tridentboy3

He may be the better overall offensive basketball player but he isn't a better overall player than any of Shaq, Wilt, Bill, Robinson, Hakeem, Ewing, Kareem. Defense is a major factor here. The question is whether Jokic superior offense makes up for his lack of defense and against some guys it does (he's better than Ewing) and against some it doesn't.

Center is the most stacked position ever. Jokic, despite being legitimately an amazing player, is at this point probably just about cracking the top 10 somewhere in like 8-10.

I mean, the top 5 in no particular order are Shaq, Wilt, Bill, Hakeem, and Kareem. Jokic is not yet close to that level. Then you have Ewing, Robinson, Moses Malone, Willis Reed, Bill Walton, Dwight, Alonzo Mourning. So that's like 12 guys.

Jokic in my opinion is better than Dwight, Mourning, Ewing. He's not yet better than Robinson or Malone but he does have a very strong shot of passing them. He's around the level of Reed and Walton (though has them beat already in terms of longevity) That puts him at around number 8 all time for me.

He isn't yet. KG and Dirk were playing at an elite level for longer than Giannis has even been in the league at this point. He scores more than KG but KG was a significantly better defensive player than Giannis ever was and the scoring gap isn't really that far between either KG/Dirk and Giannis when you account for pace. Further, KG and Dirk happened to play in the same era as Tim Duncan who would have also reduced the amount of 1st team All NBA's that Giannis has.

Years in the league are important when discussing all time ranking. Giannis peaked higher than Dirk ever did but him and KG had similar peaks and KG did it for far longer so far. We can't assume Giannis is going to have x more elite years that he hasn't actually had yet. Giannis will, very likely, surpass both KG and Dirk (there's a very very strong argument that he has already passed Dirk) and has an outside shot at TD but he hasn't yet.

Lastly, everyone knew KG was the best player on the 2008 Celtics. Pierce may have won FMVP but Garnett is the primary reason they were the champions that year.

Giannis is a fantastic player and he currently looks like he's going to go down as the 2nd greatest PF of all time with a very very outside shot (the second half of his career would have to go significantly better than the first) of taking the number 1 PF crown from Duncan.

It's actually a pretty good point regarding Curry. Like any pantheon player, Curry would be amazing in any era. The thing is though it's unclear how well his body would hold up. Curry isn't particularly strong and has dealt with tons of injuries. Back in the 80's, it was a legit "accepted" basketball play to absolutely body smaller guys like Curry if you couldn't defend them otherwise. Fragrant fouls only started being a thing in 1990/1991 so if they were going to foul Curry it would always be a very very hard foul same as they did to MJ. MJ's body of course was capable of taking the beating since he was an athletic freak and ironman but it's unclear if Stephs would.

Further, his off ball movement also wouldn't be as good given that the rules for impeding movement of off ball players were only strengthened after 2004. Obviously there were great off ball players in the 80's and 90's (particularly Reggie Miller) but it was much much harder especially given Currys size.

Curry would still be great, of course, but likely not as great relative to that era as he is in this one.

Yes, they absolutely are. This doesn't make him worse at all since what he's doing is still unprecedented and he's already proved enough to make him the second greatest player ever but the stats he's been accumulating recently aren't the reason for that.

Lebron in the 4 year span from the age of 35-38 was putting up better stats than he was in Miami at his absolute peak. I doubt any sane person believes that that version of Lakers Lebron was anywhere close to Miami Lebron who was the most complete player the league had ever seen. It's just that the game developed, completely out of luck on his part, in the exact way that completely suits the playstyle he has always been best at. Lebron, at his core, is a drive and kick player who performs best surrounded by shooters. The league moved in this direction due to the 3-point revolution started by Curry and Lebron's numbers have held up longer than previously thought possible due to that fact. This version of Lebron wouldn't be averaging nearly as much as he is if you put him in the 2000's or early 2010's (but he'd still be the best player at his age ever). Lebron's size is also a major factor. The late 2010's were filled with smaller players and there weren't really many true big men playing. This further helped Lebron play on the inside more and more. He was never particularly effective against true C's and PF's even when he was at his peak.

This applies to everyone though. Stats and efficiency today are really elevated due to the crazy spacing that the league currently has. Put the great scorers of the 2000's in this era and the added pace and better spacing would see them averaging insane numbers just like Lebron has been able to despite his age. Kobe, T-Mac, Iverson, and Wade would be even more impossible to guard if you couldn't effectively hedge towards them for fear of the kick-out pass to a shooter.

They could lose. Them teaming up likely forces other superstars to team up, as well. They'd be the best duo in the league but there could be better 3 superstar pairings.

I'm gonna go against the grain here and i'm not a Lebron fan but this wasn't really particularly good defense. Lebron was very clear going to go past him after that spin and he lost the ball on his own.