It’s ironic to see redditors bash these rankings while ignoring the very relevant context like this. Lol.

Just as ironic as complaining about recency bias while the majority opinion on Jokic swings so wildly for one bad series.

This should be the top comment of the thread. I don’t watch or listen to Bill, but it’s clear that nobody here does either; we’re just taking a single quote from him and saying he’s an idiot. This context is super important to the conversation.

I mean, it’s still just kind of dumb to rank players based on projected careers rather than what they’ve already done… Did Bill really assume Jokic would finish with multiple more championships? Or suddenly become a great defender? Because that’s what he’d have to do to realistically be placed above Hakeem or Shaq. It just seems totally backwards to rank current players based on what we think they’ll do, and then adjust when they don’t do those things, as opposed to ranking them in real time…

basketball is especially bad about this. its bad on both ends to an extreme level. recency bias and nostalgia are cancers to basketball discussion.

So why was Moses Malone a lower tier than Shaq or Hakeem according to Bill Simmons but not Jokic?

He also had 3x MVP and 1x FMVP, the exact same accolades Jokic has, why was Jokic previously ranked higher than Shaq and Hakeem and Malone ranked lower?

As someone who rooted against Lakers Shaq (I was a Magic fan as a kid and irrationally mad when he left), it’s hard to overstate how scary and dominant he was.

Every series he’d just rag doll centers to the point you’d just accept you needed 18 fouls worth of big guys to hack him. I remember Mutombo on the Sixers and Shaq just putting him in the basket no problem. He was a force of nature.

The Sixers paid Matt Geiger about double the league average salary in 2001 to play 53 minutes in the finals and foul Shaq 20 times, and he had an honest-to-god good series.

Good teams were expected to employ 3 guys over 6’10” at a minimum, partially because of the different style of play, and partially because if they met the Lakers in the playoffs they needed bodies to throw into the Shaq meat grinder.

It cannot be overstated how much Shaq changed the game.

The league unbanned zone defense because of how unstoppable Shaq was one-on-one LOL.

He was so strong the league had to change the rims because he was tearing down backboards. That’s why there’s breakaway rims today.

Entire rosters were carrying big guys whose entire purpose was to beat up and foul Shaq because you knew you needed every foul against him.

Yeah in 2001 alone:

WCSF against the Kings he averaged an efficient 35/9/4.

WCF against the prime Duncan Spurs he averaged an efficient 33/7/7.

All with great defense.

People who say this shit do not look at matchups or understand coaching strategies whatsoever

yea Kobe and shaq were 2 batmans there was no Robin

Doesn’t win big games when those people can’t make a bucket

How many shots did he take in the last 6 minutes of all these games vs the wolves?

And yet these same idiots will talk shit about Stephen A Smith while parading these dogshit takes

Its also funny to say he relied more on his teammates to score when Jokic hasnt played with nearly as many talented teammates as Shaq and Hakeem. Has he ever even played w someone else who was an all star outside of Jamal Murray this year??

He can’t defend AND he’s ugly!

And they’ve still both been in 2 and 5 finals more than Nikola Jokic.

Hakeem’s back to back is better than Jokic’s last five years combined. He made the Finals really early in his career too.

For sure winning championships is important but it got overboard with the “6>5>4” stuff. There’s nuances like Kobe averaged 15 ppg for one of his rings, nuggets played two 8 seeds and a 7 seed when they won, Warriors in 2015 beat a team missing two of their three best players not all rings are equal and it’s a team effort

The luck usually plays out long before the playoffs:

It’s Ralph Sampson’s lower body crumbling, or Jamal losing 2 years to a wet spot and having to rebuild his game through injuries after.

It’s Moses with like 5 of the biggest sliding doors in NBA history.

It’s MJ getting a generational run by his front office, and the mockery of a soft salary cap that was the second three peat.

It’s LeBron finding the good and bad of rolling the dice for superstar teammates.

It’s Larry Bird and a shovel full of gravel and Magic contracting AIDS. Len Bias and a line of cocaine.

It’s Sam Bowie’s stress fractures, TMac having the wrong birthday to get a custom pair of shoes. It’s Karl Malone’s MCL. It’s Greg Oden and Yao missing from the generation they should have dominated.

That’s where the luck swings like a wrecking ball.

Shaq watches Wolves games holding a finger over Gobert so he doesn’t have to see him play. Jokic got blocked in the paint? Nah he just missed into an invisible hand.

Can’t trust his takes on other centers. I think he sees them as threats to his legacy so he tries to tear them down

And Gobert has been the Jokic stopper these past few playoffs

That’s wild…I also thought that when they played together, but that was before Shaq moved to LA and became SHAQ

Nidy Gobic will 100% hurt you though

Jokic defense + Gobert offense is basically your average power 5 starting center who ends up bouncing around the G League for a while or starting somewhere in Europe.

It’s not like either of them are completely hopeless on either end, they’re just bad by NBA standards in a couple key ways.

That’s just fat Jobert when they mess up the finger touch during the fusion dance

Way better than Wemby and any other center that has ever existed.

I feel like Hakeem is the only All time great center who you can reliably say would’ve added a 3 point shot to his game. Hakeem was quick, kept himself in phenomenal shape,had that wiry strong build like Rudy so he’s not going to get bullied by even someone like David Robinson, could pass out of the double, defend on the perimeter,etc.

All the other all time great centers you can point can point to some singular deficiency in their game. Shaq couldn’t make free throws and didn’t take care of his body that well, Russell is challenged offensively,Wilt you can question his motor to win instead of focusing on stats, and the only who comes close is Kareem, but I don’t see him as someone would’ve thrived on perimeter game of today outside of maybe early in his career.

Hakeem literally got it all. The only knock against him is that his peak was short and he failed in the post season multiple times outside of his back to back chips.

Hakeem is my choice of big if I’m picking an all time starting 5.

KG, LeBron, Jordan, and Kobe to round it out. I would pick that lineup to beat any other. Elite offense, defense, and hustle. No weaknesses whatsoever to be exploited.

Definitely true of 1995. Adding Drexler at the deadline was big. And Hakeem was in pure “fuck you”.

1994 was a bit more iffy. That team lacked scoring depth.

He outplayed Shaq but Shaq still put up great numbers. Shaq averaged 28/12/6 on 60.6% TS.

He absolutely punked Ewing in 1994. Ewing averaged ¹⁹⁄₁₂ on 39% TS.

They were writing articles saying Jokic was some sort of genius defender because he kicked the ball lol

Those two guys also saved the NBA.

Bill has been falling off his horse more often it seems lol

No, like his entire take resetting based on whatever the newest thing to happen was, with instant amnesia for everything else that had happened before.

In a way, yes. But the fact that Jokic was in a position where one bad series causes him to move this much speaks to how reactionary the initial position already was

That’s not how historical lists work

Shaq also had a first ballot hall of famer as a teammate

And neither is a defensive cone

The whole Kobe GOAT argument has always been mind-numbingly stupid. How could Kobe possibly be the GOAT when he’s a worse version of a player that came before him? I just do not see how that makes any sense all to anyone.