night.
[QUOTE]Acquiring a better player than Barkley in '88 would help, unfortunately there were only 4 of them. Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Hakeem Olajuwon.[/QUOTE]
you forgot the other 5 that were also better than barkley: john stockton, isiah thomas, fat lever, james worthy, and dominique wilkins.
[QUOTE]Barkley was never a consistent game changer defensively anyway.
[/QUOTE]
thats ok. i would rather him play better defense and put more effort like in '86 in than be lazy and not not care.
[QUOTE]It's actually common for stars who are expected to carry the team offensively and play with limited talent. I remember the Scottie Pippen comments, that shit was hyped to no end, but why is that you disregard Pippen's opinion when it comes to his best season, but now cite his quote about Barkley?[/QUOTE]
easy. because players aren't good judges of who the best players are..whereas pippen had inside knowledge on the barkley situation in houston.
[QUOTE]I'm no Dantley fan, but you think he wasn't even top 50? Supporting casts aren't all about star power. How many championship teams, or even finals teams since then can you name that relied on a star less than Detroit?[/QUOTE]
dantley was top 48. to have your third best player not even one of the best 47 players in the nba and to still make a game 7 of the nba finals speaks volumes about thomas
[QUOTE]You can blame Moses for dropping from 24.6 ppg and 13.1 rpg on 46.9% shooting in the season to 18.2 ppg and 13.4 rpg on 40.5% shooting. Moses was the guy to blame for a Sixer team with probably the most talented team in the East, if not the league only managing 1 win vs a Celtic team with Bird limited by injuries and only averaging 20.8 ppg, 7.2 rpg and 6 apg on 41.9% shooting compared to his season averages of 28.7 ppg, 10.5 rpg and 6.6 apg on 52.2% in the season.[/QUOTE]
whoever dropped off in production isn't really the point here. the point is that barkley had alot of help in his career.
[QUOTE]After all, Moses was the same leader of the '84 Sixers who not only failed to get back to the finals after being one of the greatest teams ever the previous year, but were upset in the 1st round with the most talented team in the East.[/QUOTE]
yeh, malone, like barkley was one of the most overrated players in nba history.
[QUOTE]34 is old for this sport. A player's prime usually ends between 30-32 years old.[/QUOTE]
he was definately still in his prime, and top 2 at his position.
[QUOTE]Everyone thought Jordan's cast looked pedestrian.[/QUOTE]
jordan and his cast were good enough for only 4 less wins in the regular season, and they ended up getting demolished by the pistons in 5.
[QUOTE]Isiah had nothing to do with arguably the game's greatest player shooting 35%. Bird did play well from an all around standpoint, rebounded and passed extremely well as usual and both his individual defense on Dantley and help defense were very good. But he was also missing many shots he usually makes, and also rushing some shots and take a few uncharacteristic shots. He was just off, and it's tough to win when you get 30 ppg on 53/41/92 shooting for the season, and he drops 10 ppg and down to 35%.[/QUOTE]
arguably the games greates player? bird wasn't even top 2 in 1988. the celtics lost because the piston's best player outplayed the celtics best player. thomas averaged 23.0ppg, 5.2rpg, 8.3apg, and 2.7spg. besides, bird's scoring output and shooting percentages didn't even have much of an effect on the outcome of games. in the only 2 wins the celtics had against the pistons he averaged 19 points on 37%.
[QUOTE]Pistons were more complete.[/QUOTE]
celtics better over 82 games
[QUOTE]:facepalm [/QUOTE]
:confusedshrug:
[QUOTE]:oldlol: [/QUOTE]
:roll:
[QUOTE]Nah, BJ was a good shooter, and Grant was a very good all around power forward who teams would love to have as their 3rd best player.[/QUOTE]
awesome, well rounded players who stepped up huge to pick up the slack with no mj. bj was an all-star, and grant a top 4 power forward.
[QUOTE]They were very fortunate that Pippen could raise his game to help a team with limited talent overachieve. They were very fortunate that Pippen was the best perimeter defender, became a better scorer and rebounder that season and was also such a smart player and good playmaker who knew the triangle offense so well. Because they had to rely on the triangle more with their limited offensive talent.[/QUOTE]
pippen didn't raise his game at all. with the greatest scorer in the game leaving, the second best scorer on the team needed to elevate his scoring more than anything else.
[QUOTE]Still a pretty small sample size to call them a good team.Pippen still kept them above .500 without Grant in both the '94 season for the stretch he was out, and the entire '95 season even before Jordan came back when grant was in Orlando. And the Bulls without Grant or Jordan were very limited with huge flaws.[/QUOTE]
how many good teams did they beat without grant in '94? you would imagine that bulls team in '95 to be around .500 anyway. especially with kukoc stepping up into a bigger role and averaging 16/5/5, along with bj's continued steady play.
[QUOTE]Pippen wasn't really a 25 ppg scorer. That wasn't his game, that wasn't what made Pippen one of the great all around players. They overachieved as much as you could expect.[/QUOTE]
pippen needed to be a 25 ppg scorer. superstars do what the team requires, when they require it.
[QUOTE]'91 Knicks and '92 Hear are virtually even. The '92 Knicks were much better than the '91 Sixers. The '91 Pistons with a healthy Isiah may have been better than the '92 Cavs, but because Isiah wasn't healthy, I'm going with the Cavs team that won 7 more games. And a healthy '91 Lakers were better, but with Worthy's injured from the WCF and Scott's injury, Portland was at least as tough, if not tougher in '92.[/QUOTE]
the knicks had a better regular season, weren't a expansion team playing in its first ever playoff series. the knicks had patrick ewing who had a great regular season with 27/11/3/1/3. the heat lost the regular season series to the bulls 0-4 and averaging losing margin was over 17 points per game.

the sixers were better than the knicks also. even tho the knicks won more games in the regular season, the sixers won 3 out of 4 regular season games against the bulls, whereas the knicks went a paltry 0-4 against the bulls in the '92 regular season.

the pistons were easily better than the cavs. they were the defending 2 time champion and the bulls bogey team..and to destroy them like they did..well nothing else really needs to be said here.

the lakers were also much better than the trailblazers coming off a decade of dominance and boasting the best point guard in the nba a top 3 small forward, a top 4 center, and a top 5 power forward.
[QUOTE]No, Jordan was virtually the same player and played basically the same in the 3 seasons from '90-'92, and very close in '93. Pippen improved noticeably each year from '90-'92, same with Grant. Cartwright and Paxson fell off a bit, but Armstrong improved.[/QUOTE]
jordan was at his peak in '91 due to his playoff performance so that easily separated him from any other year. pippen was closer to his '91 self than jordan was, but still wasn't as good. the only player that was better in '92 was horace grant.
[QUOTE]The Bulls went 67-15 and were not only more comfortable in the triangle from te start having played 2 years in it and Pippen having assumed the point forward role from the start making them an even better offensive team, but they stepped up their defense too. Pippen and especially Grant got better at that end, and Jordan had arguably his best defensive season in '92.[/QUOTE]
both jordan and pippen had the better regular season in 1992, but once again, the playoffs were the difference. the bulls lost only 1 games, and jordan and pippen both played amazing ball.
[QUOTE]Yeah, Robinson walks on water, he turns water into wine.[/QUOTE]
:rolleyes:
[QUOTE]Look at their record in '95 when he was out compared to when he played, they lost 2 more games in 16 fewer games without him, and you're diminshing his imapct? And what about Person?

