Can LeBron James be better than Michael Jordan?

All right, man, peace. So, you know, I'm watching this, this, uh, program on ESPN, and, uh, it's called "The Jump." It has Rachel, uh, a media NBA media analyst named Rachel Nichols. She's the lead anchor on the show, along with the, uh, Hall of Famer Tracy McGrady, who, in my opinion, should not be a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but, you know, it is what it is. But Tracy McGrady, he's going to give his, he's going to give his, uh, his perception of LeBron James in comparison to Michael Jordan, and let's see what happens here.

LeBron, he's been good for so long that the whole world has forgot how good he actually is. And as all the MVP talk, we talking about Westbrook, we talking about Harden, the world really hasn't forgotten how good LeBron is. It's just that the, the, uh, the liberal Sports media, their thing is to try to push narratives. So, Russell Westbrook is a narrative, uh, James Harden is a narrative. The media has been a big fan of Russell Westbrook's for about five years. To me, Russell Westbrook is not a great basketball player; he's a phenomenal athlete that knows how to play basketball, all right? A great basketball player understands things, can see things before they happen. Russell Westbrook's, uh, Russell Westbrook's ability to anticipate things before they happen is very, very poor. That's why he makes so many mistakes down the stretch of close games and big games, and he just does. And I know people are going to say, "Well, you know, look at his clutch stats this year." Well, of course he's going to have great clutch stats; you know, he has the green light to do whatever he wants, so, of course, he's going to have great clutch stats this year, all right? He has very, very low basketball IQ. He's a phenomenal talent, he has phenomenal ability, but he's like a decathlete playing basketball, all right? He's probably the best overall athlete in the NBA, but, uh, his, his mental game is very, very low, all right? But the media has been pushing him for the last five years, uh, they've tried to cast him as this throwback type of player who, you know, like a "quote-unquote" old-school player who's loyal to his franchise. And look, the reason why Russell Westbrook is still with OKC is because he sees that this is the best opportunity for him to have his own team. He's already familiar with the background of the team, he's already familiar with the community, so it would make no sense for him to leave, all right? I mean, I believe, honestly, that if Kevin Durant had stayed, that Russell would have probably left after this season. It's, it's, to me, it's a very good probability.

But anyway, um, good or great, can we, can we, can we show the graphic we've been rolling out, I don't know, every week for like the past 10 weeks here in the gym? Yeah, you see that with the LeBron picture right on the right, and, and can you circle the, can you circle the, yeah, yeah, right there, okay, that's thank you. I love Danny Granger, by the way, he's, he's great, and he's hardly the only one who was saying that post-game. But comments like that, the reason why you cannot have a best player versus an MVP award... This idiotic female, she's been trying to push for this best player versus MVP award because the NFL has, the NFL has an MVP, the NFL has an Offensive Player of the Year, the NFL has a Defensive Player of the Year. She's trying to mimic that. The reason why you can't do that in the NBA is because the players play both offense and defense. So it would be a slap in the face to both parties, whoever wins the MVP and whoever wins the NBA best player award, her, her fictitious award. It would be a slap in the face to both players to not win both. Imagine you're LeBron James, and you win the Best Player of the Year, and Russell Westbrook wins the MVP. If you're LeBron James, you're saying, "Hi, am I the best player, but I'm not the MVP?" If you're Russell Westbrook, you're saying, "Hi, am I the MVP, but I'm not the best player?" All right, it would add too much confusion, but, you know, she doesn't understand, understand that because she's an idiot.

