How is it even questionable that MJ is GOAT?

Why is this even a thread?

the rest of you are idiots for even entertaining OP's question.

[QUOTE]How is it even questionable that MJ is GOAT?[/QUOTE]

-By only being a little above 50% as successful in terms of titles as another GOAT candidate.
-By being less individually dominant than at least another GOAT candidate. It's funny how in almost any team sport, the player who is the most individually dominant ever is widely considered the GOAT, even without dominating the team titles, yet, in basketball, some like to pretend he's not even top-5.
-By not having as dominant an overall basketball career as at least another GOAT candidate.
-By not creating by his presence or absence the most impressive team turnarounds in history, like taking a mediocre team and making them an instant 50+ win threat or like leaving a team and this team not collapsing anywhere near as badly as projected by lots.
-By consuming fans and media so much that a lot of them considered him the GOAT after 8-9 years, which, in order to be true, would require him to achieve things more than twice as fast as Kareem, who played for 20. This bias doesn't ruin his valid GOAT arguments, but it does mean that we'll have to take their judgment with a grain of salt.

Really, if you study the careers of all GOATs, and you apply the same sympathy or antipathy or neutrality on the career cases of each one (e.g, if the achievements of someone like Wilt have to be brought down, just because of his physical advantage, so will the achievements of any other GOAT candidate who belongs to the same "physically advantageous" category, including Jordan), how is it even questionable that someone else may also be the GOAT?

[QUOTE=Psileas]-By only being a little above 50% as successful in terms of titles as another GOAT candidate.
-By being less individually dominant than at least another GOAT candidate. It's funny how in almost any team sport, the player who is the most individually dominant ever is widely considered the GOAT, even without dominating the team titles, yet, in basketball, some like to pretend he's not even top-5.
-By not having as dominant an overall basketball career as at least another GOAT candidate.
-By not creating by his presence or absence the most impressive team turnarounds in history, like taking a mediocre team and making them an instant 50+ win threat or like leaving a team and this team not collapsing anywhere near as badly as projected by lots.
-By consuming fans and media so much that a lot of them considered him the GOAT after 8-9 years, which, in order to be true, would require him to achieve things more than twice as fast as Kareem, who played for 20. This bias doesn't ruin his valid GOAT arguments, but it does mean that we'll have to take their judgment with a grain of salt.

Really, if you study the careers of all GOATs, and you apply the same sympathy or antipathy or neutrality on the career cases of each one (e.g, if the achievements of someone like Wilt have to be brought down, just because of his physical advantage, so will the achievements of any other GOAT candidate who belongs to the same "physically advantageous" category, including Jordan), how is it even questionable that someone else may also be the GOAT?[/QUOTE]
Well said.

[QUOTE=Psileas]-By only being a little above 50% as successful in terms of titles as another GOAT candidate.
[B]-By being less individually dominant than at least another GOAT candidate. It's funny how in almost any team sport, the player who is the most individually dominant ever is widely considered the GOAT, even without dominating the team titles, yet, in basketball, some like to pretend he's not even top-5.[/B]
-By not having as dominant an overall basketball career as at least another GOAT candidate.
-By not creating by his presence or absence the most impressive team turnarounds in history, like taking a mediocre team and making them an instant 50+ win threat or like leaving a team and this team not collapsing anywhere near as badly as projected by lots.
-By consuming fans and media so much that a lot of them considered him the GOAT after 8-9 years, which, in order to be true, would require him to achieve things more than twice as fast as Kareem, who played for 20. This bias doesn't ruin his valid GOAT arguments, but it does mean that we'll have to take their judgment with a grain of salt.

Really, if you study the careers of all GOATs, and you apply the same sympathy or antipathy or neutrality on the career cases of each one (e.g, if the achievements of someone like Wilt have to be brought down, just because of his physical advantage, so will the achievements of any other GOAT candidate who belongs to the same "physically advantageous" category, including Jordan), how is it even questionable that someone else may also be the GOAT?[/QUOTE]

Who? Wilt? The guy who has a 22 ppg PO scoring average? Jordan shits on Wilt in the playoffs and in the finals. That stat padding choker is not even in the conversation. :oldlol:

because there are a lot of idiots that didnt see jordan play and like to revise history.

[QUOTE=poido123]Kareem/Russell/Wilt have cases.

The rest don't.

Do we need to beat this dead horse?[/QUOTE]
:applause:

he's the GOAT perimeter player and it's not even up for debate.

No matter who anyone thinks is GOAT, it's always questionable. There's decent cases for at least 4-5 players depending on the criteria.

Individual dominance/Stats? Wilt
Rings as the man? Russell
Combo of stats/skill/championships/ individual accolades? MJ
Collegiate/NBA titles/ stats/ longevity/ accolades? Kareem.

[QUOTE=bdreason]Because Kareem has a better resume?

Because Russell has twice the rings?

Because Wilt owns almost every record in the record books?