That's quite a few quality players, Del Negro was also a nice role player for your 6th best player or whatever.[/QUOTE]
yeh what about their 12th best player julius nwosu in his 23 games was a nice impact player, he averaged 13 points and 10 rebounds per 36 minutes! why would you trade rodman for filth if he was of any worth to your team?
[QUOTE]He still had 2 legitimate scoring options on the perimeter in Ellis and Elliott, in addition to a 3rd capable scoring option in Carr. How many scoring options does a team need? Ellis was one-dimensional, but he did that one thing extremely well. 17 ppg on 50% from the field and 40% on 3s as a 2nd/3rd option and 10th in made 3s is good.[/QUOTE]
oh ya, n don't forget about corey crowder and how well he played in his 7 games for the spurs.

[QUOTE=Shep]4 out of 5 guys were averaging 15 points. any one of the 4 could step up and score 25 on any given night.[/QUOTE]

That Sixer team didn't have particularly good offensive players outside of Barkley.

[QUOTE]you forgot the other 5 that were also better than barkley: john stockton, isiah thomas, fat lever, james worthy, and dominique wilkins.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol:

[QUOTE]thats ok. i would rather him play better defense and put more effort like in '86 in than be lazy and not not care.[/QUOTE]

And I'd rather have a far more skilled Barkley who wasn't a turnover machine.

[QUOTE]easy. because players aren't good judges of who the best players are..whereas pippen had inside knowledge on the barkley situation in houston.[/QUOTE]

Some players are good judges of players, but Pippen is more qualified than anyone to judge what his best season was.

[QUOTE]dantley was top 48. to have your third best player not even one of the best 47 players in the nba and to still make a game 7 of the nba finals speaks volumes about thomas[/QUOTE]

Teams have won titles with 3rd best players who weren't top 50. And I'm not sure Dantley was that low.

[QUOTE]whoever dropped off in production isn't really the point here. the point is that barkley had alot of help in his career.[/QUOTE]

Not in his prime except '93. He did have good rosters in his first 2 years(though Moses was injured in '86), and Phoenix and Houston. Too bad they didn't come earlier when he was at the top of his game. look what happened in the one prime year that he had a legit contending team in, he got all the way to the finals.

[QUOTE]yeh, malone, like barkley was one of the most overrated players in nba history.[/QUOTE]

Disagree on Barkley. Not sure if I'd call Moses overrated, at times I thought so, but he was the best player in the league for 2 years in '82 and '83. And he led one of the great teams of all time with a 65-17 record and a 12-1 playoff record. I definitely don't see why Moses gets into some top 10 lists. He was probably the biggest black hole I've seen. I was surprised to see him constantly hold the ball instead of passing when doubled, and then go to a drop step or something and force up a shot against 2 men. That's probably why he had such a horrible assist/turnover ratio. And he didn't seem to be the defensive anchor that the other great centers were considering Houston was often among the worst defensive teams and at times were the worst or 2nd worst. Outside of '81 and '83, his playoff career was disappointing too, and he underachieved with incredibly talented rosters in '84 and '85 including a 1st round upset loss in '84. He was one of the all-time great rebounders and a very good scorer, though. Regardless, outside of the first tier top 5 centers(Kareem, Russell, Shaq, Hakeem, Wilt), I often wonder if he was really a more effective center than some of the other great centers.

[QUOTE]he was definately still in his prime, and top 2 at his position.[/QUOTE]

:roll: Now I've heard it all. Barkley was in his prime in Houston? He hadn't been in his prime since '93!

[QUOTE]jordan and his cast were good enough for only 4 less wins in the regular season, and they ended up getting demolished by the pistons in 5.[/QUOTE]

This is useless, are you really claiming that the Bulls had a comparable team to Detroit in '88?

[QUOTE]arguably the games greates player? bird wasn't even top 2 in 1988. the celtics lost because the piston's best player outplayed the celtics best player. thomas averaged 23.0ppg, 5.2rpg, 8.3apg, and 2.7spg. besides, bird's scoring output and shooting percentages didn't even have much of an effect on the outcome of games. in the only 2 wins the celtics had against the pistons he averaged 19 points on 37%.[/QUOTE]

Bird definitely had a case for best player in '88. An incredibly well rounded player who averaged 30/9/6 on shooting percentages of 53/41/92 and probably should have been voted MVP.

[QUOTE]celtics better over 82 games[/QUOTE]

Right, because that always proves who the better team is. I forgot that Bird also shot just 35% over 82 games.

[QUOTE]awesome, well rounded players who stepped up huge to pick up the slack with no mj. bj was an all-star, and grant a top 4 power forward.[/QUOTE]

I wouldn't call BJ an "awesome well rounded player". Haven't made a list for '94 yet, but I have some doubts about Grant being a top 4 PF. In fact, I know he wasn't. There was Malone, Barkley, Kemp and Coleman.

[QUOTE]pippen didn't raise his game at all. with the greatest scorer in the game leaving, the second best scorer on the team needed to elevate his scoring more than anything else.[/QUOTE]

Revisionist history at it's finest.

[QUOTE]how many good teams did they beat without grant in '94? you would imagine that bulls team in '95 to be around .500 anyway. especially with kukoc stepping up into a bigger role and averaging 16/5/5, along with bj's continued steady play.[/QUOTE]

Kukoc was playing out of position at PF, yet they were still an elite defensive team. Pippen's all around play was just unbelievable in '94 and '95.

[QUOTE]pippen needed to be a 25 ppg scorer. superstars do what the team requires, when they require it.[/QUOTE]

:rolleyes: Pippen did do what the team required, hence their 55-27 record, only 2 fewer wins than in '93 with Jordan. And they took the Eastern Conference champion Knicks to 7, and probably would have won the series if not for the ridiculous call by Hue Hollins. '91 Pippen doesn't have that team winning 50 games or contending for a championship.

[QUOTE]the knicks had a better regular season, weren't a expansion team playing in its first ever playoff series. the knicks had patrick ewing who had a great regular season with 27/11/3/1/3. the heat lost the regular season series to the bulls 0-4 and averaging losing margin was over 17 points per game.[/QUOTE]

They were a 38-44 team, the Bulls demolition of the Knicks shows how much the Knicks were struggling as much as it shows how good the Bulls struggled.

[QUOTE][B]the sixers were better than the knicks also[/B]. even tho the knicks won more games in the regular season, the sixers won 3 out of 4 regular season games against the bulls, whereas the knicks went a paltry 0-4 against the bulls in the '92 regular season.[/QUOTE]

:wtf:

[QUOTE]the pistons were easily better than the cavs. they were the defending 2 time champion and the bulls bogey team..and to destroy them like they did..well nothing else really needs to be said here.[/QUOTE]

With a healthy Isiah, I might agree. With the Isiah Detroit had in the '91 playoffs, I'm not sure. The Cavs were extremely talented with great players like Daugherty, Price and Nance in addition to another excellent post scorer in Hot Rod Williams.

[QUOTE]the lakers were also much better than the trailblazers coming off a decade of dominance and boasting the best point guard in the nba a top 3 small forward, a top 4 center, and a top 5 power forward.[/QUOTE]

So Vlade Divac was now a top 4 center in '91? :oldlol: Robinson, Ewing, Hakeem and Daugherty have something to say about that.

I liked Vlade, and Perkins for that matter, I doubt Sam was a top 5 PF too. Worthy wasn't a top 3 SF.

[QUOTE]jordan was at his peak in '91 due to his playoff performance so that easily separated him from any other year. pippen was closer to his '91 self than jordan was, but still wasn't as good. the only player that was better in '92 was horace grant.[/QUOTE]

Pippen and Grant were clearly better in '92. It's not even close or debatable. Jordan's '91 season was very close to '90 and '92. The difference vs '90 was that Jordan had teammates who improved a lot, and he faced a Detroit team that was nowhere near as strong as '90. His level of play and skills were every bit as good in '90, and he had to do even more for that team.

