2017-18 NBA Thread

[Socnorb11]

I was playing along with bottenfield who clearly seems to understand based on his recent responses.

Sorry, I guess I missed it.

[thrill]

If we don't want the Dubs-Jameses in the Finals, who do we want?

I want LeBron vs the toughest opponent possible because I like watching him take on history and his own legacy against steeper odds than anyone has ever come up against and still had a realistic chance to prevail. I love the nuance of the LeBron vs MJ debate because, fully contextualized, there is no right answer and anyone who thinks otherwise is a slave to their own bias. We can only speculate what MJ would have done against an opponent as strong as GS because he just never had to do it. Not even close. It's such a fun, futile debate to think about and I'm going to be really sad when LeBron isn't in the finals battling basketball ghosts and living legends at the same time.

I hated the Heatles as much as anyone, but it got to the point where my love for his basketball overcame my trappings of partisan fandom. That took a while, but he's too good to root against. It'd be like rooting against Mozart or Turner.

[33anda3rd]

If we don't want the Dubs-Jameses in the Finals, who do we want?

I want LeBron vs the toughest opponent possible because I like watching him take on history and his own legacy against steeper odds than anyone has ever come up against and still had a realistic chance to prevail. I love the nuance of the LeBron vs MJ debate because, fully contextualized, there is no right answer and anyone who thinks otherwise is a slave to their own bias. We can only speculate what MJ would have done against an opponent as strong as GS because he just never had to do it. Not even close. It's such a fun, futile debate to think about and I'm going to be really sad when LeBron isn't in the finals battling basketball ghosts and living legends at the same time.

I hated the Heatles as much as anyone, but it got to the point where my love for his basketball overcame my trappings of partisan fandom. That took a while, but he's too good to root against. It'd be like rooting against Mozart or Turner.

Well said, thrill. He is hard to root against. Whoever wins this finals, I will feel like I won for getting to see it.

--

Re the Jordan/LeBron debate. One of the biggest pro-Jordan arguments is that Jordan got held, hand-checked, pushed, pulled, stabbed, shot, run over by truck on every possession and the game is different now, not as physical, and LeBron is a big sissy who had to move to Miami to win a ring and who could never have hacked it in the Jordan era. But Jordan, physically, is between Kyrie Irving and Klay Thompson but put LeBron next to, say, KC Chiefs TE Travis Kelce, and LeBron would look a bit taller and a hair lighter. That's how big and strong LeBron is. Jordan is built like an average basketball guard, LeBron is built like an All-Pro TE. LeBron would have dominated in the more physical NBA of the 90s the same as he has now. The defensive stars of the 90s like Rodman (an inch shorter and 40lbs lighter than LeBron), Laimbeer (a few inches taller but lighter), Oakley (same height as LeBron, 25 lbs lighter), Pippen (James has 40 lbs on him) would likely not have manhandled the bigger, stronger Lebron. I can't see how Oak or Rodman even begin to keep James from the rim.

Now toss in illegal defense changes. In the Jordan era, they could send Luc Longley out to the 3P line and the opposing C had to be within arms reach of Longley. No one protecting the rim. Bulls overload the weak side, Jordan gets to play one-on-one with a defender. LeBron would have excelled at the same thing--after all, LeBron excels at getting to the rim now in an league where the C can play a Thibs-style of strong side overload D in which he ducks out of and into the lane every 2.9 seconds, so LeBron would probably mop up in a league where the C can't do that. LeBron in 1999 playing iso ball in a Conference Finals against that Pacers team that had a rivalry w/ the Knicks? LeBron is at least 15 lbs heavier than every player on that Pacers team. Iso ball? Against those guys? Come on.

The argument that LeBron would have wilted under the physicality Jordan endured, and that he couldn't have thrived in the NBA of the 90s I think, is selling LeBron's game, physicality, size and strength way short.

Now, how Jordan would have played in today's game is another story.....

[thrill]

Now, how Jordan would have played in today's game is another story.....

That's a fun part of the debate. Like you said, LeBron is essentially Michael Jordan's athleticism and skill in Karl Malone's body. He'd be fine getting hand checked. He would have zero issues.

If MJ played today, I bet he turns himself into one of the elite 3 point shooters in history. He'd be Harden on steroids. You front him close and he's going to burn you to the rim. You back off, he's going to drain a 3 in your face. He'd be unstoppable. I mean, he was, but still.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

Re the Jordan/LeBron debate. One of the biggest pro-Jordan arguments is that Jordan got held, hand-checked, pushed, pulled, stabbed, shot, run over by truck on every possession and the game is different now, not as physical, and LeBron is a big sissy who had to move to Miami to win a ring and who could never have hacked it in the Jordan era. But Jordan, physically, is between Kyrie Irving and Klay Thompson but put LeBron next to, say, KC Chiefs TE Travis Kelce, and LeBron would look a bit taller and a hair lighter. That's how big and strong LeBron is. Jordan is built like an average basketball guard, LeBron is built like an All-Pro TE. LeBron would have dominated in the more physical NBA of the 90s the same as he has now. The defensive stars of the 90s like Rodman (an inch shorter and 40lbs lighter than LeBron), Laimbeer (a few inches taller but lighter), Oakley (same height as LeBron, 25 lbs lighter), Pippen (James has 40 lbs on him) would likely not have manhandled the bigger, stronger Lebron. I can't see how Oak or Rodman even begin to keep James from the rim.