That are a fantastic reminder to reexamine what we value in this league. LeBron James showed last night that if you absolutely had to win one basketball game and you could pick any guy in the league to start your team, he's still your first pick. I would agree with that. LeBron is the best player in the NBA, that's without question. He's, he's the best player, uh, probably since '98, since Jordan retired from the Bulls, all right? You know, I make statements about LeBron in regards to his PED use, and he is a PED user, allegedly, right? I make those statements, and I got a lot of idiots that come on and say, and, and they get upset because people interpret everything emotionally, all right? I just state facts. LeBron is the best player, uh, and the most impactful player in the NBA since Michael Jordan; there's no doubt about that. But he is also a PED user, allegedly. It is what it is, all right? Now, the most dominant player since Jordan was Shaq, but LeBron is the, is the overall most impactful player, all right? And he's probably the best player since Jordan, you know, right alongside with Tim Duncan, right? Those, those are just facts, but it's also a fact that he is a so-called PED user. Once again, his name was on the Biogenesis Ledger; these are facts. He also had a, a growth removed from his jawline at the end of the 2009 season. You can look that up, all right? Go ahead and Google "LeBron James has growth removed from jawline in 2009." The man, the man is on that, is, he's on that stuff, it just is what it is, allegedly. Now, that is not enough to make him MVP with the way we pick an MVP right now. Yeah, yeah, you pick an MVP based on whoever's, uh, titillating you the most for that season, all right? Russell Westbrook is a great, great talent, but he's not a great player, sorry. But last night it was more than enough for the Cleveland Cavaliers, and I want to start our starting five there. We got our five big journalism questions: who, what, where, when, why, how, who, when, where, five, 12 questions. Tracy, you start us off.

LeBron passed Kobe last night, most playoff points all time. When does LeBron enter the best ever conversation, like the GOAT, the...? I, I don't think he can enter that conversation as being the GOAT. As great as LeBron is, as great as he's been, he will be considered one of the greatest players, not the greatest. I mean, that's Michael Jordan. Thank you, sir, thank you, sir. Like, it's not even, I don't even understand how it's a debate. Like, if we're trying to evaluate who the most, that, I mean, there's so many different conversations about that. If you're trying to evaluate who's the most impactful player, then LeBron is up there with Jordan. But when you're talking about best ever or greatest ever, you have so many different things that you have to factor in, not just numbers and production. Championships, uh, skill level on both sides of the ball, uh, you know, mental game, uh, uh, stamina, things of that nature, you know, how you came through in, in the, in the clutch, uh, what you did in regards to improving your team, all those things. LeBron is extremely high on a level, but Jordan maxes out on just about all of them. And if we just want to talk about accomplishments, uh, LeBron really is around the level of a Larry Bird, all right? That's more of his, of his comparison of, or of, of the player that people should be comparing them to right now. They both have three championships, uh, Bird has three MVPs, LeBron has four, but Bird won his three in a row. Everybody says, "Well, LeBron has been to seven straight finals." Yeah, well, you know what, Larry Bird had to go against the 'DoJ' Sixers, uh, in the early '80s, and then he had to go against the Isaiah Thomas Pistons in the late '80s, so no, he wasn't going to make seven, seven championships in a row. Making seven titles in a row, to me, is more, is, is more reflective of how poor the competition is around you than it is of how great you are, all right? I'm sorry, but when you make seven in a row, that means that your conference is kind of weak, that's what that tells me. You just think it's closed. No one will ever play basketball as well as that. We're talking about LeBron, I'm not talking about nobody else, I'm talking, we're talking about specifically LeBron and what he's accomplished up to what Michael Jordan has accomplished. We're talking about six championships, never played in a Game 7. We're talking about averaging 33 points in the finals, six MVPs. I mean, look, right? And that's the same amount of points that Jordan averaged in the playoffs overall, about 33 and a half. I mean, come on, man, it's, it's not even close when you just go by accomplishments, it's not even close, right? There is your answer. There's no way he can surpass that man right there. Mark Signin, China. I thank you, thank you, Hall of Famer.

I, and I like Tracy, but Tracy should not have been a first-ballot Hall of Famer. The only reason why they put him in first ballot was because they didn't want to put in Chris Webber because of the issues that Chris Webber had, uh, with the University of Michigan and with the boosters, all right? But Chris Webber deserved to be in a Hall of Fame over Tracy McGrady. Chris Webber transformed that Washington, uh, that Washington Bullets franchise, and then he went to the, to the Sacramento Kings, a franchise that was moribund throughout the '80s, throughout the '90s. He went there and turned him into a team that was going to the Conference Finals, all right? Like that, that, that guy, he deserved to be in a Hall of Fame over Tracy. Tracy never even won one playoff series, not one. Nothing against T-Mac, he was a, he was a dynamic scorer, long, great mid-range jumper, great post, great, great game in the post, uh, but, you know, a transcendent talent is supposed to be able to get out of the first round at least once. He, he was never able to do it, and I remember when he blew that 3-1 lead against the Pistons, I think it was '02 or '03, one of those years, all right? Just is what it is, but, you know, congratulations to the brother. We're just going to fin every ever s that today.