[QUOTE]both jordan and pippen had the better regular season in 1992, but once again, the playoffs were the difference. the bulls lost only 1 games, and jordan and pippen both played amazing ball.[/QUOTE]

Jordan's level of play in both the regular season and playoffs were comparable both years. Pippen had comparable playoff runs both years, but his regular season and overall skills and level of play were too much to make '91 even comparable.

And the '92 Bulls were clearly better than the '91 Bulls.

[QUOTE]yeh what about their 12th best player julius nwosu in his 23 games was a nice impact player, he averaged 13 points and 10 rebounds per 36 minutes! why would you trade rodman for filth if he was of any worth to your team?[/QUOTE]

they thought Rodman was a cancer, and he didn't get along with Robinson. But you can't ignore a 40-9 record with him compared to just 22-11 without him. And Dennis went on to win 3 more titles after Chicago had just lost to Orlando.

[QUOTE]oh ya, n don't forget about corey crowder and how well he played in his 7 games for the spurs.[/QUOTE]

Are you pretending that guys like Elliott, Rodman, Avery Johnson, Chuck Person and Del Negro, or Dale Ellis and Antoine Carr weren't quality players? Del Negro was the worst, but good for a role player.

shep either trolling, is stupid, or didnt actually watch ball back then by the stuff he's saying

[B]Shep is a Jazz Fan and Hates It When People Give CLEAR Evidence on Barkley > Malone or Stockton-To-Malone. :confusedshrug:

Its a Fact that for 10-11 Years Barkley Outplayed and Owned Malone. Malone Got the Better on Barkley from 1995-96 On Cause of Injuries and Loosing the Potence, Agility, Quickness and Leaping Ability He Once Had. NEVER BEFORE

Fat Lever Better than Barkley? :facepalm :rolleyes: GTFO Lost Creability Right There[/B]

Shep is just trolling. Fat Lever better than Barkley? :facepalm I've heard it all.

[QUOTE]That Sixer team didn't have particularly good offensive players outside of Barkley.[/QUOTE]
with stockton and sikma they would've had a much more potent offense with alot more options which in turn would be harder to defend.
[QUOTE]:oldlol: [/QUOTE]
:rockon:
[QUOTE]And I'd rather have a far more skilled Barkley who wasn't a turnover machine.[/QUOTE]
how far did those skills get his teams?
[QUOTE]Some players are good judges of players, but Pippen is more qualified than anyone to judge what his best season was.[/QUOTE]
he would've said '94 was his best season so people would think he was at his best when mj wasn't there which was hardly the case at all considering all the season's i've mentioned that he was better than he was in '94..all of those season's playing alongside jordan.
[QUOTE]Teams have won titles with 3rd best players who weren't top 50. And I'm not sure Dantley was that low.[/QUOTE]
how many teams? i am certain he was the 48th best player in 1988.
[QUOTE]Not in his prime except '93. He did have good rosters in his first 2 years(though Moses was injured in '86), and Phoenix and Houston. Too bad they didn't come earlier when he was at the top of his game. look what happened in the one prime year that he had a legit contending team in, he got all the way to the finals.[/QUOTE]
how can the second best year of his career not be included in his prime?
[QUOTE]Disagree on Barkley. Not sure if I'd call Moses overrated, at times I thought so, but he was the best player in the league for 2 years in '82 and '83. And he led one of the great teams of all time with a 65-17 record and a 12-1 playoff record. I definitely don't see why Moses gets into some top 10 lists. He was probably the biggest black hole I've seen. I was surprised to see him constantly hold the ball instead of passing when doubled, and then go to a drop step or something and force up a shot against 2 men. That's probably why he had such a horrible assist/turnover ratio. And he didn't seem to be the defensive anchor that the other great centers were considering Houston was often among the worst defensive teams and at times were the worst or 2nd worst. Outside of '81 and '83, his playoff career was disappointing too, and he underachieved with incredibly talented rosters in '84 and '85 including a 1st round upset loss in '84. He was one of the all-time great rebounders and a very good scorer, though. Regardless, outside of the first tier top 5 centers(Kareem, Russell, Shaq, Hakeem, Wilt), I often wonder if he was really a more effective center than some of the other great centers.[/QUOTE]
lol moses malone wasn't even top 4 in '82, i agree with him being the best player in the nba in '83 tho. and outside that tier you mentioned still above malone on the all time center's list is david robinson, george mikan, and patrick ewing. he is, however, ranked higher than charles barkley :oldlol: .
[QUOTE]Now I've heard it all. Barkley was in his prime in Houston? He hadn't been in his prime since '93![/QUOTE]
so according to you his prime was from 1993 until 1993? that is the only plausible explanation here.
[QUOTE]This is useless, are you really claiming that the Bulls had a comparable team to Detroit in '88?[/QUOTE]
they were the number 2 and number 3 seed in the eastern conference playoff picture. obviously they did have a comparable team to detroit to only win 4 less games than the pistons over an 82 game season.
[QUOTE]Bird definitely had a case for best player in '88. An incredibly well rounded player who averaged 30/9/6 on shooting percentages of 53/41/92 and probably should have been voted MVP.[/QUOTE]
:oldlol: that was easily michael jordan's mvp. infact it was closer bird and fourth most valuable player clyde drexler than it was between bird and jordan.
[QUOTE]Right, because that always proves who the better team is. I forgot that Bird also shot just 35% over 82 games.[/QUOTE]
yeh it usually proves who the better team is, and then its the players who step up the most is what determines how far a team gets in the playoffs.
[QUOTE]I wouldn't call BJ an "awesome well rounded player". Haven't made a list for '94 yet, but I have some doubts about Grant being a top 4 PF. In fact, I know he wasn't. There was Malone, Barkley, Kemp and Coleman.[/QUOTE]
the playoff's proved grant was better than coleman (40%fg, 5topg, destroyed in the first round)
[QUOTE]Revisionist history at it's finest.[/QUOTE]
:lol :wtf:
[QUOTE]
Kukoc was playing out of position at PF, yet they were still an elite defensive team. Pippen's all around play was just unbelievable in '94 and '95.[/QUOTE]
not as unbelievable as in other years, especially 1991
[QUOTE]Pippen did do what the team required, hence their 55-27 record, only 2 fewer wins than in '93 with Jordan. And they took the Eastern Conference champion Knicks to 7, and probably would have won the series if not for the ridiculous call by Hue Hollins. '91 Pippen doesn't have that team winning 50 games or contending for a championship.[/QUOTE]
'91 pippen probably wouldn't have pouted and they probably make the conference finals and puts up alot healthier numbers than the 21.7ppg, 7.7rpg, 4.7apg, 2.0spg, 0.6bpg, 3.3topg, and 41%fg he put up in the knicks series.
[QUOTE]They were a 38-44 team, the Bulls demolition of the Knicks shows how much the Knicks were struggling as much as it shows how good the Bulls struggled.[/QUOTE]
the bulls turned the all-nba second team center into the most disappointing player of the entire playoffs. who was the heat's best player? rony seikaly? :roll:
[QUOTE]With a healthy Isiah, I might agree. With the Isiah Detroit had in the '91 playoffs, I'm not sure. The Cavs were extremely talented with great players like Daugherty, Price and Nance in addition to another excellent post scorer in Hot Rod Williams.[/QUOTE]
talented, but not the defending 2 time nba champion
[QUOTE]So Vlade Divac was now a top 4 center in '91? Robinson, Ewing, Hakeem and Daugherty have something to say about that. [/QUOTE]
daugherty wasn't better than divac. daugherty could barely break the .400 mark and did not participate in playoff action. meanwhile divac was the lakers third best player in the regular season and playoffs and averaged 18.2ppg, 8.8rpg, 2.0apg, 1.8spg, 2.4bpg, and 57%fg in the nba finals while daugherty was getting fat sitting on his couch watching.
[QUOTE]I liked Vlade, and Perkins for that matter, I doubt Sam was a top 5 PF too. Worthy wasn't a top 3 SF.[/QUOTE]
they both were, no need for doubts here you can trust me
[QUOTE]Pippen and Grant were clearly better in '92. It's not even close or debatable. Jordan's '91 season was very close to '90 and '92. The difference vs '90 was that Jordan had teammates who improved a lot, and he faced a Detroit team that was nowhere near as strong as '90. His level of play and skills were every bit as good in '90, and he had to do even more for that team.[/QUOTE]
grant was clearly better, the other two were better in 1991. jordan by a huge margin.
[QUOTE]Jordan's level of play in both the regular season and playoffs were comparable both years. Pippen had comparable playoff runs both years, but his regular season and overall skills and level of play were too much to make '91 even comparable.