Now toss in illegal defense changes. In the Jordan era, they could send Luc Longley out to the 3P line and the opposing C had to be within arms reach of Longley. No one protecting the rim. Bulls overload the weak side, Jordan gets to play one-on-one with a defender. LeBron would have excelled at the same thing--after all, LeBron excels at getting to the rim now in an league where the C can play a Thibs-style of strong side overload D in which he ducks out of and into the lane every 2.9 seconds, so LeBron would probably mop up in a league where the C can't do that. LeBron in 1999 playing iso ball in a Conference Finals against that Pacers team that had a rivalry w/ the Knicks? LeBron is at least 15 lbs heavier than every player on that Pacers team. Iso ball? Against those guys? Come on.

The argument that LeBron would have wilted under the physicality Jordan endured, and that he couldn't have thrived in the NBA of the 90s I think, is selling LeBron's game, physicality, size and strength way short.

Now, how Jordan would have played in today's game is another story.....

On that note, this is a fun thread.

[33anda3rd]

Now, how Jordan would have played in today's game is another story.....

That's a fun part of the debate. Like you said, LeBron is essentially Michael Jordan's athleticism and skill in Karl Malone's body. He'd be fine getting hand checked. He would have zero issues.

If MJ played today, I bet he turns himself into one of the elite 3 point shooters in history. He'd be Harden on steroids. You front him close and he's going to burn you to the rim. You back off, he's going to drain a 3 in your face. He'd be unstoppable. I mean, he was, but still.

In the 3+ seasons that were between Retirements #1 and #2, Jordan was a .375 3P shooter. 42.7% in one of those years, which was some Klay stuff. In 6 seasons in Houston now, Harden has hit that mark (the .375 Jordan averaged for 3.25 years) in only one season. When Jordan's athleticism slowed (and it slowed quicker than LeBron's) he figured out a way to keep scoring by shooting 3s really well. He added that to his game and there's not much reason to think that if Jordan came out of UNC today, into a 3P league, he wouldn't make himself a good 3P shooter. He'd probably also, in today's league, play for a coach who had the analytics to make sure Jordan was shooting 3P shots from an optimal location, making him even better.

I like Interchange comparisons on this topic when we are crossing eras and especially when we are talking rings.
--Take 21 year old LeBron and put him on the 1984-85 Bulls in place of Jordan and build the same thing around him over the following decade-plus in the same NBA and do you get the six rings?
--Put 21 year old MJ right out of UNC onto the 2006 Cavs and follow the same career movement in the same NBA as LeBron and do you get the same thing--a LOT of Finals trips with more Finals losses than wins?

To me, you'd get about the same result. Young LeBron in CLE = Young MJ in Chicago. That injury year that was 2nd in his career, where MJ came back and tried to single-handedly beat Boston in round one with a supporting cast of Orlando Woolridge and Quentin Daly and the remains of The Iceman. They got swept. Young LeBron who singlehandedly pulled CLE to the Finals in 06 had Ilgauskas and Varejao and they got killed in the Finals. Both needed more, both were not champs as individuals--we are seeing that with Lebron now, having maybe the best post-season, individually, of his life but very likely to not get the ring. Both got help, and got some rings, but Jordan had stability in Pippen, and that's something LeBron never had--a HOF #2 who was with him the whole way through. To me, Pippen/Lack-Of-A-Pippen is more telling in the rings count between MJ/LeBron than the actual quality of MJ and LeBron, which are damn near equal.

[thrill]

The other aspect of the debate that is consistently lost is that MJ always gets the nod in the area of mental fortitude and competitiveness, and yet he's the one who literally walked away at his peak to go on a walkabout. LeBron grinds it out year after year with increasingly suspect rosters around him and he does it with dignity and respect. MJ would have threatened to kill Dan Gilbert and gotten coach after coach fired if he had to put up with it.

[33anda3rd]

The other aspect of the debate that is consistently lost is that MJ always gets the nod in the area of mental fortitude and competitiveness, and yet he's the one who literally walked away at his peak to go on a walkabout. LeBron grinds it out year after year with increasingly suspect rosters around him and he does it with dignity and respect. MJ would have threatened to kill Dan Gilbert and gotten coach after coach fired if he had to put up with it.

Consider LeBron James. He has been a national celebrity since age 16 and an international celebrity since about 19. He's a billionaire, when we add in the future of his Nike brand, his ownership stake in the BoSox/Liverpool FC group, etc. His name is known on every continent. He has been given all of the pitfalls of fame and money to fall into.

Now name a LeBron James scandal. There's no gun charge. There's not kids spread all over the country. There's not an ill-advised vanity project. There's not gambling debt (cough, Jordan, cough). There's no MAGA hat. There's no unsavory hangers-on limiting his potential and distracting him, his close team is Rich Paul and Mav Carter and Steve Stoute. About the worst we can come up with is that he was tone-deaf in leaving Cleveland. That's not bad for 17 years under the public microscope, all of them at an age when we're all making mistakes. He has handled himself like a dignified 80 year old with a lifetime of wisdom at ages at which it would have been understandable if he handled things like a spoiled 24 year old multi-millionaire.

[thrill]

Here are the LeBrontroversies that I can recall off the top of my head:
- Got his mom an H2 Hummer, himself a Wes Unseld throwback and some shoes from questionable sources when he was 17.
- Once did an embarrassing, tone deaf TV special to announce to the world that he got a better job in a better city with his best friend.
- Liked the posts of an instagram model who is not his wife.

[Jocephus]

oh, there's a maga hat incident. this could start wars