Dwyane Wade: ‘I Don’t Know If LeBron Has the Ability to Surpass Michael Jordan’

Honestly Batum was a bum for France after inking that big extension he goes out and plays like that. Kirilenko came out making a statement early in tye summer games and that point guard of theirs who also signed w/minn as well showed flashes , they got POTIENTAL

@the seed: true. but kobe could theoretically add 2 more rings or so, people would still consider jordan as better and point out, that any ring kobe earns now would be because of howard or more talented team than jordan had. like almost nobody says bill russell is the best of all time coz he had 8 rings. just dont really see any championship coming for the lakers unless their bench stays the way it is.

* shockexhange & thewhitemarkprice just played this out like the band on the titanic. We do our thing even when this mess goes down.
* wades top 50 if dirk is.
* cannot compare lebron and mj. I mean …. you can but it doesn’t work.

Kobe is the best and you all can kiss my ass. Smelly lizards!

Kirilenko. He was dominating that entire Olympics until he had a quadriceps injury.

@Roscoe: jordan lost 6 straight playoff series and never faced the quality of competition that james faced when james won bronze. so while jordan lost in the semis or conf finals, james took one team to the finals allready. that accomplishment aint inferior to jordans by this time of his carreer. anyway, jordan was still the better player than james will ever be but for different reasons.

Kobe has 5 rings. And his finals failures are not at all what Seperate him from Jordan. There’s no reason it should.

Feez_22… kb24 lost in the finals twice… MJ was perfect. My argument is that winning titles & not losing in the finals is all that matters when comparing MJ to other players. Awards mean nothing, rings are everything. As we know the NBA has seen many talented players. Talk to me about titles.

@roscoe……….So you’re telling me that Durant automatically can NEVER be better than MJ just because he lost in the Finals even though he led an OKC team to the Finals at an age when MJ was getting swept in the 1st round? Dafaq kinda logic is that??? @Feez_22…..So skill is related to the caliber of the player yet Kobe isn’t the same caliber of player jordan was? Wait what?

it wasnt mjs fault and as i said, he is the goat and lebron is not on jordans level. but please: winning when it counts? oh my, have you guys ever played basketball on a high level yourselves? doesnt look like that. it ALLWAYS counts. not getting to the finals at all meant he lost 6 years in the row when it mattered too. not getting to the finals at all coz you werent clutch in the semis or conf finals is still worse than getting your team to the finals and losing there. and by the way, being clutch is just one part of team success, it takes way more than one player being clutch for a team to come up on top. there are allways 5 guys on the floor who have to do their job perfect or at least better than the 5 guys on the other team. jordan wouldnt have won without his supporting cast while james wouldntve won his first chip without his guys neither. so the amount of championships should be one part of the consideration about which player is the greatest of all time but it also comes down to many other things as individual skills and the way a player uses his skills or teamplay, etc…

danny boy… easy fella. you make some good points, but we are talking about unicorns and rainbows here (meaning: who is the best ever?). With that in mind a tainted finals record weighs more heavily than a tainted playoff loss record. Losing in the finals at a younger age still means you lost in the finals. In order to be considered the greatest ever for at least the next 50 years that person cannot lose in the finals thanks to the MJ precedent, 6-0. But by all means continue with your emotional rant above which gave me a laugh.

Jordan is still the man period. Lebron “might” be better all around talent but Jordan is still the GOAT!!! even if LBJ wins 6 rings!!!!!!!!!!

Better raise his resume, took a dam big hit coming to miami. Gotta to something more over the top to have a solid argument over MJ

^^^ LOL yeah. a measuring stick for a pr!(k . great selfish stats. But could Kobe average a triple double ? im with flight9

@roscoe: 6 rings and 12 total finals appearences would still be a greater achievement than 6 rings out of 6 appearences because it wouldve meant just more success overall. sorry man but to me that “being perfect in the finals” doesnt make any sense at all