And the '92 Bulls were clearly better than the '91 Bulls.[/QUOTE]
jordan's playoff was easily better in 1991. as for pippen, his play in the playoff's proved that he was better in 1991 also.
[QUOTE]they thought Rodman was a cancer, and he didn't get along with Robinson. But you can't ignore a 40-9 record with him compared to just 22-11 without him. And Dennis went on to win 3 more titles after Chicago had just lost to Orlando.[/QUOTE]
they won 59 games the next year after trading rodman for a bag of dirt :roll: robinson also went on to win 2 more titles :bowdown:
[QUOTE]Are you pretending that guys like Elliott, Rodman, Avery Johnson, Chuck Person and Del Negro, or Dale Ellis and Antoine Carr weren't quality players? Del Negro was the worst, but good for a role player.[/QUOTE]
robinson's main teammates were proven to be d-league talent without him

[QUOTE=Shep]with stockton and sikma they would've had a much more potent offense with alot more options which in turn would be harder to defend.[/QUOTE]

Except they'd still suck defensively. That's why they were a losing team. Stockton had just as many scorers in Utah, including a star player who was a perfect fit with him, and Utah was still a mediocre offensive team, and worse than Philly. They can thank Mark Eaton and the defense for their 47 wins.

[QUOTE]how far did those skills get his teams?[/QUOTE]

Funny you mention it, Charles won almost as many games(53) with less talent than he did in '86, and he got just as far in the playoffs(second round). While being a better player, who put up much better numbers.

So '86 Barkley has absolutely no case over '90 Barkley based on level of play, team success and numbers, pretty much everything anyone would use to rank a player.

And '91 Barkley was right on par with '90 Barkley. He won less games partially because he played less. And you've said that games played aren't a factor in ranking players. The '91 Sixers were 39-28 with Barkley, a 48 win pace. And they were clearly worse than his '90 team because he had the same team on paper entering the season, but he pretty much lost Johnny Dawkins for the year(played 4 games), and Mike Gminski declined(13.7 ppg, 8.5 rpg, 45.7 FG% in '90 vs 9.1 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 38.4 FG%).

So Barkley clearly had less help, yet they were 19-11 with Gminski, a 52 win pace, right on par with '90 or '86, despite no Dawkins and Gminski playing like trash.

But they got worse with the Gminski for Gilliam trade because Gilliam didn't fit on the team. So the '91 Sixers were much worse than '90 and Barkley missed 15 games explaining the drop in wins.

But he still got just as far in the playoffs as he did in '90 or '86, making the second round.

There's no case for his '86 season over '90 or '91.

[QUOTE]he would've said '94 was his best season so people would think he was at his best when mj wasn't there which was hardly the case at all considering all the season's i've mentioned that he was better than he was in '94..all of those season's playing alongside jordan.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol: Nice theory, except pretty much everyone said it, and the people who didn't chose '95 or '96 as his best....except you apparently.

[QUOTE]how many teams? i am certain he was the 48th best player in 1988.[/QUOTE]

I don't have top 50 rankings, but probably the '91 Bulls. The only year that I'm pretty sure Grant would make top 50 is '92. I'm unsure about '93.

After Hakeem and Thorpe, who could make top 50 on the '94 Rockets? And Horry played the best ball of his career in the '95 playoffs, but I'm not sure he was at a top 50 level.

I don't see a 3rd best player on the '99 Spurs who is top 50. Neither Avery Johnson or Sean Elliott seem good enough in that stage of their career.

I'm positive that the 3 Laker championship teams from '00-'02 didn't have a 3rd best player who was top 50.

I'm not sure the '03 Spurs did either. The '06 Heat didn't.

[QUOTE]how can the second best year of his career not be included in his prime?[/QUOTE]

Because it's not even remotely close to the second best year of his career.

[QUOTE]lol moses malone wasn't even top 4 in '82, i agree with him being the best player in the nba in '83 tho. and outside that tier you mentioned still above malone on the all time center's list is david robinson, george mikan, and patrick ewing. he is, however, ranked higher than charles barkley :oldlol:[/QUOTE] .

I'd give Moses best player in '82 because there doesn't seem to be anyone else. Kareem was a bit past his prime, though I'm not fully convinced Moses was better yet. Bird had some injuries that affected his play, I believe inthe season and playoffs and he wasn't really in his prime yet.

Dr. J didn't seem to have lost that much, but probably wasn't at his best anymore, and we saw that Moses was clearly better the next year when they played together.

It's tough having not seen an '82 Rockets game, I just have an idea of how Moses played from his other prime years, and have read a bit about his '82 season. I know he had a disappointing playoff series.

He seems to be the best by default.

[QUOTE]so according to you his prime was from 1993 until 1993? that is the only plausible explanation here.[/QUOTE]

His prime clearly started in '88 or '89 and ended after '93.

they were the number 2 and number 3 seed in the eastern conference playoff picture. obviously they did have a comparable team to detroit to only win 4 less games than the pistons over an 82 game season.

[QUOTE]:oldlol: that was easily michael jordan's mvp. infact it was closer bird and fourth most valuable player clyde drexler than it was between bird and jordan.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol: at Bird being closer to Drexler.

Bird definitely had a case over Jordan for MVP. He had a better team, but won 7 more games, and had Boston not rested their best players like Bird and McHale in the last couple of games, they probably win 59 games and keep the Bulls at 49 wins.

Bird was a better passer, and a more mature and unselfish player who was playing a style that seemed to fit better with talent and had a great impact on his teammates than Jordan.

He was getting 9 rpg, a less ball-dominant forward who averaged more assists than Jordan and still averaged 30 ppg with an unbelievable shooting season of 53/41/92. And I'm sure Bird could have scored more had he wanted to/had to.

Jordan was less polished in '88 and not nearly as smart or fundamentally sound defensively so the difference wasn't as great as it'd be later.

Both had a legitimate case for best player and MVP.

[QUOTE]yeh it usually proves who the better team is, and then its the players who step up the most is what determines how far a team gets in the playoffs.[/QUOTE]

Many teams, especially contenders don't go all out in the playoffs.

[QUOTE]the playoff's proved grant was better than coleman (40%fg, 5topg, destroyed in the first round)[/QUOTE]

You really love putting 3rd option types over stars, don't you?

