The first
thing I wanted to address was Jordan himself.
He almost seems hell bent on discrediting LeBron at every turn. From comments like this one, or his comment
that LeBron wouldn’t have been as successful in Jordan’s era, it just seems as
though he has a personal vendetta against The King. As I previously had written,
LeBron makes us question what we have always known; Michael Jordan is the
greatest player of all time. It seems
that even Jordan himself is questioning this, and the hyper-competitive guy
that he is, forces him to try and rip LeBron down. Anyone who watched is Hall of Fame speech knows Jordan is a
somewhat angry and vengeful person, who continued to rip his opponents in an
arrogant speech regularly given by others in a humble way.
As all of
this information kept trickling out, I could help but wonder, “What makes
Michael Jordan’s opinion matter?” I know
that sounds almost blasphemous to question the almighty Jordan, but just hear
me out on a couple of points. I just want
you to wonder where Jordan is coming from with his comments, and how is he
qualified to make them.
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| All smiles with Kwame Brown |
The biggest
thing to consider is that just because you played the game, it doesn’t make you
an expert on talent. Jordan is not the
best evaluator of talent the league has ever seen. Let’s be honest. If you need evidence, please see the 2001 NBA Draft in which
Jordan drafted Kwame Brown with the first overall selection. While hindsight is always 20/20, this one is
a glaring as there were two tremendously talented players (Tyson Chandler and
Pau Gasol) drafted directly after Brown.
Heck, Jason Richardson and Joe Johnson would have been better
selections! Kwame Brown was never was
going to be a star, as it was widely known that he simply did not care enough
to be. Jordan looked past all the
looming issues and drafted him anyway.
This was simply the first stumbling block in historically unimpressive
draft selections. It can definitely be argued that while he was
one of the greatest players to touch
a basketball, he was as inept as an owner and talent evaluator.
Jordan’s
competitiveness could be driving his hostility towards James, simply because
LeBron has achieved benchmarks Jordan never did. For example, in 2010, LeBron
became the first player since “Pistol” Pete Maravich to put up 40 points, 10
rebounds and 10 assists in a game. Just
recently, LeBron went on a historic run of 7 games scoring at least 30 points
while shooting 60% or better from the field.
For someone like Jordan, it is simply unfathomable to see someone
accomplish something he didn’t.
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| If rings matter, "Big Shot" Robert Horry has 7... |
Jordan also
made the comment that no matter how he looks at it, 5 rings are better than
1. I’m going to scream the next time I
hear someone talk about rings. Rings do
not define player greatness. Is Adam
Morrison a better player than Karl Malone, simply because he has 2 rings? Obviously not, except in Jordan’s world where
rings are the only thing that matters. I
have some news for His Airness, though.
He is nowhere near the top of the rings list. He’s tied with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bob
Cousy with 6. He trails Robert Horry,
who has seven. How about Bill Russell
with his 11, including 2 as a player-coach?
That doesn’t even list all the bit players from the Celtics teams of the
50’s and 60’s that racked up rings. The point is, rings don’t define you. It’s an easy, cop out argument used by people
who don’t want to really examine the facts.
We’re not talking about a 1-on-1 game here. We’re talking about basketball, one of the
best team games in the world.
What Jordan
doesn’t seem to comprehend is that LeBron James doesn’t comprehend “me
ball”. He plays “we ball”, the way the
game is supposed to be played. James has
the supreme talent to take over any game at any time. Players like Jordan and Kobe Bryant seem to
think that the only way to take over is to score alone and play hero ball. Highlight jumpers over a triple team may look
good on SportsCenter, but the smart basketball play is to find one of the open
players for an uncontested look.
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| The Lakers were Diesel's team |
This all
leads me to a quick dissection of the LeBron James versus Kobe Bryant argument
that Jordan initiated this past weekend.
As stated above, the rings argument is null and void. It’s weak.
