Would Kareem had won all those chips in place of MJ?

[guy]

The evidence is the evidence. We can speculate on what he would have done on the Clippers in his prime but that is a separate discussion. MJ's fans in this thread can't even acknowledge what the existing evidence shows.

For KAJ we have four pieces of evidence with bad teams.

*He joined a 29 win expansion team and got them to 56 wins and the WCF as a rookie. The Oscar shiny object is irrelevant since he wasn't there that year.
*Then he joined a 30 win LA team (more like a 20-25 win team based on roster losses to acquire KAJ) and got them to 40 wins. Not great but same as MJ.
*The 75' Bucks' win pace went from 14 to 44 with KAJ.
*The 78' Lakers' win pace went from 31 wins to 50 with KAJ.

LeBron joins a 17 win team. They win 35, 42, 50 his first three years. So that is +18 in one year and +33 by year three (Bulls were only +13, remember). Then the wins stop rising but the playoff results do. They make the finals in year four. They oddly thereafter tend to regress in playoffs results but improve in wins. 45 wins in 08' (50 win pace with LeBron, 0-7 without him), 66 and 61 in 09' and 10'.

If you want to say early Kareem was better then early Jordan, I don’t really care. Sh*t, if you want to say Kareem > Jordan in general, I don’t really care. Seems like there’s definitely an argument. I don’t agree with it, but I didn’t see enough of Kareem to really have that much interest in talking about it – I’m just pointing out the logic and arguments you have against Jordan and his impact are really dumb and I have a hard time believing that anyone that watched him play enough would instead defer to these stupid “groundbreaking” observations you have vs concluding that he’s one of the GOATs and clearly one of the most impactful players in history.

I’m not getting into the “with vs. without” argument with you. I’ve done it with you before and a its f*cking stupid argument. You say the “evidence is the evidence” but according to that “evidence”, Jordan was most impactful as a 38-39 year old on the Wizards than he ever was during his time with the Bulls. It’s a narrow, simple-minded argument that totally disregards other changes surrounding that team such as that the superstar players’ career don’t always evolve the same, the maturity, experience and motivations of players/coaches/FO aren’t the same in every situation (tanking for example) and/or from year to year, the norm for how teams have been built has differed throughout history, the rules have changed over time, etc. Sh*t, starting with Phil’s first year coaching up until Jordan retired in 93, the Bulls core was basically the same with minimal injuries and they went +6, +6, then -10 from year to year . There was basically no change in situation/roster, but there was that much of a big difference. Its not a great argument to use just from year to year, but you’re even trying to use that argument for eras that are 10-15 years apart? That’s f*cking stupid.

[guy]

It is relevant because only his fans make everything about a specific number of rings and a specific finals record.

No its not relevant regardless of what his fans do. If great teams falling off while newer teams take advantage of it is nothing new and happens in every single era, it makes absolutely no sense to only use that fact as some kind of argument against 1 player in the entire 70+ year history of the NBA.

Come on. You can say that about a lot of those types (Magic not in the Barkley, Malone category). If Kareem didn't exist Dr. J would have been the best at some point. If LeBron didn't exist Durant would be the player of the 2010's. The "Jordan" excuse is specious because it can apply to every era, which have 1-2 GOAT candidates.

Yes, you can say that about a lot of eras, which is why it’s a bad argument - you made it, not me. Its easy to point the flaw here. Similar to my point about teams, if every player is what they are except for one who is much better then he was, that doesn’t make the other players worse then what they were. If instead of being neck and neck with Bird, Magic was actually a much better player then he originally was, instead of winning 5 rings, 3 MVPs, and averaging 20/7/11 for his career, maybe he would’ve won 10 rings, 7 MVPs and averaging 24/9/14 for his career – and maybe Bird doesn’t win any rings or MVPs. That wouldn’t make Bird less of a player, only that Magic was clearly better then him and Bird never had a case for best player in the league.

Now again, I don’t know why you keep ignoring this, but for like the 4th time now, f*ck the rankings, you never watched Wilt, West, or Oscar play, all you’ve done is read their resume. That doesn’t mean you have any legitimate clue about them to quantify the difference between them and the 90s stars to label them as “great” competition while the 90s weren’t. You don’t see how stupid and getting ahead of yourself of an assumption that is?

[HoopsNY]

Well, I would say Toni Kukoc as a rookie was better then those guys as rookies but I don’t think anyone says he was the sole reason they were able to win as much as they did despite losing Jordan.

Which I keep telling him, but he just doesn't listen. And it's really rich that he accuses MJ "stans" of doing this, but he hinges the success of the Bulls in 1987-88 on the addition of a rookie coach, a rookie Pippen, and a rookie Grant, especially Jordan's first playoff series win.

The Bulls went from 67 wins to 57 wins between 1991-92 and 1992-93, I guess that must be MJ's fault too.

I thought we were solely focused on all-nba? You’re changing the argument when it fits you. My point is if you’re going to point to Pippen and Grant at a time when they weren’t even all-NBA players to say Jordan had enough, its contradictory to say Kareem only had help when he had all-nba players at his side, especially when we are talking about an era you probably didn’t watch.

I've noticed this with him and LeBron fans. What's good for LeBron or Kareem isn't good for MJ. So Kareem can play with Dandridge and Goodrich, and somehow those guys are inferior to Orlando Woolridge.

Kareem got that from Oscar/Magic basically his whole time playing with them. Jordan didn’t get that from Pippen the whole time. Bringing up rookie Pippen and comparing him to rookie Magic just is not an appropriate comparison.

Which is another caveat that he conveniently overlooks. At this point, you would think 1970-72 Oscar and Dandridge or Wilkes/Magic/Nixon in 1979-80 were inferior to Woolridge. I mean, how could MJ's win pace in 1985-86 ONLY be 41 wins (only +3 from the previous year). After all, he had 7 starts and for the remaining 15 games, had severe minutes restrictions where for the first 7 games, he played between 13-19 minutes, finishing 1-6.

For some reason, that's a knock on Jordan, not an excuse!!! Yet for Kareem and co, the premise of "all-nba" teammates is suddenly dropped, probably because Rick Barry upset a 60+ win team with no all-nba teammates in 1975, and the Phoenix Suns had NO all-nba selections, yet made it to the finals somehow in 1976.