[QUOTE]not as unbelievable as in other years, especially 1991[/QUOTE]

:roll:

[QUOTE]'91 pippen probably wouldn't have pouted and they probably make the conference finals and puts up alot healthier numbers than the 21.7ppg, 7.7rpg, 4.7apg, 2.0spg, 0.6bpg, 3.3topg, and 41%fg he put up in the knicks series.[/QUOTE]

The part about '91 Pippen not pouting is based on nothing. '91 Pippen wasn't the primary focus of opposing defenses and he never faced a defensive team anything like the '94 Knicks who arguably had the toughest defense ever.

The numbers you listed are fine. Shooting % is a bit low, but consider the opponent. He was one horrendous call from taking a 3-2 lead back to Chicago.

'91 Pippen would have to worry about making the playoffs with the '94 team, and he isn't getting out of the first round.

[QUOTE]the bulls turned the all-nba second team center into the most disappointing player of the entire playoffs. who was the heat's best player? rony seikaly? :roll:[/QUOTE]

Do you only judge teams by their best player? Miami also had Glen Rice. Who did the Knicks have around Ewing.

[QUOTE]talented, but not the defending 2 time nba champion[/QUOTE]

And Detroit wasn't at that level by '91 anymore. It was the end of an era, the Knicks knocked them out in the 1st round just the next season.

[QUOTE]daugherty wasn't better than divac. daugherty could barely break the .400 mark and did not participate in playoff action. meanwhile divac was the lakers third best player in the regular season and playoffs and averaged 18.2ppg, 8.8rpg, 2.0apg, 1.8spg, 2.4bpg, and 57%fg in the nba finals while daugherty was getting fat sitting on his couch watching.[/QUOTE]

:oldlol: at comparing team success between a player who was the 4th or 5th best player on his team to a star player.

[QUOTE]grant was clearly better, the other two were better in 1991. jordan by a huge margin.[/QUOTE]

There is really no way to argue that Pippen was better in '91 than '92. There's no way to argue that Pippen was better in '91 than any year from '92-'97.

And there was never a huge margin separating any of Jordan's 3 years from '90-'92, and not a huge difference separating any of his prime years from '89-'93 for that matter.

jordan's playoff was easily better in 1991. as for pippen, his play in the playoff's proved that he was better in 1991 also.

[QUOTE]they won 59 games the next year after trading rodman for a bag of dirt :roll: robinson also went on to win 2 more titles :bowdown: [/QUOTE]

Worse team than with Rodman, and they failed to make it back to the conference finals.

[QUOTE]robinson's main teammates were proven to be d-league talent without him[/QUOTE]

Wow, the D-League is better than I thought, I have to start watching it. Thanks!

[QUOTE]Except they'd still suck defensively. That's why they were a losing team. Stockton had just as many scorers in Utah, including a star player who was a perfect fit with him, and Utah was still a mediocre offensive team, and worse than Philly. They can thank Mark Eaton and the defense for their 47 wins.[/QUOTE]
utah had nowhere near as many scorers. stockton was a perfect fit for malone because he had the type of unselfish game that would suit playing alongside anyone offensive minded and would only made them a better player because of it. stockton attempted less than 10 field goals per game and scored almost 15 points, and shot at 57% from the field, best among point guards and fourth in the entire league. the jazz still remained one of the best defensive teams in the nba once eaton had been rendered useless a couple of years later.
[QUOTE]Funny you mention it, Charles won almost as many games(53) with less talent than he did in '86, and he got just as far in the playoffs(second round). While being a better player, who put up much better numbers.

So '86 Barkley has absolutely no case over '90 Barkley based on level of play, team success and numbers, pretty much everything anyone would use to rank a player.[/QUOTE]
1990 was barkley's third best year in the nba, and it was relatively close, but if you looked into it it becomes clear.
i will give you the barkley's regular season in 1990 over his in 1986, but only by the smallest of amounts. but then you have to look into what happened in the playoffs.
barkley in the 1986 playoffs:
team record: 6-5
playoff production: 25.0ppg, 15.8rpg, 5.6apg, 2.3spg, 1.3bpg, 58%fg

took the powerful 57 win milwaukee bucks to a 7th game on their home floor that went down to the wire (113-112), all without moses malone and his 24/12, who missed the entire playoffs.

barkley in the 1990 playoffs:
team record: 4-6 (barely scrape past the cavaliers (gets outscored by hersey hawkins for the series), destroyed in the second round).

the sixers required a huge series clinching game 5 against 7th seed cleveland from hersey hawkins who had 39 points meanwhile barkley finished with only 18 on 7/15 fg.

playoff production: 24.7ppg, 15.5rpg, 4.3apg, 0.8spg, 0.7bpg, 54%fg

in 1986 he stepped up the most out of anyone on his team, in 1990 hersey hawkins stepped up more, as did johnney dawkins.

with all this in mind it is and easy decision to make - 1986 barkley was clearly the better player than 1990 barkley.
[QUOTE]And '91 Barkley was right on par with '90 Barkley. He won less games partially because he played less. And you've said that games played aren't a factor in ranking players. The '91 Sixers were 39-28 with Barkley, a 48 win pace. And they were clearly worse than his '90 team because he had the same team on paper entering the season, but he pretty much lost Johnny Dawkins for the year(played 4 games), and Mike Gminski declined(13.7 ppg, 8.5 rpg, 45.7 FG% in '90 vs 9.1 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 38.4 FG%).

So Barkley clearly had less help, yet they were 19-11 with Gminski, a 52 win pace, right on par with '90 or '86, despite no Dawkins and Gminski playing like trash.

But they got worse with the Gminski for Gilliam trade because Gilliam didn't fit on the team. So the '91 Sixers were much worse than '90 and Barkley missed 15 games explaining the drop in wins.

But he still got just as far in the playoffs as he did in '90 or '86, making the second round.

There's no case for his '86 season over '90 or '91.[/QUOTE]
i don't use missed games, but i also don't use the record with them/without them due to the fact that he should be out on the court at all times for his team, so if the team does not so well without them then he will be also held accountable for this.

it is very close between barkley in 1990 and 1991. in 1990 he was better in the regular season, but in 1991 he was better in the playoffs. overall he was better in 1990 due to his very strong regular season. hersey hawkins also elevated his game huge in 1991 and was the third best shooting guard in the nba, only behind jordan and drexler. gilliam came in and provided some spark, and overall i'd say they had a slightly deeper team with the likes of mahorn, anderson, green, turner, and bol.
[QUOTE]Nice theory, except pretty much everyone said it, and the people who didn't chose '95 or '96 as his best....except you apparently.[/QUOTE]
:confusedshrug: don't care what everyone says :confusedshrug:
[QUOTE]I don't have top 50 rankings[/QUOTE]
well i'm not going to discuss this if you don't have a list to back up your statements.
[QUOTE]Because it's not even remotely close to the second best year of his career.[/QUOTE]
:hammerhead:
[QUOTE]I'd give Moses best player in '82 because there doesn't seem to be anyone else. Kareem was a bit past his prime, though I'm not fully convinced Moses was better yet. Bird had some injuries that affected his play, I believe inthe season and playoffs and he wasn't really in his prime yet.

Dr. J didn't seem to have lost that much, but probably wasn't at his best anymore, and we saw that Moses was clearly better the next year when they played together.

It's tough having not seen an '82 Rockets game, I just have an idea of how Moses played from his other prime years, and have read a bit about his '82 season. I know he had a disappointing playoff series.

