Which Players Have Gotten the Most Overrated Since Retirement

[DatAsh]

Bird coukd not put the ball on the floor and score off the dribble. Thats the difference.

Jordan couldn't make the kinds of passes that Bird routinely made to get his teammates clear looks at the basket.

[elementally morale]

No, Those numbers are real head to head for every game they played against each other. Now your talking about just the 95 finals, where Hakeems numbers were better.

I was talking about the 95 Finals, so may be right about the rest. I honestly don't know and I almost never make my judgement based on stats. You can argue prime Hakeem and prime Shaq either way. Peak Shaq was better than peak Hakeem but peak Shaq was better than anybody since 1980.

[elementally morale]

Jordan couldn't make the kinds of passes that Bird routinely made to get his teammates clear looks at the basket.

Magic was even more insane. He seems to have been running close to full-speed 80% of the time... yoiu think he is going to lose the bell... what the hell is this cat doing... and then, all of a sudden the ball is passed to a guy you didn't even see was on the court.

[ZeN]

Jordan, Moses, Oscar.

Baylor is the most under.

Naw Jerry West is the ultimate underrated player.

[wakencdukest]

I was talking about the 95 Finals, so may be right about the rest. I honestly don't know and I almost never make my judgement based on stats. You can argue prime Hakeem and prime Shaq either way. Peak Shaq was better than peak Hakeem but peak Shaq was better than anybody since 1980.

I don't either, I judge players from what I see when they played. I won't even comment on players before 1978 or so, because I don't think seeing limited footage and looking up their stats qualifies me to make that judgement. But sometimes to make a point with some of these stat guys you have to. That's what cracks me up about some of the younger guys here that have such strong opinions about players from before their time.

[97 bulls]

Jordan couldn't make the kinds of passes that Bird routinely made to get his teammates clear looks at the basket.

OK. But he was at worst a solid passer. Bird could not break a guy off the dribble.

This is what makes Jordan the best ever. He may not have been great at everything, but he was solid to great at every aspect of basketball.

[DonDadda59]

1. one bad play in a million? ill still take pippen

That's as egregious an offense as there is in sports. A supposed 'leader' quitting on his team, in crunch time, in the playoffs because he was pouting about the coach not drawing up a play for him? That's completely unforgivable. Pippen was a perfect complementary player but as Steve Kerr said: "I don't know what got into Pippen. He is such a great teammate and maybe the pressure was getting to him and he just could not take it anymore"

Not everyone is built for moments like that.

2. pippen was a top dog with jordan. pippen led a JORDANLESS bulls to 55 wins and almost a finals appearance. jordan wasnt even REPLACED.. if they had a suitable REPLACEMENT pippen wouldve won a chip,

The Bulls added Toni Kukoc and Steve Kerr, two guys who were key to their second Jordan-led threepeat. The next season they were barely hovering over .500 when Jordan came back after nearly 2 years off and dragged them into the playoffs. Then when he had a full offseason to get back into game shape all he did was lead the Bulls to the best record ever and a second threepeat.

So basically in Jordan's absence, Pippen had one great year and one terrible year where the Bulls were saved from missing the playoffs only by a rusty Jordan coming back to close out the last 17 games (Bulls went 13-4 with his return). Now look at the '98 season where Pippen missed the first 35 games due to a back injury- Bulls went 24-11, Jordan won MVP, won finals MVP.

pippen was 12 minutes away from a chip with the blazers until kobe/shaq took over. .. he was also the top dog /playmaker on that Blazers squad.

And if he was a clutch player, he wouldn't have been a spectator and let that lead slip away. How many times in the playoffs did the Bulls lose a huge lead in an important game like that with Jordan leading them?

jordan never sniffed a championship without pippen (didnt make playoffs on wizards either).. pippen came close twice.

Pippen joined up with Hakeem and Barkley the season after Jordan carried him to yet another championship. He was the third option and accomplished nothing. He then went to the Blazers and as you pointed out, stood idly by while real superstars and leaders did what was necessary to win the championship.

After that major chokejob, the Blazers fizzled out and accomplished nothing. Not that Pippen was even the man on those teams, that was very clearly Mr. Rasheed Wallace.

Now why would you expect a 38-40 year old Jordan with Jahidi White as his starting center to make the playoffs with that abysmal Wizards lineup? Give a 33 year old MJ Barkley and Hakeem and you're talking about another championship. He damn sure wouldn't have been a third option on a first round exit team or a 3rd-4th option on those Blazers squads.

Hell Dwyane Wade would've have as well, and Pippen is supposedly better than that guy? Let's not even bring Lebron into this

[DatAsh]

Magic was even more insane. He seems to have been running close to full-speed 80% of the time... yoiu think he is going to lose the bell... what the hell is this cat doing... and then, all of a sudden the ball is passed to a guy you didn't even see was on the court.

Magic was incredible; best offensive player ever - and by a decent margin - in my opinion.

look at the offensive ratings of his teams over the years

[CODE]
1980 - 1st
1981 - 7th --- Magic misses 45 games
1982 - 2nd
1983 - 1st
1984 - 5th --- Magic misses 15 games
1985 - 1st
1986 - 1st
1987 - 1st
1988 - 2nd
1989 - 1st
1990 - 1st
1991 - 5th
1992 - 13th --- Magic retired
[/CODE]

He did have a lot of help, but his impact on that side of the ball is undeniable.

