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OT: LeBron

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i gotta admit... i've spent the last 2.5 years making the exact argument i (and many others) are making right now and i do it far far far too much... i argue about Lebron about twice a week like this with clients/friends/family/etc.

i'm generally laughed out of a room and told 'he's the worst, he's a , yada yada'. i don't know if i'm just lucky today to find some Lebron fans or people are finally starting to get it, but this has been a refreshing change.
 
JaYnYcE said:
There is no way to qualify a statement like that if you're team is less than 48 minutes from the Finals, I'm sorry.
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Huh? What if LeBron had 48 points with 30 seconds left and the Heat were up 20? I mean, I personally wouldn't want LeBron to hit 50, but who cares if a Celtics fan does. The game's out of hand; who cares about stats.
 
If/When Lebron finally wins a championship by playing huge in the 4th quarter of a game 7 and hits a game winner, he will still somehow be criticized.

I feel bad for high-profile athletes living in this generation. Social media lets any genius speak their without consequences, whether they make a relevant/intelligent point or not. And the media just feeds into it even more.
 
nomar said:
Huh? What if LeBron had 48 points with 30 seconds left and the Heat were up 20? I mean, I personally wouldn't want LeBron to hit 50, but who cares if a Celtics fan does. The game's out of hand; who cares about stats.
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Hold the ball and take the violation. Thats what teams usually do anyway if they're up by 10-15 with 30 seconds left.
 
JaYnYcE said:
Hold the ball and take the violation. Thats what teams usually do anyway if they're up by 10-15 with 30 seconds left.
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Who gives a . 48 or 50, shoot or dribble the clock out, he CLOCKED OUT the celts. You are just being a blowhard at this point.
 
JaYnYcE said:
Hold the ball and take the violation. Thats what teams usually do anyway if they're up by 10-15 with 30 seconds left.
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You're being deliberately obtuse. Say there's 2 minutes left and the Heat are up 40. I refuse to believe you don't understand the point.
 
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BigErnMcCracken said:
No. It's a perfectly valid comparison. Your posts are just silly on this subject.
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If its perfectly valid then why can't you tell me how old Harrison Barnes is and how old Lebron James is?
 
I actually pity the LeBron haters. They are missing one of the greatest players of all-time in his prime.
 
nomar said:
You're being deliberately obtuse. Say there's 2 minutes left and the Heat are up 40. I refuse to believe you don't understand the point.
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He shouldn't be in the game if the game is in hand, he could get injured (Say hi to Derek Rose) and it shows poor sportsmanship. At least with Bulls Philly could have made a comeback but it's a risk keeping your best player (2011 MVP by the way) in the game that late. Why is the MVP in the game when you're winning by 40 with 2 minutes left?
 
JaYnYcE said:
He shouldn't be in the game if the game is in hand, he could get injured (Say hi to Derek Rose) and it shows poor sportsmanship. At least with Bulls Philly could have made a comeback but it's a risk keeping your best player (2011 MVP by the way) in the game that late. Why is the MVP in the game when you're winning by 40 with 2 minutes left?
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OK, now you're just ducking with me, right?
 
I don't think its necessary to have the MVP in the game when you're up by 40 at any point in the game. If you disagree then hey, May the road rise up to meet you. May the wind always be at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face, and rains fall soft upon your fields. And until we meet again, May God hold you in the palm of His hand.
 
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21Huskies said:
thats what the media has brainwashed you to believe your whole life. obviously its great to win and it makes a resume look better.

but, its a lazy and illogical way of looking at individual talent. if somehow the Heat lost the game last night, by your measures, it's held against him.

just as a point of reference... he put up a postseason in '09 that had game logs of the following (all the while shooting 51% and avg 9 reb and 7 assists): 38,29,25,36,34,27,47,27,49,35,41,44,37,25 ... they didn't win the title (obviously), you're blaming him? somehow thats a knock on him?

winning is a team accomplishment regardless of what the 'experts' tell you.
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How can you seriously contest that winning championships is one of the valid criterion on which to judge the greatness of a basketball player? Illogical and lazy? By his own admission, that's the reason that Lebron is in Miami. Did the media brainwash him into thinking that championships mattered in terms of his legacy as the greatest ever?