The fact of the matter is Kobe Bryant was handed rings the moment he
walked on the court in LA. He was given
the most dominant big man of his era, Shaquille O’Neal. He was given, arguably, one of the greatest
coaches in history Phil Jackson. The
teams he was part of were stacked, and they likely left rings on the table
because of personal issues. Even during
the time he won two more, Jackson was back guiding him. They were gift-wrapped Pau Gasol, a multiple
time All-Star and considered one of the best big men in the game. He had Lamar Odom, who was the sixth man of
the year candidate every season. He also
had the steady hand of Derek Fisher along with the emerging big man, Andrew
Bynum. It was nearly impossible to fail!
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| One man can only do so much. |
Conversely,
let’s look at the teams LeBron was surrounded by in Cleveland. Coached by Mike Brown, who hasn’t done
anything of note in the league outside of getting fired from the Cavaliers and
the Lakers, there was no off court leadership.
If you look at the team LeBron single-handedly led to the Finals in
2007, you’ll see a team of back-ups and mid-level talent. He elevated the play of Drew Gooden, Larry
Hughes, Sasha Pavlovic, Eric Snow and Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Seriously, what he accomplished with this
team is far better than anything Kobe has ever done. Don’t believe me? Take some time to look at the Kobe-led
2004-05 Lakers. Jackson and O’Neal were gone. It was the Kobe Show and what happened? They were below average and missed the
playoffs. This was 8 seasons into his
career, after winning 3 titles. There is
no excuse for the drop off. It all boils
down to one thing; leadership. Kobe
Bryant is not a leader of men. He is
divisive, dismissive and self-absorbed.
He’s too busy pointing his finger elsewhere to recognize that he is a big
part of the problem. LeBron is the
ultimate teammate. He holds others
accountable, but will take the heat himself when needed. It’s a night and day comparison.
Kobe also
had the benefit of growing into a franchise player. He did not have to carry the Lakers franchise
until the trade of Shaq to Miami. It was
never Kobe’s team until the aforementioned 2004-05 season. He had Phil Jackson guiding him. LeBron was given Paul Silas and Mike Brown,
neither of which has a strong track record of player development. Cleveland was his franchise and it took them
to heights they never reached before.
Due to Cleveland’s management, and their inability to build a strong
team around him, he left. As I have
previously written,
there’s a ton of reasons he left but the crux of it had to be the obvious
inability to help him. He understands
something so few do; teams win titles, not individuals.
The general
consensus in the media is that LeBron James is the unquestioned, best player on
the planet. It’s hard to argue it, and
it has been this way for quite some time.
I find it interesting that despite the accolades and accomplishments of
Kobe Bryant, he was never considered that.
There may have been a season here or there where he was considered in
that realm, but never the way LeBron is.
He will go down as one of the all-time best, but never the greatest. I think that’s one of the subtle reasons
Jordan loves him; he doesn’t contest the throne no matter how many rings he
has.
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| Two of the greats battling. LeBron leads their series 13-6. |
The only
good thing about this argument is that we can quantify it with stats and
facts. LeBron and Kobe have played head
to head 19 times and because of their ages, the argument is valid. While Kobe is slightly older, they are still
close enough in age that their individual team battles matter for the
discussion. Without further ado, here’s
a quick snapshot of their head to head battles:
LeBron James
13 wins, 6
losses
40.8 Minutes
per game
46.1% Shooting
27.9 Points
per game
7.7 Rebounds
per game
7.3 Assists
per game
3.6
Turnovers
Kobe Bryant
6 wins, 13
losses
37.6 Minutes
per game
41.9%
Shooting
25.3 Points
per game
4.9 Rebounds
per game
4.9 Assists
per game
3.4
Turnovers
So Mr.
Jordan, let me get this straight. You
prefer a player who shoots worse, scores less, grabs fewer boards and dishes
out fewer assists while losing over a player better in every category except
turnovers (and really, it is a total of 5 turnovers in 19 games). The head to head match up matters in this
argument and the clear winner is LeBron James.
So what did
we learn? I think this weekend we
learned that Michael Jordan is not a good judge of talent, which we all kind of
knew given the state of the Charlotte Bobcats.
We learned that Jordan seemingly has something against LeBron
James. We learned that Jordan sees his
insane competitiveness and self-importance in Kobe Bryant. We’ve learned that Jordan thinks higher of
himself than anyone could possibly imagine.
What else
did we learn? We’ll listen to anything
we can when it pertains to Michael Jordan and LeBron James.
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