Iverson.

Len Bias obviously

Yeah, Gretzky and Tebow are never even getting approached

NHL fans replace GOAT talk with conspiracy theories about whoever’s winning. Take the ref favoritism complaints about OKC and ramp it up 2-3 times

Yeah, I remember Iguodala putting Kyrie in his top 20

Don’t think this is true. What other players “get overrated” because of one on one skills?

No one. This is used only for Kobe.

They hold Kobe in high regard because of a variety of things, and they talk about his BBIQ, play knowledge, ability to take over a game individually, as well as other aspects relating to games within the game.

Kobe’s career filled with paradoxes on this sub:

• They doubled Shaq so Kobe had no coverage. Only Kobe’s entire shot chart was in the paint during his early years and the three peat, and front the post or doubling Shaq still allows you to contest a driving guard at the rim. Also, only bigs that could have any impact helping on Shaq were never mobile enough to venture to the perimeter to defend Kobe anyway. 1-2 punch of Big-Wing works because there’s no real defensive overlap on the outside.

• Kobe is a ball hog and took all the shots. But he played in the triangle and had like 60% of his shots assisted. He was an off ball, two dribble pull up on cutting action player for much of his career, and mixed in some iso face up / back to the post plays to keep defenses in the penalty, get some Kobe assists, watch. If he was a ball hog, he went to 7 finals and won 5 championships with relatively weak teams. Would those not then be fully attributed to him since he’s hogging the ball the entire time? I.e. he’s the carry? He also averaged 5-6 apg for his career.

Got bored with this comment hitting send.

Kobe had more than 1 on 1 skills, which fans discredit. Kobe did everything. Fans love to discredit his actual resume as well when it comes to teams he played against and beat.

“Yeah but basketball reference says he’s not” - this sub

yeah, i thought my phrasing was awkward/redundant but idk just saying “players” to me seemed misleading. Shaq isn’t currently a professional basketball player, he’s a shitty sports personality. 

I feel like you’re both right. He was already (imo) a little overrated when he was alive, then when he died his fans dug their heels in harder.

Anyone who says kobe gets boosted after dying never watched bball til. 2016. Such a blatant lie lmaooo

If anything its a post-mortem bump down, which is insane.

Yeah in 2010, which was peak Kobe mania, his name was always tossed around next to Mike and Bron’s. It was recency bias at the time though

The “post mortem bump” thing is just a new way for haters to hate.

Let’s not forget that at the time that Kobe retired, Kobe was considered best of his era across everyone but the haters. And let’s not forget that by the time Kobe won ring 5, people were comparing his greatness with Magic and Bird. That should give context on discussion of where his greatness tier is. It’s not reflective of the Reddit haterade.

Yea that’s a bs talking point and when I see it I know its coming from someone who wasnt there

Kobe became polarized. A lot of people are either saying he’s top 3 (like Shaq here) or going to lengths to downplay him.

The tiers are

MJ/Bron
Kareem/Russell/Wilt
Magic/Bird
Duncan/Shaq/Kobe/Hakeem/Curry/Oscar

The order in the tiers can be debated, but these are pretty consistently the tiers if you look through all of the big all-time lists.

Malone isn’t giving up the crown for now.

He’s down there with Karl Malone, best Lakers duo 🤣

I think to counter his college resume is basically non existent in this debate which is unfortunate because he was the goat college player and he played in an era where the best players in the world had to go to college because of league rules. A kind of interesting thing that also never gets talked about when talking cumulative stats is that if you match the age of his rookie year (22) to LeBrons and compare totals from that point on, Kareem is 2000 points ahead of LeBron. The same also goes for Karl Malone. Kareem would have only had to average 16 ppg ages 19-21 to still have the scoring record….

Funny how it’s held against Cap that he only won 1 ring before Magic but there’s no issue with Jordan winning 0 rings before Pippen

Ok now how many championships did Magic win without Kareem?

How many championships did Jordan win before Pippen?

Yeah for sure, I wasn’t alive but most of the articles and interviews from back then paint a picture that people thought Kareem was overrated til he won again. People see sky hook and scoring record and assume he was unquestionably the best in the league.

It’s all recency bias In 50 years another generation will have the players whose careers they the grew up with ranked higher . It’s just the way it works

Two thirds of the USA weren’t alive to see Babe Ruth or Muhammad Ali either, that doesn’t exclude them from the GOAT convos in their sport.

Also, nice to know the rest of us outside of the US have no say in the basketball GOAT convo.

Thank you for saying this as a Celtics fan. its one of the coolest feats to win that much, so is Wilt’s 100 point game. Both of these things will never happen again so its neat, but it doesn’t make them the greatest.

Heck, he peaked at 6th in pts/36…on his own team. Dude was straight up a non-scorer. His offensive/defensive winshares are as lopsided as Steve Nash for good reason. He certainly was capable of scoring, but for the most part he just put all of his focus on defense and let his 8 HoF teammates handle the offense. He was easily the best player on the Celtics dynasty and deserved those MVPs, but in terms of play style his closest modern comp is Draymond Green (but way better because he was bigger, more athletic, smarter, better leader, better attitude, better person, etc). People tend to knock the no-defense guys down a few pegs on the all-time ranks, so it’s certainly weird that we don’t knock the no-offense guys down a bit.

Its disingenuous to ignore the historical conditions he lived under, the medical disadvantages, and social climate. They still lynched blacks in the 60s. Russel did more for the NBA than Kobe and Bron. Jordan grew the game globally but Russell set the foundations.

He had more rebounds in a quarter than some of the best rebounders had per game

UCLA went 82-2 in his 3 seasons there, including a 71-game win streak. He’s not just a top 3 NBA player, he’s the GOAT high school-college player. The only other candidate is Walton, but Kareem still beats him.

Kareem’s reputational surge over the last decade has had a lot to do with the MJ vs. LeBron debate heating up, more specifically with LeBron fans boosting Kareem’s status as a proxy for LeBron’s due to their similar longevities

Simmons had Kareem at #3 15 years ago, he’s hardly a LeBron stan.

Ironically, Wilt arguably suffered the most legacy damage from the LeBron Jordan debate. He was widely considered the GOAT until Jordan took the mantle, and now his legacy gets shit on by Jordan fans pushing the rings

everything argument.

You could also argue that the recent focus on rings is one of the contributing factors that boosted Kareem above players like Wilt and Bird, as he’s tied for the most of any star since Russell.

fact is Kareem’s ranking has become oddly entangled with LeBron’s.

There’s no “fact” presented here, just conjecture.

I definitely think LeBron opened the door to allow GOAT to be an actual conversation rather then an assumption. Once people were willing to accept someone other then Mike, they realized how good KAJ actually was.

MVPs aren’t a legitimate argument, the only reason Bron doesn’t have 6 is voter fatigue.

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Wilt blocked the sky hook. 

He’s also the greatest highschool player ever w something Like 100 games won in a row. As far as basketball he’s undeniably the best. But best NBA career is debatable

I feel like I experience many more Jordan/Kobe stans who have LeBron outside of the top 3. I’ve seen some unreasonable LeBron stans, but absolutely none of them are crazy enough to leave Jordan out of the top 3.

So I guess my comment is aimed more at the Kobe stans than anyone, but they are quite numerous in my experience.

Lol man was still being picked in the all defense accolades when he was older and bad. LeBron and MJ are both upgraded versions of Kobe’s defense

The voices