Basketball is a team sport. Being a great basketball player includes being a great teammate and finding a way to make your team win, no matter what you have to do to accomplish it. It also involves judgment. That is part of the individual talent of a basketball player, and imo it has to be considered when you are discussing a team sport. Some nights it might require dominating like he did last night; others it might require deferring to Wade as he did a few times in the Indy series. Whatever it takes to win, and winning it all is the only goal.

If athletes want to be evaluated based solely on their own physical skills, they should take up individual sports like golf, tennis, swimming or gymnastics. If they are playing a team sport, logic and rigor dictates that their ability to help their team win championships be taken into account--as one factor--when considering their greatness relative to others who have played the sport.
 
He's in Miami cause he wants to win a ring and have the success of being on a winning team. But that isn't something he controls other than his role. He is 1 guy, basketball is a team sport like you said.

Him winning a ring or not winning a ring doesn't change his greatness as an individual player and when you ask who is the 'best player ever' you are asking an individual question. MJ is the best player ever, if he played w you me and 2 other boneyarders he'd have never won a ring... He still would have been the best individual player ever.

If the Heat lost last night, are you saying there is something more Lebron could have done? If your answer is no then team success shouldn't be used to determine individual greatness.
 
21Huskies said:
If the Heat lost last night, are you saying there is something more Lebron could have done?
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Yes. There is always more that anyone could have done. In that instance, the "something more" would have been whatever was required to win.

My point is simple: I agree that it was a great individual performance irrespective of the result. But the fact that it was in a winning effort made it a greater performance. IMO you cannot properly evaluate the greatness of a performance in a team sport without considering whether it was toward a winning effort. I believe that LeBron has the ability to get there--probably the greatest package anyone has ever had toward that end. I do not believe that he is like Carmelo, a player who is singularly great but ends up being a net negative on a team. But unless LeBron gets some rings, it is legitimate to consider his lack of championships when evaluating his legacy as the greatest ever.
 
If Peyton Manning never won a Super Bowl, I don't think any of us would question how good a player and winner he was. I've never fully understood why people point to LeBron's never winning a title as being what is keeping him from being a great player. Maybe because it's literally the one thing they have left to criticize.
 
babysheep said:
If Peyton Manning never won a Super Bowl, I don't think any of us would question how good a player and winner he was. I've never fully understood why people point to LeBron's never winning a title as being what is keeping him from being a great player. Maybe because it's literally the one thing they have left to criticize.
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This is a straw-man argument. Nobody is saying that LeBron is not a great player: Everyone agrees that he is a great player. The point is that winning titles is one of the things that matters in terms of evaluating how great a player is, historically, compared to others that have played the game.

To put it as simply as possible: IMO there is no legitimate way to consider LeBron the greatest basketball player of all time if he never wins a title. I do think he will win at least one, so the point is likely to be moot sooner or later. But until then, his ceiling is "greatest player to never have won a title." Titles matter.
 
Meh. If Peyton had never won a title and retired, I'd still consider him the greatest QB of all time, given his sheer mental mastery of and control of the game, his incredible accuracy, and his poise.
 
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8893 said:
Yes. There is always more that anyone could have done. In that instance, the "something more" would have been whatever was required to win.

My point is simple: I agree that it was a great individual performance irrespective of the result. But the fact that it was in a winning effort made it a greater performance.
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If you are only 1 piece of a team you don't control whether or not that effort is in a winning or losing effort.

If you are going to tell me you think more of Lebron if he goes 8 of 18 last night and they win than if he does what he did last night and they lose than more power to you. We can agree to disagree.
 
8893 said:
To put it as simply as possible: IMO there is no legitimate way to consider LeBron the greatest basketball player of all time if he never wins a title. I do think he will win at least one, so the point is likely to be moot sooner or later. But until then, his ceiling is "greatest player to never have won a title." Titles matter.
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Titles matter to you, not to me. I am a big fan of Lebron... If he wins a ring it's not going to change my opinion of him as a player at all.