He seems to be the best by default.[/QUOTE]
better players than moses malone in 1982 were magic johnson, kareem abdul-jabbar, larry bird, and julius erving.
[QUOTE]His prime clearly started in '88 or '89 and ended after '93.[/QUOTE]
but his peak 2 season's were 1993, then 1986
[QUOTE]at Bird being closer to Drexler.[/QUOTE]
:oldlol: at bird being close to jordan
[QUOTE]Bird definitely had a case over Jordan for MVP. He had a better team, but won 7 more games, and had Boston not rested their best players like Bird and McHale in the last couple of games, they probably win 59 games and keep the Bulls at 49 wins.

Bird was a better passer, and a more mature and unselfish player who was playing a style that seemed to fit better with talent and had a great impact on his teammates than Jordan.

He was getting 9 rpg, a less ball-dominant forward who averaged more assists than Jordan and still averaged 30 ppg with an unbelievable shooting season of 53/41/92. And I'm sure Bird could have scored more had he wanted to/had to.

Jordan was less polished in '88 and not nearly as smart or fundamentally sound defensively so the difference wasn't as great as it'd be later.

Both had a legitimate case for best player and MVP.[/QUOTE]
jordan had the bulls improved 10 games from the season prior with more or less the same roster, played all 82 games, and averaged 35.0ppg, 5.5rpg, 5.9apg, 3.2spg, 1.6bpg, on 54%fg and won 50 games. his second best player probably wasn't in the top 10 at his position. jordan was named defensive player of the year, and led the league in minutes played, field goals, free throws, steals, and points.
[QUOTE]Many teams, especially contenders don't go all out in the playoffs.[/QUOTE]
:wtf:
[QUOTE]You really love putting 3rd option types over stars, don't you?[/QUOTE]
just as much as you love putting losers over winners
[QUOTE]The part about '91 Pippen not pouting is based on nothing. '91 Pippen wasn't the primary focus of opposing defenses and he never faced a defensive team anything like the '94 Knicks who arguably had the toughest defense ever.

The numbers you listed are fine. Shooting % is a bit low, but consider the opponent. He was one horrendous call from taking a 3-2 lead back to Chicago.

'91 Pippen would have to worry about making the playoffs with the '94 team, and he isn't getting out of the first round.[/QUOTE]
'91 pippen would definately step up in the playoffs rather than step down and increase his level of productivity and do what the team needed him to do to be successful. '91 pippen was better than anyone in the '94 league not named hakeem and they more than likely make it back to the finals.
[QUOTE]Do you only judge teams by their best player? Miami also had Glen Rice. Who did the Knicks have around Ewing.[/QUOTE]
no, but i'd definately rather face a franchise playing in its first ever playoff series than a guy coming off a top 6 season. the knicks also had tough seasoned veteran's such as charles oakley, maurice cheeks, and gerald wilkins.
[QUOTE]And Detroit wasn't at that level by '91 anymore. It was the end of an era, the Knicks knocked them out in the 1st round just the next season.[/QUOTE]
the 1991 bulls officially ended that era
[QUOTE]at comparing team success between a player who was the 4th or 5th best player on his team to a star player.[/QUOTE]
divac was actually the third best player on the lakers in the regular season and the playoffs. daugherty could only dream about putting up those numbers in the playoffs..instead he didn't even make them :oldlol:
[QUOTE]There is really no way to argue that Pippen was better in '91 than '92. There's no way to argue that Pippen was better in '91 than any year from '92-'97.[/QUOTE]
i've already destroyed this about 10 times
[QUOTE]And there was never a huge margin separating any of Jordan's 3 years from '90-'92, and not a huge difference separating any of his prime years from '89-'93 for that matter.[/QUOTE]
see above
[QUOTE]Worse team than with Rodman, and they failed to make it back to the conference finals.[/QUOTE]
so the difference between rodman and perdue is 3 wins
[QUOTE]Wow, the D-League is better than I thought, I have to start watching it. Thanks![/QUOTE]
not really, it is filled with filth. but put any of those guys on a roster with prime robinson and he would make it work.

[QUOTE=Shep]utah had nowhere near as many scorers. stockton was a perfect fit for malone because he had the type of unselfish game that would suit playing alongside anyone offensive minded and would only made them a better player because of it. stockton attempted less than 10 field goals per game and scored almost 15 points, and shot at 57% from the field, best among point guards and fourth in the entire league. the jazz still remained one of the best defensive teams in the nba once eaton had been rendered useless a couple of years later.[/QUOTE]

Utah had 4-5 scorers outside of Stockton, one of them being a superstar and one of the league's top scorers, the other Thurl Bailey being a better scorer than any of Barkley's teammates.

And Utah's defense did decline significantly after Eaton declined, though they remained good, until '93.

[QUOTE]1990 was barkley's third best year in the nba, and it was relatively close, but if you looked into it it becomes clear.
i will give you the barkley's regular season in 1990 over his in 1986, but only by the smallest of amounts.[/QUOTE]

I don't see it as remotely close, but at least we're on the same page about which is the better regular season.

[QUOTE] but then you have to look into what happened in the playoffs.[/QUOTE]

The Cavs being a 7th seed is deceptive. Daugherty missed 41 games and Nance missed 20. With those 2 healthy, as they were in the playoffs in addition to Price, Williams and Ehlo, that's easily a 50+ win team, and more talented than the Sixers. Much more formidable than the '86 Bullets.

regarding game 5 vs the Cavs, Barkley also had 19 rebounds, and I've seen that game, he played well.

As far as the Milwaukee series, their best player Sidney Moncrief only played 3 games in the series, and Milwaukee won all 3 of the games that Moncrief played, so that also takes away from how impressive taking the Bucks to 7 was.

I have been critical of Barkley for not tying the series 2-2 with Pippen out for a game 4 in Phildelphia, particularly since Barkley didn't play that well in the series outside of game 1 and 3, and I thought the Bulls and Sixers had pretty comparable rosters to begin with. But I can't be too critical considering prime/peak Jordan was playing flawless basketball, as well as an individual can play.

[QUOTE]with all this in mind it is and easy decision to make - 1986 barkley was clearly the better player than 1990 barkley.[/QUOTE]

I don't see how 10-11 games would be enough to overcome the clearly superior regular season. I'm not denying that his '86 playoff run was better, I can't say for sure having seen more '90 games than '86 playoff games, but the numbers are very close, and that's with a faster pace in '86.

[QUOTE]i don't use missed games, but i also don't use the record with them/without them due to the fact that he should be out on the court at all times for his team, so if the team does not so well without them then he will be also held accountable for this.[/QUOTE]

This doesn't make sense to me because injuries happen, and you can't play through them all. I don't think Barkley is helping his team by playing when limited instead of letting the injury heal so he can be 100% in the playoffs.

Plus, seeing the team have twice as many losses as wins when he was out, and then a very respectable record with him shows how much of a positive impact Charles made on his team.

[QUOTE]it is very close between barkley in 1990 and 1991. in 1990 he was better in the regular season, but in 1991 he was better in the playoffs. overall he was better in 1990 due to his very strong regular season. hersey hawkins also elevated his game huge in 1991 and was the third best shooting guard in the nba, only behind jordan and drexler. gilliam came in and provided some spark, and overall i'd say they had a slightly deeper team with the likes of mahorn, anderson, green, turner, and bol.[/QUOTE]

I can agree with your reasoning, and probably would lean towards '90 over '91 as well. Also because he just impressed me more watching '90 Barkley games vs '91 games. But there's no doubt in my mind that his '91 team was worse.

[QUOTE]better players than moses malone in 1982 were magic johnson, kareem abdul-jabbar, larry bird, and julius erving.[/QUOTE]

Kareem and Bird do have a case, so I can't really argue with either, but Moses did seem to be the dominant player of the year.

