NBA - Main

It's not that they're dumb. The highest virtue to these players is the ability to create buckets one-on-one. All those years growing up, so much of their identity was tied into being better than the guy in front of them. so they see a guy like kyrie who could do anything with a ball, as the apex of that standard.

They weren't coming up thinking what makes for winning basketball. They were so good that the only thing that was needed for winning basketball was them - how many games did they win because they were singularly better than the best 5 players on the other team combined? So even at the highest levels you have world-class basketball players that still think Kyrie's bag is more important to winning than Luka's.

At any level below the NBA, that might be true. But at the highest level, Luka is obviously more of a problem to an opposing defense than Kyrie.

For reasons that elude me, Kyrie is one of those players’ players who others vouch for no matter what.

Kenyon is racist so why is anyone surprised by this lol

Being the best one-on-one player doesn’t make you the best player. I’m fine if they wanna argue that Kyrie is the best player on the team but that’s a poor reason.

This is so stupid

Not the real basketball people take

Players tend to judge other players differently, thank his they don’t vote on certain awards

Kmart is a fucking tool

I think Luka is incredibly overrated and this is still an absolutely braindead take (to be fair I think the same of Kyrie)

Isn’t Kenyon Martin a known racist? Including his whole thing with Jeremy Lin? Not saying he is right or wrong about kyrie but he definitely has a bias

ooo racism

I have a feeling he doesn't even consider Luka a real hooper for some odd sneaking suspicion

People say dumb shit to get attention and we fall for it every time

An example of how ex-athletes don’t always know the game. It’s usually the guys who only see it as a, “who’s tougher to guard 1 on 1”, and even then, Luka is 6’8 with an elite post game and an incredible tough shot maker with great touch, pace and a handle that’s more practical than flashy, so it’s purpose is to work. That’s just his scoring game. He’s always a top 3 passer and playmaker in the league. Anyway, again, even considering this isolation heavy line of thinking as harshly as they do, Luka is still better. If you gave kyrie the ball Luka wouldn’t touch it again? And kyrie would if the roles reversed?

Gilbert Arenas runs a podcast with the sole purpose of disproving the "NBA players know what they're talking about".

People real down grade Kyrie talent I don’t think he said anything wrong. Watching NBA since the 80’s Kyrie is something different

people call this idiotic but they need to understand that they’re approaching the question as if they have to individually guard either player (they’re ex-nba players after all), and Kyrie is going to be the one that is most difficult to guard.

Like they likely think a player that passes more is easier to guard — for them individually. But as a spectator you’re not thinking about it like that. Kyrie is gonna be the one that no wants to deal with because he’s looking to cross them up at high speed over and over

KJ get yo daddy

I could actually understand the take that kyrie is better in 1v1s than luka but clearly luka is the better player