Well Manu’s never averaged 20 pts a game and has only eclipsed the 30 minute mark once in 7 years, while Kobe on the other hand in those same 7 years has averaged over 40 minutes a game 4 times!! and scored over 26.8 every year but one.
Plus Manu is a great complimentary player for Duncan, who’s Kobe the complimentary player of now.. that shaq’s long gone.
Carrying a team night in and night out takes a lot out of anyone, being able to show up 1 out of 2 games and have an impact is a lot easier, or as far as this year goes maybe one out of 4 games for Manu.

Perfectly fair argument, although I would note that Kobe gets paid twice as much as Manu.

Many of the people involved in professional sports are simply not very smart. Everyone remembers the guy in their highschool who was dominant in one or more sports but who could barely read and write.

Who do you think plays professional sports? And who, after retiring, gets hired to coach or manage a team?

Most of these guys wouldn’t understand true shooting percentage if you explained it twenty times in a row with diagrams.

I’d add that since things come naturally to them, they don’t understand the learning process. Imagine a piano prodigy trying to teach children. They may not understand the tough steps the kids have to conquer to get on a competent level – since the prodigy didn’t have those same hurdles. Also they may not understand that some players have limitations. The superstar may feel that what they accomplished was due to hard work as opposed to innate ability. So they feel that others players should be able to accomplish the same goal as well – when it just may not be possible for the lesser player to make a change.

I always think about baseball where Babe Ruth and Ted Williams weren’t successful managers (Ruth never got a shot – Williams didn’t do much in 2 years in Washington). They were the two best players for the first 100 years of baseball but were never considered for the managers job. Because that job requires a radically different skillset than that of player.

Kobe has played 20,000 more minutes. That’s the reason you might say he is better.

Z-Man – I agree about your point about Magic, although I think Lebron is a pretty close facsimile…

I think the problem is most people now only remember the slower, older MJ of the 2nd 3-peat after he returned from baseball. I dont think most people realize how insane his stats were before he even won a championship.

I mean MJ one season averaged 37.1 ppg, another season 35.0 ppg and one season besides averaging 32.5 ppg he also averaged exactly 8 reb and 8 asts per game something Lebron has never even done. Let alone the fact that he had other seasons where he scored 33.6 and 32.5 like I said before he ever even won a title. Defensively he lead the league in steals 3 times while having 6 seasons of averaging at least 2.7 steals per game. Let alone the fact he had 2 seasons where he averaged 1.5 blocks per game as well. Kobe doesnt come anywhere near MJ in any of those stats.

Mike you should have John Hollinger write something up about this because I know he gets frustrated when people compare Kobe to MJ. He too has mentioned the only player who comes close to comparing to MJ is Lebron yet he doesnt have the titles obviously yet to really be involved in a real debate between him and MJ.

Lastly MJ played most of his career in a time, especially when he got older, where the NBA was actually physical and mugging players on the perimeter was basically legal. No cheap ticky-tacky flagrant fouls either. If the young MJ played in today’s NBA I truly believe he wouldve averaged 40 ppg at least once. Like I said I LOVE watching Kobe and still would pick him over Lebron today (if they meet in the Finals the results could change my opinion though) but he is still nowhere near MJ’s level.

Yeah, I understand that point, and it is certainly valid. But you can put your faith in some people more than others, based on what you know about them. I guess it’s kind of like getting married, or choosing which people to date. If we depended on an accepted metric to guide us, we’d all die virgins…

It is interesting, though, that good players tend not to be good broadcasters, coaches, or GMs. Maybe it’s because what made them great is the competitive drive, which doesn’t translate very well to a desk job.

Broadcasters are hired because they fit a niche– they appeal and speak to the common fans, not the stat-heads, so there’s no reason to expect decent analysis from ex-players.

It’s also difficult to really assess GMs. A lot of what they do is dictated by ownership, budget restraints, and plain dumb luck. The best GMs, though, certainly seem to be people who never played professionally.

I’m not sure I’d put Bird in the same group with Isiah. Larry has a good coaching resume (3 straight conference finals appearances, one trip to the finals) and as GM his hands are still handcuffed by the Detroit Brawl. He only brings in players without off-court baggage (which is very limiting in the NBA), which I think is a policy mandated by Pacer ownership.

Larry’s not-prone to hyperbole either. If he says Manu is better than Kobe I’d listen. More so than if Dave Berri says it.

In that sense, Jordan was a physical mismatch against virtually every SG in the league for most of his career, except maybe Drexler, who he had to out-talent. Kobe has definitely faced superior athletic defenders because of the way Jordan changed the position. I also think that some things mentioned in defense of Jordan negate each other, e.g.hand-checking allowed in 90′s negated by zone defenses allowed recently and crackdown on palming and traveling employed nightly by Jordan. Still, there is no getting around that Jordan is the greatest all-around basketball player ever, clearly better than Kobe, and that only LeBron has a chance to surpass him.

Interestingly, it was thought that Magic would revolutionize the PG position, but it seems like that position had gone back in the opposite direction towards smaller players after a few false starts (Walt Williams and Penny Hardaway, to name 2). An interesting argument would be: who enjoyed the greatest physical/talent combined advantage ever at his position–Wilt, Magic, or Michael?

Yeah but how do you know which ones? Isiah Thomas, Michael Jordan, and Larry Bird were great thinking players – but they’ve been sub-standard GMs. So obviously just being an ex-player (even a great one) doesn’t mean the person is able to evaluate players at a higher level than others.