[elementally morale]

I don't either, I judge players from what I see when they played. I won't even comment on players before 1978 or so, because I don't think seeing limited footage and looking up their stats qualifies me to make that judgement. But sometimes to make a point with some of these stat guys you have to. That's what cracks me up about some of the younger guys here that have such strong opinions about players from before their time.

When we are young we have strong opinions on everything.

[Carbine]

Jordan was a better defensive player (though he is nowhere near the best perimeter defender of all time, but he is good). Bird was a better offensive player though. He (Bird) was more efficient, not only with his shot but with his allaround offensive numbers. And he was a much better passer and playmaker.

I know it's unheard of if someone says he saw better (as in: more efficient, more effective) offensive players than Jordan, but I saw at least two: peak Bird and peak Shaq. Neither of these players I really like btw, so by no means I want to prop either of them. It's just the 'truth', at least in my perception.

It doesn't matter if Bird had a better outside shot, the only thing that matters is impact. Jordan dominated with what he had, he didn't need to be prolific from outside.

I'm not fully understanding the more efficient thing either. Peak Bird for efficient is at 60.8 total shooting percentage and .555 eFG% scoring 28 points per game.

Peak Jordan for efficient is at 61.4 total shooting percentage and .546 eFG% doing 32.5 points.

So Jordan was just as efficient for all intents and purposes and scored 4.5 more points per game doing so.

I'm confused?

[DatAsh]

OK. But he was at worst a solid passer. Bird could not break a guy off the dribble.

I get that, but you just listed one thing Jordan does better than Bird and said "That's the difference" as if that somehow made him a better offensive player on its own merit. My point was that you could just as easily do the exact same thing for Bird, albeit with a different arbitrarily chosen skill.

There's far too many differences between the two players to try and determine the better overall offensive player based on one skill alone . No matter the skill you choose, your being unfair to one player or the other.

This is what makes Jordan the best ever. He may not have been great at everything, but he was solid to great at every aspect of basketball.

In terms of having the weakest weaknesses, Jordan would get my vote as the most complete player ever, so I don't disagree with you there.

[DonDadda59]

The point is: Jordan could have easily had much better opponents than he did have. Had he had much better opponents, he would not have 6 rings. He would have 2 or 3. Maybe just 1. He would not be any worse a player, but he sure wouldn't be labelled the GOAT by society with 1 ring alone. Not even with 2 or 3 rings.

To make a long story short: Circumstances.

Jordan played in an era that had the most skilled and outright dominant big men of any era... and he was the best player of his generation... as a perimeter player who never had a dominant big to play with. Just look at how the league looked when he retired the first time.

94- Hakeem won MVP, David Robinson won the scoring title, Hakeem vs Ewing in the finals.

95- Robinson won MVP, Shaq won the scoring title, Hakeem vs Shaq in the finals.

This was in a time where the league wasn't geared towards perimeter stars, it was very clearly a big man's league and Jordan absolutely dominated all of them. It took him leaving for 2 seasons for them to accomplish anything.

You can point to any team/player as you and your accomplice fallaciously did here and say 'oh, yeah he/they were great but it would've been different if players from different eras somehow magically transported to their era'.

But the truth is, that's impossible and the facts remain the same.

[DatAsh]

I'm not fully understanding the more efficient thing either. Peak Bird for efficient is at 60.8 total shooting percentage and .555 eFG% scoring 28 points per game.

Peak Jordan for efficient is at 61.4 total shooting percentage and .546 eFG% doing 32.5 points.

So Jordan was just as efficient for all intents and purposes and scored 4.5 more points per game doing so.

I'm confused?

I think he was referring to all around offensive efficiency. Jordan was the more efficient scorer, but Bird was one of the best passers to ever play the game.

[Micku]

Jordan is a depth at every facet of baseketball offesively. Bird was definately better at some parts of offense. But there wasnt anything Jordan coukdnt do. Bird coukd not put the ball on the floor and score off the dribble. Thats the difference.

He could, just not as efficient, and it was a bit awkward.

He did score more with post ups or catch and shoot. But there were a few times where he did score off the dribble or he walked the ball up the court.

And to NumberSix, Jordan was equal or better than D.Wade at the midrange game in his early years. Probably not the 08-09 Wade or current Wade.

To the OP:

Hmm...Well, a lot of guys pump up Jordan a little bit too much, so he is a bit overrated in some aspects. But ppl were calling him GOAT and pumping him up since the late 80s.

My guess would be John Stockton. He didn't seem to be considered better than Penny, Payton or Tim Hardaway when he played. But I think if you ask anybody now, they would take Stockton. I don't know if he was just that underrated or guys overrate him when he retired.

[elementally morale]

To several posters: I have no problem with anyone claiming Jordan was the best player ever. I'm a bit at odds when I see some young people claiming nobody else was even near him ever, and I'm almost sure said poster started watching the game 3 years ago and even prime Shaq is history to him.