Magic definitely wasn't as good as Moses yet, though. He had not added his outside shot or post game, 2 things which made him a really good half court player, but in '82, he still relied on transition opportunities, which is why he's below these other 4.

[QUOTE]but his peak 2 season's were 1993, then 1986[/QUOTE]

'93 has a case for being his best season, I think I could make a solid case for that. It's tough to separate his years from '89-'93, his level of play was remarkably consistent with the exception of '92. His 2 peak seasons are somewhere there. '88 isn't that far behind.

[QUOTE]jordan had the bulls improved 10 games from the season prior with more or less the same roster, played all 82 games, and averaged 35.0ppg, 5.5rpg, 5.9apg, 3.2spg, 1.6bpg, on 54%fg and won 50 games. his second best player probably wasn't in the top 10 at his position. jordan was named defensive player of the year, and led the league in minutes played, field goals, free throws, steals, and points.[/QUOTE]

Jordan had a tremendous season, but so did Bird.

Jordan was probably the more dominant and explosive scorer by that point, bur Bird averaged 30 points himself. And he did so on as amazing of a shooting season as you'll see. 53% from the field, 41% on 3s and 92% from the line.

Bird played better without the ball at that point, he was the better shooter from all areas, was crafty in the post and a more effective post player at that point and was scoring in a role where he had to fit in more with all of the other weapons on the team instead of being the team.

Bird was also the best rebounder at his position. He averaged 9 boards while playing with Robert Parish, who averaged 12.5 rpg the next season without Bird, and Kevin McHale, who was a solid rebounding power forward.

And Bird was not only the best passer at his position by far, but one of the best passers in the league. Outside of Magic, and maybe Stockton, who else could you say was a better passer. Bird averaged more assists as a forward with a less ball-dominant role than Jordan did as a guard.

It's close, I'm not arguing that Bird was better, just that it's close, because I'm not sure who I'd choose yet. But I can see a teamhaving a better chance to win a title with Bird than Jordan at that point in their careers.

Larry also won 57 games, and probably would have won 59 if Bird and other starters didn't rest/sit out on the last 2 games which meant nothing. And without his second best player Kevin McHale, Bird led the Celtics to a 10-3 record, and a 9-2 record excluding the games Bird played limited minutes in.

[QUOTE]'91 pippen would definately step up in the playoffs rather than step down and increase his level of productivity and do what the team needed him to do to be successful. '91 pippen was better than anyone in the '94 league not named hakeem and they more than likely make it back to the finals.[/QUOTE]

'94 Pippen was arguably the second best player in the league. I'm laughing at the thought of '91 Pippen as the primary focus of the legendary '94 Knicks defense. Not that he'd have probably gotten to the second round in the 1st place.

[QUOTE]no, but i'd definately rather face a franchise playing in its first ever playoff series than a guy coming off a top 6 season. the knicks also had tough seasoned veteran's such as charles oakley, maurice cheeks, and gerald wilkins.[/QUOTE]

Both were poor teams, no matter how good Ewing was. the Knicks were a 39-43 team and Miami were a 38-44 team, both teams were swept.

[QUOTE]the 1991 bulls officially ended that era[/QUOTE]

Yeah, and it helped that Isiah was injured throughout the year and Detroit had gone from 63 wins in '89 and 59 in '90 to just 50 in '91. And then a 48 win team that lost in the 1st round in '92.

[QUOTE]divac was actually the third best player on the lakers in the regular season and the playoffs. daugherty could only dream about putting up those numbers in the playoffs..instead he didn't even make them :oldlol:[/QUOTE]

:oldlol: Are you serious? Daugherty could only dream of putting up 13.3 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 1.1 apg, 2.2 TO, 2.2 bpg, 1.4 spg, 56.4 FG%? Vlade did that in 19 games, just the next season, Daugherty put up 21.5 ppg, 10.2 rpg, 3.4 apg, 2.2 TO, 1 bpg, 52.8 FG% absolutely destroying Vlade's numbers from '91.

[QUOTE]so the difference between rodman and perdue is 3 wins[/QUOTE]

Not at all. The Spurs were on a phenomenal 67 win pace with Rodman in '95 at 40-9, and just a 55 win pace without him at 22-11. They lost 2 more games in 16 fewer games. He made the all-nba 3rd team while playing just 49 games.

[QUOTE]not really, it is filled with filth. but put any of those guys on a roster with prime robinson and he would make it work.[/QUOTE]

When Robinson went down for the final 14 games of the '92 season, Elliott raised his game to 18 ppg on 49% shooting 20 ppg on 48% in the playoffs. Cummings and Carr raised their games as much in that or much more in Cummings case. Strickland kept up his solid play.

So it doesn't look like any of his best players on the '92 team, including Elliott, struggled to produce without him.

nothing to contribute, but this is a ridiculous back and forth

so fvcking intense here, holy sh*t

[QUOTE]Utah had 4-5 scorers outside of Stockton, one of them being a superstar and one of the league's top scorers, the other Thurl Bailey being a better scorer than any of Barkley's teammates.

And Utah's defense did decline significantly after Eaton declined, though they remained good, until '93.[/QUOTE]
4 out of 5 guys were averaging 15 points. any one of the 4 could step up and score 25 on any given night.

eaton was a non factor from 1990 onwards and they still won 55+ games
[QUOTE]I don't see it as remotely close, but at least we're on the same page about which is the better regular season.[/QUOTE]
only by the smallest of amounts tho
[QUOTE]The Cavs being a 7th seed is deceptive. Daugherty missed 41 games and Nance missed 20. With those 2 healthy, as they were in the playoffs in addition to Price, Williams and Ehlo, that's easily a 50+ win team, and more talented than the Sixers. Much more formidable than the '86 Bullets.[/QUOTE]
the main reason the cavaliers struggled so much during the regular season was because they traded away a top 2 shooting guard in ron harper for filth. daugherty and price were nice players, but this wasn't a powerful team by any stretch of the imagination, especially with the fact that they hadn't been together all year with people missing time due to injury.
daugherty and nance were average all season long, and nance played even worse in that series, dipping to 12 points and 5 rebounds per game. price was consistant, but even he wasn't top 5 at his position.

the bullets were one of the best defenses in the league and althought they might not have had the talent that cleveland did, what they did do was every player played out of their skins to take those sixers to 5 games.

manute bol went from 3.7ppg, 6.0rpg, 0.3apg, 0.4spg, 5.0bpg
to 4.6ppg, 7.6rpg, 0.2apg, 0.6spg, 5.8bpg

gus williams went from 13.5ppg, 2.2rpg, 5.9apg, 1.2spg, 0.2bpg
to 18.2ppg, 2.0rpg, 6.6apg, 2.2spg, 0.0bpg

cliff robinson went from 18.7ppg, 8.7rpg, 2.4apg, 1.3spg, 0.6bpg
to 21.4ppg, 8.6rpg, 3.4apg, 2.0spg, 0.6bpg

jeff malone went from 22.4ppg, 3.6rpg, 2.4apg, 0.9spg, 0.2bpg
to 22.0ppg, 3.2rpg, 3.4apg, 1.4spg, 0.6bpg