If he plays like crap and Wade goes crazy and the Heat win it all and he gets his ring that way, by your standards he's somehow a more complete player, that's absurd.
 
Peyton Manning the best QB ever? ;)

Everybody is entitled to use whatever criteria they want for determination of "greatest."

If "winning the big games" and "leading team to championship success" are not part of the metric, then the list of GOAT contenders is going to look different.

I guess my ultimate "greatest" question is, you're putting together a team. Who is your first string QB?

You take Manning over Montana? Not me.
 
I find it absurd that anyone could consider an athlete to be GOAT in a team sport without considering whether they have ever assisted their team in winning that sport's ultimate prize.

I'm gonna guess that this is a bit of a generational thing. I was raised that winning as a team matters more than individual accomplishments; you know, the greater good and all that. It seems that younger generations are more fixed on individual accomplishments.

To each, their peach. I'll take winning, thank you.
 
If I were to build the greatest possible offense that would go against the greatest defense possible, I take Peyton Manning. When you have him under center, you have an automatic advantage in a guy who can already tell what the defense is going to do and can not only make the proper blocking commands/audibles/hotreads, but also make perfect throws after making those adjustments.

And let's be honest; has Peyton ever really had a Superbowl-caliber defense before?
 
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Some good discussion going on here. Usually when LeBron's name comes up we've got a handful of posters saying things like, "He's a huge , he quit in Cleveland, never won anything", etc. etc.

For the record, LeBron's never been one of my favorite players, but the (mostly) unwarranted he's received from pretty much everybody with a camera or keyboard in front of them has turned me into an avid LeBron supporter. As I've said before, if the worst mistake you've made in life is hosting a self-promotional TV show, then I would guess you're a pretty good guy. I really don't get the "LeBron is a huge bi*ch" line of thinking. Ever since the Heat Welcome Party, he has handled himself extremely graciously all things considered IMO.

That said, I don't completely agree with the notion that an individual player can achieve "living legend" status without a ring, although I do agree with the bulk of what 21Huskies (and others) have been saying. If LeBron had gone out with his pistols blazing in last years finals, I suppose I could accept this argument more, but I think even the biggest LeBron supporters would agree that by his standards, his finals performance was extremely underwhelming. With that said, the guy is still only 27 years old and if he wins 2-3 titles by the time his career is over I don't think there is any doubt that he'll go down as one of the top 10 players to ever play this game.
 
He chose to conspire with two other All Stars and try to win multiple rings. That was a move. The decision. That was a move. He chose to hold the decision 20 minutes from the Knicks' practice facility. That was a move.

Nick naming yourself King James. That was a move. Proclaiming that your "team" will win not 1, not 2, not 3, etc., that was a move. Never participating in the dunk contest. That was a move. Dr. J, Jordan, Kobe, all of the best before you have participated for the fans yet he's too good for us to do it. Then, this year tease everyone that you may do it but then ultimately don't. That was a move. Being one of the strongest players in today's game, yet turned into a flopper in game 1 versus the Knicks. That was a move.

The fact that I'm a Knick fan and historically hate the Heat is just gravy. I'm a proud member and supporter of the world wide phenomenon Anti-Heat. Go Boston!


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I would take Steve Young if I were to start my own team. But that's my personal preference and he's a proven champion. And I think Elway is the best QB of all time.


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JaYnYcE said:
He chose to conspire with two other All Stars and try to win multiple rings. That was a move. The decision. That was a move. He chose to hold the decision 20 minutes from the Knicks' practice facility. That was a move.

Nick naming yourself King James. That was a move. Proclaiming that your "team" will win not 1, not 2, not 3, etc., that was a move. Never participating in the dunk contest. That was a move. Dr. J, Jordan, Kobe, all of the best before you have participated for the fans yet he's too good for us to do it. Then, this year tease everyone that you may do it but then ultimately don't. That was a move. Being one of the strongest players in today's game, yet turned into a flopper in game 1 versus the Knicks. That was a move.

The fact that I'm a Knick fan and historically hate the Heat is just gravy. I'm a proud member and supporter of the world wide phenomenon Anti-Heat. Go Boston!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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Waaa. Poor Knick fan needs a crying towel it seems.
 
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