This might not have been mentioned, but I think LeBron finishing second behind Jordan after his career is over isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Even if he doesn’t match him, good luck finding someone who will get closer than LeBron probably will. One more title and Finals MVP will put him level with Kobe if you ask me. Forget the big scoring games. Kobe has only 2 championships as the best player on his team, only 2 Finals MVPs. If LeBron gets past 2, he will leave Kobe behind. LeBron can have 50 point games, but we all know his game is different. He’s a playmaker before anything. The best part of his game is his passing still. Kobe had those big scoring games because he’s one of the best pure scorers to ever play. The 50 point games are great, but I’d rather have the guy who can do everything on the court. Notice that LeBron’s 50 point games also included him doing everything else on the floor while also scoring at will. To be behind Jordan and Magic, LeBron needs 2 more Finals wins and Finals MVPs putting him at 3 rings, 3 Finals MVPs, add in a few more regular season MVPs. That would easily move him past Kobe leaving only Jordan and Magic in front of him. What also should be talked about is LeBron’s durability. Dude only misses games to get some rest.

Roscoe, your logic is flawed. Making it to the finals at 23 is a greater accomplishment to getting swept in the first round at 23. You can’t compare the resume of someone who is approaching his prime to someone who is already retired. The fact that Bron, Howard, and Durant even made it to the finals as hands down the best players on their teams at 23 is an accomplishment, not a failure. Like I mentioned in a previous post, MJ didn’t even make it to the finals until he was almost 29 and at the apex of his career, big difference.

Jordan
Magic
Kareem
Bird
Oscar
Chamberlain
West
Dr. J
Duncan
Hakeem

Fuk u all haters Lebron James is the best player since michael Jordan and would crush Kobe Bryant in a game

10 “best” or 10 “greatest” – ?

what about this idea: on a team of low talent, james is the better choice to make his team mates better than bryant. if both play on highly talented teams, bryant wouldve been the better choice during his prime to close out games and consistantly score big points when they are needed. at least so far, is we speak about a comparable sample saying james and kobe untill their 27th birthday. its unnecessary to say that james has the better overall game while kobe was maybe not the more efficient but more versatile scorer.

James definitely makes bad talent better while Kobe doesn’t. And James clearly works better with teammates. While Kobe may have been a better scorer, he was never a LeBron type of defender, he was never LeBron efficient, and he was never a LeBron like playmaker. I’m sorry but there is just no way you can convince me Kobe could help a team at any point in his career as much as James does now. The difference between them is Kobe has been at an elite level for 13 years. If LeBron keeps up what he’s doing for another 5 years he will have broken every record Kobe has except single game scoring records, and will have better career averages in every single drastically category (which is already true). I don’t know how many people would really choose Bryant at 27 over James st 27, but I’m sure it’s not the majority.

sure but come on, ball isnt only played on paper and statistics. james sure was/is the better athletes and can uses this nicely on the defensive end. kobe was also an over average and at times (when he wanted to) a great defender. its also clear that kobe could only guard other two guards while james could be used to guard multiple positions. but where is the problem, i mean jordan also guarded almost only other two guards and i dont think that this makes jordan an inferior defender compared to james. id take james defense over kobes tho, but not by thatmuch. kobe also played almost all of his prime in the triangle offense, not allowing him to dish many assists. jordans assist totals also decreased under this system and i wouldnt say that jordan didnt have court vision. just look at all his years and assist totals before he played that system. the main point was just, that before last years finals i wouldve taken a 27yr old kobe over a 27yr old james when its crunchtime. when it mattered the most, teams were able to take james drive away and he struggled to score / succeed. i didnt see many defensive schemes or single defenders (like eg marion in the 11 finals on james) that were able to shut kobe down or slow him down.

James was 26 against Marion. That same defense would not have had the same effect this year. James is clearly a much much better player than he was a year ago. And Jordan guarded all 3 perImeter positions. Plus, no matter what offense Kobe played in, he never had relatively close to the passing ability as James does. LeBron is a superior defender, playmaker, and a much more efficient (although less volumous) scorer. If you value scoring over everything, including efficiency then that’s fine. But if you don’t, the answer is obviously James.

It’s definitely not a science. But as far as talking to people, reading, and watching, I’ve learned about as much as I can about how all those guys were as players and how they affected games. Not that I or any of us know everything there is to know, but we are educated, it’s not like we just look at stats and say oh (blah blah blah is greater than bleu bleu bleu)