There are plenty of reasons why MJ isn't the undisputed GOAT... and I was raised on Michael Jordan.[/QUOTE]

Yeah this is pretty much exactly where I stand as well. Gun to my head I probably vote Jordan but its idiotic to suggest no one is even in the conversation. Kareem very well might have been the best player in the world from his Jr year at UCLA until 80-81. His PER rankings are >>> MJs and he won the BUCKS a freaking NBA title. And C always have a more significant impact defensively than wings. And his longevity... Well he is the all-time leading scorer.

Kind of embarrassing we are 5 pages in and no one has really bothered to make the case against MJ.

The biggest argument out there against MJ is the statistical calculation of impact on impact on score. RAPM is Ridge Adjusted Plus Minus. It attempts to remove who you are playing, who are you on the court with and your personal impact on score. Its a per possession calculation so sometimes you end up with outliers but MJ simply did not dominate this stat the way you would expect him to. In fact, his best season was ~+5.3. LeBron and TD have both had seasons > 10.0.

The last argument is the age he achieved his legacy. The Heat and Hornets had just joined the league and it was decidedly a little more watered down than in previous generations. It wasn't that there wasn't significant talent on other teams, its that the depth of that talent was pretty mediocre. Who was MJ's biggest rival? The Knicks? Who was the second best player on the Knicks? Because John Starks was BAGGING GROCERIES for a living in 1989.

As far as MJ vs today's players, the differences in defense rules are enormous. In his best scoring season there were 36 players that scored 20+ ppg. In 2013 there were 9. Defenses are significantly better now at denying first options. And while Iso ball was the most efficient play in basketball in Jordan's age it is the worst basketball possible now. The league avg for ISO plays is ~.54 ppp. That loses to league avg basketball by ~50 points/100 possessions. Even the most efficent ISO player is well below league avg. So anyone that says MJ could win titles playing like he did in his peak is flat out wrong. Now I think he could adjust but that is far from a certainty.

I believe Jordan is the GOAT, but I believe the questioning is also legitimate.

Jordan had 4 solid losing seasons, whereas a guy like Duncan who's played A LOT longer has never had a season under 60% wins. Duncan has 5 championships and counting and was a better defender than Jordan. Duncan has far less holes in his resume, but didn't have the length of peak that Jordan did (although you could argue that his peak was just as good...in other words, you didn't see Jordan ever getting close to a quadruple-double in a championship-sealing Finals game). Jordan also shot pretty bad percentages from the field. I mean, we give all this praise to Kawhi for shutting down Lebron this year in the Finals, but for comparison-sake Jordan NEVER had a finals where he shot as good as Lebron did THIS YEAR. He also had fairly weak Finals competition overall (in other words, these were teams that couldn't win championships...Jazz, Sonics, Blazers, Suns.) Duncan ousted the defending '04 Champion Pistons and B2B Champion Heat for comparison. For conference competition, it was fairly similar. Jordan finally got past the Isaiah Pistons, whereas Duncan finally got past the Shaq/Kobe Lakers (granted he did it before their dynasty and after). I really wish Jordan wouldn't have retired the second time so we could have seen him go up against Duncan. I also wish Jordan had the sustained greatness that Duncan did late in his career to keep his team in the playoffs, so we could have seen how he faired when he wasn't in his absolute prime, but he never could do that.

I do consider MJ the GOAT, but come on. I'm comparing him to the guy I have at #5 who has a lot on him, so I don't think it's without question that he is the absolute GOAT...he had his resume flaws, mainly longevity and the inability to carry teams who weren't really good without him.

[IMG]http://www.movpins.com/big/MV5BNDI1NzAzNDU4N15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwOTkzNTA2OQ/still-of-kareem-abdul-jabbar-in-airplane!-(1980)-large-picture.jpg[/IMG]

airplane> looney coons

Jordan detractors like to go on and on, and anyone can type longwinded essays about why ANY of the top 10 players of all time aren't as great as they're supposed to be. That is because basketball and a sport and thus subjective, unlike mathematics.

However, Jordan has the best combination of offensive excellence, mixed with defensive excellence mixed with gaudy numbers, mixed with winning, mixed with accolades from both a team and individual perspective.

No one else who's a candidate has all of that. No matter how many longwinded essays about he's overrated, and it's all because of Nike/Gatorade, etc. that brainwashed everyone, you can't change that.

And even if you don't think he's GOAT, you just can't argue that what I mentioned doesn't at least make him a CANDIDATE. And if he's a candidate, wtf are you mad that he's considered GOAT?

:pimp:

[QUOTE=Soundwave]The 2000 Lakers are probably the most stacked team of the modern era ... young Shaq, young Kobe, Glenn Rice, Robert Horry. Before that would be the 80s Lakers/Celtics.

Bulls are on par with the recent Heat for talent, maybe a little less. They had less pure talent, but more heart/hustle.[/QUOTE]
By what metric are you basing this?

[QUOTE=Knoe Itawl]
And even if you don't think he's GOAT, you just can't argue that what I mentioned doesn't at least make him a CANDIDATE. And if he's a candidate, wtf are you mad that he's considered GOAT?

:pimp:[/QUOTE]
I think you missed the entire premise. No one questions Mj's case or legitimacy of it. It's the absolute certainty it's presented with.......