Hey folks - as a member of the DawgNation community, please remember to abide by simple rules of civil engagement with other members:
- Please no inappropriate usernames (remember that there may be youngsters in the room)
- Personal attacks on other community members are unacceptable, practice the good manners your mama taught you when engaging with fellow Dawg fans
- Use common sense and respect personal differences in the community: sexual and other inappropriate language or imagery, political rants and belittling the opinions of others will get your posts deleted and result in warnings and/ or banning from the forum
- 3/17/19 UPDATE -- We've updated the permissions for our "Football" and "Commit to the G" recruiting message boards. We aim to be the best free board out there and that has not changed. We do now ask that all of you good people register as a member of our forum in order to see the sugar that is falling from our skies, so to speak.
- Please no inappropriate usernames (remember that there may be youngsters in the room)
- Personal attacks on other community members are unacceptable, practice the good manners your mama taught you when engaging with fellow Dawg fans
- Use common sense and respect personal differences in the community: sexual and other inappropriate language or imagery, political rants and belittling the opinions of others will get your posts deleted and result in warnings and/ or banning from the forum
- 3/17/19 UPDATE -- We've updated the permissions for our "Football" and "Commit to the G" recruiting message boards. We aim to be the best free board out there and that has not changed. We do now ask that all of you good people register as a member of our forum in order to see the sugar that is falling from our skies, so to speak.
Comments
My Top 10 in order:
MJ
Kareem
LBJ
Magic
Oscar
Bird (I have a hard time with the big O and Bird, I go back and forth on them)
Wilt
Russell
Kobe - actually I have him at #9
Tim or Shaq or Hakeem or Zeke - I have a hard time with #10
picking by best roster is a different exercise haha I love NBA historical conversations
Couldn't have said it better myself! I will miss LeBron when he retires but that finals collapse against Dallas will always linger in my mind - JJ Barea looked like Hardaway in that series LOL.
Not trying to put on my wcdawg impression just responding in fun conversation.
I disagree with this argument- players play within the rules they are given. I think players today play basketball with your feet and play team defense. Bill lambert would be garbage in today’s NBA- He fouled people that’s not defense. But could you imagine if the Klaw could arm check someone??? He’d be a better defender than Scottie. Could you imagine if LBJ could arm check someone who could get around him? What about Rudy Gobert or Deandre Jordan? You can flip the agreement both ways and if in today’s game they could foul you and that’s just called defense then it would change the dynamic of the game so to me it’s tough to say well “curry” couldn’t play in the 90s he’d get beat up is too tough to argue. I think elite players would thrive most of the time in any era.
I think the resume of the players LBJ played against are incomplete- being a HOF isn’t just elite play it’s elite play + longevity.
If you look at the Vegas odds for every finals LBJ played in he won every series he was favored in except the Mavs. The series he lost he wasn’t favored in and the 15 and 16 finals against the Warriors pushed him to #3 for me.
Every team he played against has 2-4 HOFs in their primes/near primes except the Mavs (Kidd way past prime)
I know you are good with these conversations but other can jump in all crazy at times and I’m just trying to have a fun debate.
point totals are there- Rodman was never a scorer, he only averaged double digit points once in his career. Fine to disagree - i would only add that his work on the bulls is the time in his career that influenced him getting the HOF nod.
Top 10
No. 1 Michael Jordan
The rest, by position:
Guards: Oscar Robertson, Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant
Forwards: Lebron James, Larry Bird, Elgin Baylor
Centers: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell
I don’t have real quarrels with the list but I don’t see 8 players better than Kobe. To each is own, we agree to disagree.
True...imagine MJ if he was allowed to take 4-5 steps before a dunk and nobody was allowed to touch him. Dude would have averaged 50+ per game. In the 80's and 90's you still had to dribble the ball by the rules and defenses were much more physical. Today's game is painful to watch.
So I know you’re probably older than me. I never saw Wilt or Russell but Shaq and Dream played in the big man era. Wilt and Russell only had each other. Russell is the greatest champion for sure, Wilt was a giant among midgets.
In their primes I just don’t think they match up with a Shaq, Kareem, Hakeem. So I detract from them. If I’m being honest, Russell probably barely makes my top 20. Based on highlights, I see a Ben Wallace that played in 60s and 70s.
Yeah, that's fair, and the debate has certainly been had over the years. To me, Shaq was the most physically gifted center to ever play. But he never developed his game much. And I was a huge fan of Olajuwon, dating back to his Phi Slama Jama days. But he was undersized for a true center.
If we're playing a pickup game and choosing teams, I'll take Jabbar over Chamberlain, Chamberlain over Russell, and Russell over Shaq or Hakeem.
@SoFL_Dawg If I were trying to put together the best possible starting five, Hakeem might be in there with Kareem, while Russell rides the pine and Chamberlain conquers the women.
It’s still hard to fathom how our Bulldogs, without Dominique Wilkins, were able to defeat Jordan’s defending national championship team in the 1983 East Regionals. That UNC team was loaded with other stars, too, and Georgia was a blue-collar no name crew with tons of chemistry.
I was a UGA freshman then and had watched Herschel’s final season in Athens, then our run to Final Four. Unbelievable to think back on.
Here’s my favorite Michael Jordan memory! Saw it on a little black and white TV in Myers dorm. Still awesome even now!
Whew, I think Shaq developed a lot of game. In taking him first but I will acknowledge Kareem had the most unstoppable shot. Shaq would break Kareem though. Put him in the rim.
I would love to see that matchup. Kareem would pull Shaq out from under the basket and potentially get him into foul trouble. Kareem was also extremely strong, but Shaq was gifted supernatural size. That’s a fun historical matchup. I’d prefer Kareem on my team because he fully understood and bought into the team concept.
Shaq did as well as long as everyone told him he was the man, lol.
Shaq was the common denominator with a few bad break ups. Penny, Kobe, Wade...heck he even played with Nash and Lebron. Relationships all went south when the guard started getting equal or more praise. That said I’m still taking Shaq first as big man.