I got to be honest, I can't let go of the three and four record in the finals either. I can't let go of the Dallas Mavericks' performance, I'm sorry. And I was rooting hard for LeBron, man, because the media was coming down so hard on him when he went to Miami. The way that he came up in those, uh, finals against the Mavericks, um, that's, that's why I stay on the, this, this topic about him versus Jordan, because, you know, if he wanted to be compared to Michael Jordan, he had to win that series. I'm, I'm willing to, to disregard the first loss against the Spurs; he really was ahead of schedule, all right? He really had no business even being in those finals, but the Maverick series, no, bro, I'm sorry. I'll even give you a scratch against the, um, the Celtics in, in 2010, when you had the mental breakdown when you found out that Delonte West was born in your mother and all your teammates knew about it and nobody told you, all right? I, I'll give you a scratch on that. Now, allegedly, allegedly, the word around the campfire is that, uh, LeBron's wife was sleeping with, uh, uh, Rashard Lewis from the Orlando Magic, and that's why he had the breakdown, the mental breakdown in 2011 against the Mavericks. That's alleged, all right? But, you know, it is what it is. That's why you got to, you know, they always tell you, "Behind every great man is a great woman," you know? Well, actually, behind the fall of every great man is normally a woman, all right? So, but like I said, that is allegedly, but still, that's on his record, all right? Jordan never had any of those breakdowns in the finals. And when, when you, when you start having best ever conversations, you have to, you have to nitpick in that way, period. You know, we can say a lot of those years his teams... Jerry West, all, yeah, Jerry West was one and nine in the finals, and he, nobody calls him the best player ever, so that's a straw man argument. And he had to live with that, and I mean, it, it, it hampered his legacy too. I mean, it eats him up to this day, you know, his care factor, he'll never get over it.

I know, I, he's in the conversation, and there are people around the league who, who already have him in consideration, but I know I'm supposed to be a know-all. I'm still not sure about Bill Russell and Jordan because Russell played in a different era, the league wasn't as deep. Uh, Bill Russell is an all-time great. Bill Russell is not, uh, the greatest player ever. You could put him on the list of maybe the most impactful player ever, along with LeBron, Larry Bird, Tim Duncan, Shaq, Magic, Michael Jordan. When I say most impactful, I mean that guy gets on your team and auto, automatically, you're a threat to, to advance in the playoffs, win or win a championship, all right? And no, for the Kobe Bryant fans, no, he is not one of the most impactful players ever. Kobe was a phenomenal, uh, overall talent, but when you look at his record when he didn't have Phil Jackson, the man didn't even make the playoffs, much less make the finals, all right? So no, Kobe Bryant is not in the conversation, no. But when you talk about impactful players, that, that's, that's the list to me: Bill Russell, Magic, Bird, uh, Jordan, Tim Duncan, Shaq, and LeBron. Those guys, you bring them on your team within two to three years, as long as you have good management, you're going to be a contender, all right? If not right away, Larry Bird came on a team that was, that, that I believe won 21 games in his rookie year. They went from 21 and 61 to 61 and 21, something along those lines, all right? People know, people, people got to understand how great Larry Bird was. Larry Bird was a phenomenal player. That's why I say right now that's who they should be comparing LeBron to in regards to him trying to establish some type of distance between him and Larry Bird, all right? But no, Bill Russell played in an era with no free agency. They had the best team, they had the best front office, they had the best, uh, they had the best scouting system. I mentioned before, Red Auerbach, he was a revolutionary in regards to scouting, uh, that team had, had phenomenal talent, but there was no free agency. So when you look at 11 championships, you know, Jordan was the first player ever in league history to, uh, lead his team to a championship without a dominant big man and win multiple titles like that.

The only two guys to ever do that were Jordan and before him, Isaiah Thomas. And Isaiah Thomas had a great front court; he had B, he had Dennis Rodman, he had Bill Laimbeer. People think Bill Laimbeer was just a dirty player; Bill Laimbeer was a four-time All-Star. That guy was the All-Star representative for the Eastern Conference before, uh, Patrick Ewing got there and came into his own, all right? Bill Laimbeer could play. He had Mark Aguirre before that, he had Adrian Dantley, who's a Hall of Famer. Mark Aguirre was a Hall of Fame talent. Yeah, had Dennis Rodman, who's a Hall of Famer. He had a great front court, Isaiah Thomas, but he was, Isaiah was the first guy to win multiple championships without a dominant front court, all right? Pardon me, without a dominant center, he was the first guy to really do that, right, or to be, or to have a dominant front court. Jordan was the first guy to win multiple championships and really not have a great center at all or a great front court at all. That's what, no, people don't understand this. Prior to Jordan winning the championship, everybody was saying nobody's ever won a championship leading the league and scoring. This guy did it six times, Michael Jordan, all right? People have no idea how great he was and how he changed the, uh, the game as far as the dominance level, all right? And he played in an era with, with, uh, a lot of physicality and a lot of dominant centers: Hakeem Olajuwon, David Robinson, Patrick Ewing, Shaq. The list goes on and on, people who don't know, guy like Brad Daugherty, who, like I've said before, in my opinion, was just as good as Tim Duncan before he got hurt, just my opinion.

What do we do with his 11 Rings compared to Jordan's 6? But look, three and four in the finals, that LeBron, that's on that, that jumps off his page, and he's got, that's got to look better than three and four. I mean, he doesn't, and let's be honest, three and four in the finals, and not to sound like Skip Bayless, but he's won Ray Allen's three. He's a Ray Allen three and a Draymond Green, uh, uh, chopped to the nuts from being, from being one and seven or one or, pardon me, one and six. Like, come on, it's not like he went to the finals and he's been dominating. LeBron has not had dominating performances in the finals until last year, all right? His, his, his, his performances in the finals have not been great; they've been, they've been good for his standards, but they have not been great. He doesn't need seven rings to top, but it's got to look better than three and four. I would only say, I agree with both of you guys on, on the big picture right now with MJ, but I would only say that he's not done yet. I would not have expected him to go back to Cleveland and in the first two years to give that city its first major pro sports championship. That's true, he's not done yet, and you never know what the NBA has planned for him in regards to the officiating to try to get him some more championships as much as possible. Championship in more than 50 years, that was unexpected, so who knows what is, but he's not there today going to happen. I just, just say the conversation's not closed, keep it open, keep it open. Next step. Yeah, the conversation's not closed, it's still open. LeBron is an all-time great player, he's definitely top 10, uh, is he Jordan? Absolutely not. Like I've said before, he is on PEDs, allegedly. You know, people can get mad at that, like I said, you could look it up, his name was on the Biogenesis Ledger as well as guys like Ray Lewis, uh, Jair Nelson, Ryan Braun, Alex Rodriguez. That was a huge case, all right? The NBA covered it up. Like I said before, the man his first year came back to Cleveland, he tried to flush those PEDs out of his system, and he was a totally different player. He was still a great player, but he was not the guy who was jumping through the gym and, you know, with the, you know, with the, with the eye high jumping up and his eye height to the rim and all this other stuff that you see now, he was not that guy. And a lot of people in the media know about it, right? Like I said before in the last video, Max Kellerman knows about it, that's why he made that face. And like I also said, do your research, LeBron had a growth removed from his jawline in 2009 at the end of the season, all right? Look it up. Nothing against him, it just is what it is. When you start talking about how you, how you're as good as Jordan and, you know, Jordan, uh, uh, Jordan's teammates helped them and all the stuff that LeBron was talking last off season, well, now you open yourself up for scrutiny, period. But anyway, peace.