dan roundfield went from 11.6ppg, 8.1rpg, 2.1apg, 0.5spg, 0.6bpg
to 14.0ppg, 9.2rpg, 2.0apg, 0.4spg, 0.8bpg
[QUOTE]regarding game 5 vs the Cavs, Barkley also had 19 rebounds, and I've seen that game, he played well.[/QUOTE]
hawkins played better, and played more like a star player. 39/4/2/4 14/26 fg 4/6 3p 7/8 ft. barkley 7/15 fg 0/3 3p 4/7 ft.
[QUOTE]As far as the Milwaukee series, their best player Sidney Moncrief only played 3 games in the series, and Milwaukee won all 3 of the games that Moncrief played, so that also takes away from how impressive taking the Bucks to 7 was.[/QUOTE]
pressey and cummings were the bucks two best players and they were there for all 7 games.
[QUOTE]I don't see how 10-11 games would be enough to overcome the clearly superior regular season. I'm not denying that his '86 playoff run was better, I can't say for sure having seen more '90 games than '86 playoff games, but the numbers are very close, and that's with a faster pace in '86.[/QUOTE]
pace is already taken into consideration here. and 12 playoff games are enough to overcome a regular season in this case due to:
1. the regular season being almost inseparable, and
2. his 1986 playoff's being easily superior
[QUOTE]This doesn't make sense to me because injuries happen, and you can't play through them all. I don't think Barkley is helping his team by playing when limited instead of letting the injury heal so he can be 100% in the playoffs.[/QUOTE]
injuries happen, but players who miss more games than players who don't miss games are less valuable to their respective teams.
[QUOTE]Plus, seeing the team have twice as many losses as wins when he was out, and then a very respectable record with him shows how much of a positive impact Charles made on his team.[/QUOTE]
so he holds more responsibility for the losses
[QUOTE]Kareem and Bird do have a case, so I can't really argue with either, but Moses did seem to be the dominant player of the year.

Magic definitely wasn't as good as Moses yet, though. He had not added his outside shot or post game, 2 things which made him a really good half court player, but in '82, he still relied on transition opportunities, which is why he's below these other 4. [/QUOTE]
magic johnson led the lakers to second best record in the nba and championship, where he also won finals most valuable player. magic led the lakers to a 12-2 playoff record, and stepped up the most out of all players who participated in the playoffs averaging close to a triple double with 17.4ppg, 11.3rpg, 9.3apg, 2.9spg, on 53%fg and 83%ft after completing a regular season with averages of 18.6ppg, 9.6rpg, 9.5apg, 2.7spg on 54%fg and 76%ft.
[QUOTE]'93 has a case for being his best season, I think I could make a solid case for that. It's tough to separate his years from '89-'93, his level of play was remarkably consistent with the exception of '92. His 2 peak seasons are somewhere there. '88 isn't that far behind.[/QUOTE]
1993 was his peak by a huge margin. followed by 1995, 1986, 1994, 1990, 1991, 1997, 1987, 1988, and 1996.

[QUOTE]Jordan had a tremendous season, but so did Bird.

Jordan was probably the more dominant and explosive scorer by that point, bur Bird averaged 30 points himself. And he did so on as amazing of a shooting season as you'll see. 53% from the field, 41% on 3s and 92% from the line.

Bird played better without the ball at that point, he was the better shooter from all areas, was crafty in the post and a more effective post player at that point and was scoring in a role where he had to fit in more with all of the other weapons on the team instead of being the team.

Bird was also the best rebounder at his position. He averaged 9 boards while playing with Robert Parish, who averaged 12.5 rpg the next season without Bird, and Kevin McHale, who was a solid rebounding power forward.

And Bird was not only the best passer at his position by far, but one of the best passers in the league. Outside of Magic, and maybe Stockton, who else could you say was a better passer. Bird averaged more assists as a forward with a less ball-dominant role than Jordan did as a guard.

It's close, I'm not arguing that Bird was better, just that it's close, because I'm not sure who I'd choose yet. But I can see a teamhaving a better chance to win a title with Bird than Jordan at that point in their careers.

Larry also won 57 games, and probably would have won 59 if Bird and other starters didn't rest/sit out on the last 2 games which meant nothing. And without his second best player Kevin McHale, Bird led the Celtics to a 10-3 record, and a 9-2 record excluding the games Bird played limited minutes in.[/QUOTE]
larry bird was playing alongside 3 other hall of famers beside himself (including a top 2 power forward), where as jordan's next best teammate's consisted of a top 8 power forward, and dave corzine, yet the bulls still managed to only win 7 less games than the mighty celtics with a good enough record for third in the east. jordan also did not need to rest/sit out games.

jordan was the best offensive player in the league, and the best defensive player in the league. he led the bulls in points(almost tripling the second best scorers average), assists, minutes, steals, blocks, field goal percentage, and free throw percentage. there was no team that relied on 1 player more in the league..maybe even all time.
[QUOTE]'94 Pippen was arguably the second best player in the league. I'm laughing at the thought of '91 Pippen as the primary focus of the legendary '94 Knicks defense. Not that he'd have probably gotten to the second round in the 1st place.[/QUOTE]
pippen wasn't even top 4 in '94. 1991 pippen averaged 22.0ppg, 7.8rpg, 5.3apg, 3.0spg, 2.0bpg, 48%fg against the great defense of detroit in 1991. with the ball in his hands alot more i can see him easily scoring atleast 5 more points per game.
[QUOTE]Both were poor teams, no matter how good Ewing was. the Knicks were a 39-43 team and Miami were a 38-44 team, both teams were swept.[/QUOTE]
the knicks were a tougher matchup for the bulls
[QUOTE]Yeah, and it helped that Isiah was injured throughout the year and Detroit had gone from 63 wins in '89 and 59 in '90 to just 50 in '91. And then a 48 win team that lost in the 1st round in '92.[/QUOTE]
who cares what happened in 1992? we saw detroit win consecutive championships and then get swept out of the playoff's the next season by the chicago bulls with its 2 best players at their respective peaks.
[QUOTE]Are you serious? Daugherty could only dream of putting up 13.3 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 1.1 apg, 2.2 TO, 2.2 bpg, 1.4 spg, 56.4 FG%? Vlade did that in 19 games, just the next season, Daugherty put up 21.5 ppg, 10.2 rpg, 3.4 apg, 2.2 TO, 1 bpg, 52.8 FG% absolutely destroying Vlade's numbers from '91.[/QUOTE]
we were talking about divac's performance in the finals. saving the best for last and stepping up the most against the best competition, divac averaged 18.2ppg, 8.8rpg, 2.0apg, 1.8spg, and 2.4bpg, on 57%fg
[QUOTE]Not at all. The Spurs were on a phenomenal 67 win pace with Rodman in '95 at 40-9, and just a 55 win pace without him at 22-11. They lost 2 more games in 16 fewer games. He made the all-nba 3rd team while playing just 49 games.[/QUOTE]
lol@that all nba team selection. give me vin baker and larry johnson on my third team easily over rodman, not to mention countless others. the wins amounted to nothing and they'd rather have a bag of dirt rather than him, proving his real worth to that franchise.
[QUOTE]When Robinson went down for the final 14 games of the '92 season, Elliott raised his game to 18 ppg on 49% shooting 20 ppg on 48% in the playoffs. Cummings and Carr raised their games as much in that or much more in Cummings case. Strickland kept up his solid play.

So it doesn't look like any of his best players on the '92 team, including Elliott, struggled to produce without him.[/QUOTE]
5-9 over those games. give me a bigger sample size, like hmm..maybe 82 games in for example 1994 tho? how did elliott fare this time around.

[QUOTE=Shep]
you forgot the other 5 that were also better than barkley: john stockton, isiah thomas, fat lever, james worthy, and dominique wilkins.

[/QUOTE]

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The things I read on this board.....:hammerhead:

barkley needs to shut tha fuhk up:rolleyes: