Victim of Racism
I'm a brehette
This was a comment from a Bleacher Report article but I can't find the original comment. Since it's only a comment and not an article (even though it's long), I'll post it in full, like the person on HoopsNation did. Aside from the claim that Lj is “the best player in the league right now”, that “his mid-range game is solid” (he shoots a pitiful 32.1% from 15-19ft 
), and that Miami had a solid bench (Dallas' benched ranked #2 in ppg when Dallas won but Miami's ranked dead last), this is very informative:
Lebron James is the best player in the league right now, but when people attempt to place him in the top 10 of all time they are simply delusional. Since people are attempting to play the farce of putting Lebron in the top 10, he is overrated. Remember, overrated does not mean bad. It simply means Lebron is given more credit than he deserves. Regardless, no one should believe the farce that if Lebron retired at this moment, he would be a top 10 player of all time. Anyone who does believe this is a sheep that blindly and arbitrarily follows the herd. I am going to attempt to open the eyes of these blind sheep slowly so that they may WITNESS the truth. Of course, such sheep will in all likelihood deny the light of truth after blindly stumbling through the darkness and following the herd for so long. Still, it's a start.
All of these player's careers are better in no particular order (except of course MJ at number 1 1. MJ 2. Magic 3. Bird 4. Hakeem 5. Duncan 6. Kareem 7. Shaq 8. Oscar Rob 9. Isaiah Thomas 10. Kobe 11. Jerry West. Before you start talking about how ridiculous this list is, consider the level of competition these people had to face, in addition to tougher defensive eras (for Duncan Shaq and Kobe - this was in the earlier stages of their career) instead of just copy pasting statistics, MVPs, rings etc. That stuff is relatively meaningless without putting it into context.
Wilt and Bill Russell played in a weak era and used their pure physical skill to dominate. Unlike Jerry West and Oscar Robertson, who had the skills to transfer over to todays game, Russell and Wilt used only their physical skills to dominate an era where you might only need to win 2 playoff rounds to win a title and with only 8-10 teams in the league. For this reason they are not in the top 10 Now, back to the lecture at hand. Perfection is perfected, so Ima let you understand. Lets look at why Lebron is not top 10 YET. By the end of his career he can easily be a top 5 player but he is not even top 10 yet.
1. Weak era Compared to the past - In the pre 2000s defense was much more physical than today, and very physical hand checking was permitted. Very rarely did they call little touch fouls that are constantly called today. Just watch some physical 80s 90s ball and you will see that there is no comparison. The level of hand checking and physical defense back then made it much harder to score, and after Jordan's era new rules were implemented. It was much harder to drive in the lane because teams were able to clog the lanes much more often than today (80s Pistons and 90s Knicks did that a lot) With the removal of these rules, offensive statistics were inflated and it is UNQUESTIONABLE that it is much easier to score in the post Jordan era.
In the 98-99 season, the NBA averaged 91.6 points per game. Nowadays the average is around 100 pts per game. You cannot simply attribute this to the quality of todays NBA players. The defensive rules have been changed to favor the offense. In spite of having it much easier in terms of playing offense, Lebron's scoring numbers still can not surpass Jordan, Bird, or Dominique's scoring in their prime years playing against REAL defense.
2. Failure and poor performances in the Finals - Despite having it easy compared to the past Lebron has a 2-2 record in the finals, even with another franchise player (wade) on his supporting cast. Some may say - well Magic is 5-4 Bird is 3-2 in the finals. Tell me, what team has Lebron faced in the finals with players of the same quality that Bird and Magic played - such as Bird and Magic themselves, Hakeem, Sampson, Dr J, Moses Malone, Kareem, Isiah Thomas? Lebron lost to Dirk Nowitzki's mavs - who cannot hold a candle to the vast majority of those mentioned earlier and a well rounded Spurs team with Tim Duncan past his prime. He did beat Durant and Westbrook - but again, the inflated offensive numbers of Durant due to a weak defensive era do not put him in the same category of the vast majority of those greats. Yes, Lebron did not have a good supporting cast with CLE in the Finals, but you would expect him to still have a good performance since he is supposed to be a top 10 player, right? nope - 22 ppg on 36% shooting, though he did have 7 rpg and 6 apg.
In the 2011 finals - with the help of 2 more franchise players - Lebron scored even less. On the other hand, Jordan never had less than 27 ppg in a finals series or even less than 22 points in a single game - and keep in mind this is all while lebron is playing in a WEAK DEFENSIVE era. Imagine how terrible he would have performed against the 96 sonics defense or the physical 90s knicks or 80s pistons when they allowed the defense to beat you up like they beat up Jordan.
3. Lebron's defense is weak - Lebron's defense is overrated. Yes, he does often guard the opposing team's best player, but he rarely does a good job of slowing them down. For every time he has a good defensive performance against Derrick Rose he lets Carmelo hit a game winner in his face or Paul George blow by him for an easy dunk. Oh well you might say Lebron was second in DPOY voting First of all, the fact that Lebron got voted second in the league for defense itself is overrating Lebron. Kawhi Leonard, P George, Tony Allen, Avery Bradley, Deng, are all better at slowing down a good offensive player. Lebron gets the highlight plays with the huge blocks and easy fast breaks, making people think he is a better defender than he really is, but he does not slow down offensive players as effectively as those guys (for example Kawhi Leonard did most of the work in holding lebron to under 20 pts in each of the first 3 games of the finals - Lebron could definitely not do the same to a player like Durant or Melo).
Secondly - again this is a weak defensive era. There are no Gary Payton Dennis Rodman Dikembe Mutombo Alonzo Mourning Hakeem Olajuwon David Robinson Sidney Moncrief Al Robertson Michael Cooper or Michael Jordan level defenders. The fact that Marc Gasol won DPOY last year is proof of this. Does any sane human being honestly think Marc Gasol can play defense anywhere near the level of the past top defenders?
To those saying Lebron can guard all 5 positions - that is only a half truth. He can guard all 5 positions for maybe one or two plays, but he cannot consistently guard a dwight howard, chris paul, paul george, tim duncan over the course of a whole game. No one on earth can find me a game where Lebron singlehandedly completely shuts down a big man/PF like Dwight or Garnett for 40+ minutes like Rodman used to shut down Shaq or Malone. Guarding a top big man or a top point guard for 5 seconds (not the whole game - Lebron can't do that at a high level consistently) is impressive to a degree, but don't act like Lebron's defense is the second coming of Dennis Rodman or Gary Payton.
4. Lack of clutch - Lebron's clutchness is a little underrated. He is more clutch than many think, but he is not super clutch. Lebron has played better in crunch time in recent years. Still, having Ray Allen bail him out after missing several clutch shots in game 6 vs SAS, getting showed up by Dirk Nowitzki in crunch time, missing clutch shots in 07 vs SAS - in other words - falling short several times when the stakes are at their highest. This goes back to Lebron's failures in the finals. He has clutch performances when the stakes aren't that high - but in the Finals he rarely makes the big shot. Some may say, oh well Robert Horry is so clutch and Steve Kerr was so clutch why don't you have them better than Lebron? Horry and Kerr are not franchise players, and outside of a good jumper and clutch shooting, and in Horrys case some defense, you did not get much else out of them. Lebron is a franchise player and if he wants to be among the top 10 his poor clutch performances, combined with his failure in the finals cannot warrant him such a high ranking.
As always, remember this is still in a weak defensive era which does not include physical defense, hand checking, or constant lane clogging like it was in the pre 2000s era. Also, yes a lot of past players like Duncan or Shaq were not that clutch, but they had other qualities that Lebron didn't - better performances in the finals, less failures, leading their teams to more championships, and better defense for their positions.
I had to separate this into 2 posts...
), and that Miami had a solid bench (Dallas' benched ranked #2 in ppg when Dallas won but Miami's ranked dead last), this is very informative:Lebron James is the best player in the league right now, but when people attempt to place him in the top 10 of all time they are simply delusional. Since people are attempting to play the farce of putting Lebron in the top 10, he is overrated. Remember, overrated does not mean bad. It simply means Lebron is given more credit than he deserves. Regardless, no one should believe the farce that if Lebron retired at this moment, he would be a top 10 player of all time. Anyone who does believe this is a sheep that blindly and arbitrarily follows the herd. I am going to attempt to open the eyes of these blind sheep slowly so that they may WITNESS the truth. Of course, such sheep will in all likelihood deny the light of truth after blindly stumbling through the darkness and following the herd for so long. Still, it's a start.
All of these player's careers are better in no particular order (except of course MJ at number 1 1. MJ 2. Magic 3. Bird 4. Hakeem 5. Duncan 6. Kareem 7. Shaq 8. Oscar Rob 9. Isaiah Thomas 10. Kobe 11. Jerry West. Before you start talking about how ridiculous this list is, consider the level of competition these people had to face, in addition to tougher defensive eras (for Duncan Shaq and Kobe - this was in the earlier stages of their career) instead of just copy pasting statistics, MVPs, rings etc. That stuff is relatively meaningless without putting it into context.
Wilt and Bill Russell played in a weak era and used their pure physical skill to dominate. Unlike Jerry West and Oscar Robertson, who had the skills to transfer over to todays game, Russell and Wilt used only their physical skills to dominate an era where you might only need to win 2 playoff rounds to win a title and with only 8-10 teams in the league. For this reason they are not in the top 10 Now, back to the lecture at hand. Perfection is perfected, so Ima let you understand. Lets look at why Lebron is not top 10 YET. By the end of his career he can easily be a top 5 player but he is not even top 10 yet.
1. Weak era Compared to the past - In the pre 2000s defense was much more physical than today, and very physical hand checking was permitted. Very rarely did they call little touch fouls that are constantly called today. Just watch some physical 80s 90s ball and you will see that there is no comparison. The level of hand checking and physical defense back then made it much harder to score, and after Jordan's era new rules were implemented. It was much harder to drive in the lane because teams were able to clog the lanes much more often than today (80s Pistons and 90s Knicks did that a lot) With the removal of these rules, offensive statistics were inflated and it is UNQUESTIONABLE that it is much easier to score in the post Jordan era.
In the 98-99 season, the NBA averaged 91.6 points per game. Nowadays the average is around 100 pts per game. You cannot simply attribute this to the quality of todays NBA players. The defensive rules have been changed to favor the offense. In spite of having it much easier in terms of playing offense, Lebron's scoring numbers still can not surpass Jordan, Bird, or Dominique's scoring in their prime years playing against REAL defense.
2. Failure and poor performances in the Finals - Despite having it easy compared to the past Lebron has a 2-2 record in the finals, even with another franchise player (wade) on his supporting cast. Some may say - well Magic is 5-4 Bird is 3-2 in the finals. Tell me, what team has Lebron faced in the finals with players of the same quality that Bird and Magic played - such as Bird and Magic themselves, Hakeem, Sampson, Dr J, Moses Malone, Kareem, Isiah Thomas? Lebron lost to Dirk Nowitzki's mavs - who cannot hold a candle to the vast majority of those mentioned earlier and a well rounded Spurs team with Tim Duncan past his prime. He did beat Durant and Westbrook - but again, the inflated offensive numbers of Durant due to a weak defensive era do not put him in the same category of the vast majority of those greats. Yes, Lebron did not have a good supporting cast with CLE in the Finals, but you would expect him to still have a good performance since he is supposed to be a top 10 player, right? nope - 22 ppg on 36% shooting, though he did have 7 rpg and 6 apg.
In the 2011 finals - with the help of 2 more franchise players - Lebron scored even less. On the other hand, Jordan never had less than 27 ppg in a finals series or even less than 22 points in a single game - and keep in mind this is all while lebron is playing in a WEAK DEFENSIVE era. Imagine how terrible he would have performed against the 96 sonics defense or the physical 90s knicks or 80s pistons when they allowed the defense to beat you up like they beat up Jordan.
3. Lebron's defense is weak - Lebron's defense is overrated. Yes, he does often guard the opposing team's best player, but he rarely does a good job of slowing them down. For every time he has a good defensive performance against Derrick Rose he lets Carmelo hit a game winner in his face or Paul George blow by him for an easy dunk. Oh well you might say Lebron was second in DPOY voting First of all, the fact that Lebron got voted second in the league for defense itself is overrating Lebron. Kawhi Leonard, P George, Tony Allen, Avery Bradley, Deng, are all better at slowing down a good offensive player. Lebron gets the highlight plays with the huge blocks and easy fast breaks, making people think he is a better defender than he really is, but he does not slow down offensive players as effectively as those guys (for example Kawhi Leonard did most of the work in holding lebron to under 20 pts in each of the first 3 games of the finals - Lebron could definitely not do the same to a player like Durant or Melo).
Secondly - again this is a weak defensive era. There are no Gary Payton Dennis Rodman Dikembe Mutombo Alonzo Mourning Hakeem Olajuwon David Robinson Sidney Moncrief Al Robertson Michael Cooper or Michael Jordan level defenders. The fact that Marc Gasol won DPOY last year is proof of this. Does any sane human being honestly think Marc Gasol can play defense anywhere near the level of the past top defenders?
To those saying Lebron can guard all 5 positions - that is only a half truth. He can guard all 5 positions for maybe one or two plays, but he cannot consistently guard a dwight howard, chris paul, paul george, tim duncan over the course of a whole game. No one on earth can find me a game where Lebron singlehandedly completely shuts down a big man/PF like Dwight or Garnett for 40+ minutes like Rodman used to shut down Shaq or Malone. Guarding a top big man or a top point guard for 5 seconds (not the whole game - Lebron can't do that at a high level consistently) is impressive to a degree, but don't act like Lebron's defense is the second coming of Dennis Rodman or Gary Payton.
4. Lack of clutch - Lebron's clutchness is a little underrated. He is more clutch than many think, but he is not super clutch. Lebron has played better in crunch time in recent years. Still, having Ray Allen bail him out after missing several clutch shots in game 6 vs SAS, getting showed up by Dirk Nowitzki in crunch time, missing clutch shots in 07 vs SAS - in other words - falling short several times when the stakes are at their highest. This goes back to Lebron's failures in the finals. He has clutch performances when the stakes aren't that high - but in the Finals he rarely makes the big shot. Some may say, oh well Robert Horry is so clutch and Steve Kerr was so clutch why don't you have them better than Lebron? Horry and Kerr are not franchise players, and outside of a good jumper and clutch shooting, and in Horrys case some defense, you did not get much else out of them. Lebron is a franchise player and if he wants to be among the top 10 his poor clutch performances, combined with his failure in the finals cannot warrant him such a high ranking.
As always, remember this is still in a weak defensive era which does not include physical defense, hand checking, or constant lane clogging like it was in the pre 2000s era. Also, yes a lot of past players like Duncan or Shaq were not that clutch, but they had other qualities that Lebron didn't - better performances in the finals, less failures, leading their teams to more championships, and better defense for their positions.
I had to separate this into 2 posts...
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at you getting into your feelings about an entertainer. 
You must have a horrible relationship with your mother.