Top 5 most skilled NBA players All Time

[IIVI]

Not a clean fit into top 5, but if someone said Kawhi I wouldn’t blame them. 3 level scoring that was championship material with an arsenal that carried a team to a ring, some of the best defensive reads the game has seen, etc.

Another one was Ginobli. No other foreigner can say they beat Team USA in a medal game before. Scoring, defense, passing, winning and changed foreign play in the NBA.


I hate the Spurs, but them two cats were not only skilled, but they had championship impact.

Kobe
Jordan
Kyrie
Ginobli
Kawhi/Olajuwon

 

[MostReal]

Curry should be at 1 or 2, dude scores a majority of his points off skill

 

[Black Man of the Nile]

For those who think Kobe was more "skilled" than Jordan:

Please watch from the 25 min mark to the 1 hour mark of this video.



Have some shame Like, most of that stuff should not be humanly possible! The young MJ demonstrated a skill level far higher than anyone in the history of basketball.

Also, consider this was the same player who will then totally re-invented his game

And go on to perfect the fade-away and dominate in the low post becoming and unstoppable low post scorer despite being only 6'6 and playing in the era of greatest Centers and Power forwards in history.

"Skill wise", MJ is clear of everyone, including Kobe. Jordan just went through to many re-incarnations of himself and his bag was endless

Kobe was essentially an evolution of Jordan

 

[DoubleClutch]

I still think penny was the most skilled all around

 

[Professor Emeritus]

lol at 90% of responses being the 0.08% of the population that is 6'6" or taller and half of those are extraordinary athletes on top of that. Shows how many people can't evaluate basketball for shyt. Less than 1 in 1000 men are over 6'6", and probably less than 1 in 10,000 men are over 6'6" and transcendent athletes besides, but we're supposed to believe that the most skilled bball players ever just happen to be in that tiny 1 in 10,000 pool of athletic tall guys and not somewhere in the 99.99% of other guys?

MJ said his own brother was better than him but just never grew tall enough. MJ is one of the greatest athletes in NBA history and that turbo'd all his other skills but none of those skills by themselves were next level - without the size and athleticism neither MJ's shooting, nor his ballhandling, nor his passing, nor his defensive technique are next-level. 6'9" Magic getting named despite not being a notable shooter, ballhandler, or defender. Hakeem getting named because he has good footwork and touch for his SIZE, but when Hakeem came into the league he was known as raw as fukk with remarkable agility for a center but not a fraction of the skill that a lot of smaller, less athletic players needed to make the league.

For every 6'6" transcendent athlete with skill, there are 100 other guys under 6' who were just as skilled but didn't have the height or the athleticism to make it.


Players like CP3, Steph, and Kyrie are far more skilled than Kobe, MJ, and LeBron. Duncan or Hakeem don't remotely belong in the discussion. Having a height advantage or having supreme athleticism is not a skill. 6'2" Steph is a back-to-back MVP, whereas a 6'2" MJ with Steph's hops wouldn't even be an all-star. 6'0" CP3 is a first-ballot hall of famer. 6'0" Kobe is maybe a starter, maybe not. 6'2" Kyrie makes All-NBA teams. 6'2" LeBron with Kyrie's speed/vertical is carving out a career as a pass-first PG on an ensemble cast.

 

[HabitualChiller]

In no particular order
MJ
Kobe
Kyrie
Jokic =/= Magic
KD =/= Curry

Players like Bron, Shaq, Wilt, Giannis are skilled but rely a lot on physical advantages.

LeBron lost A LOT of his athleticism and he's still saucing nikkas up at 38. At a certain point, you can't pull the "look how physically dominant he is!" card.

Said point was about 4-6 years ago.

 

[Sccit]

For those who think Kobe was more "skilled" than Jordan:

Please watch from the 25 min mark to the 1 hour mark of this video.



Have some shame Like, most of that stuff should not be humanly possible! The young MJ demonstrated a skill level far higher than anyone in the history of basketball.

Also, consider this was the same player who will then totally re-invented his game

And go on to perfect the fade-away and dominate in the low post becoming and unstoppable low post scorer despite being only 6'6 and playing in the era of greatest Centers and Power forwards in history.

"Skill wise", MJ is clear of everyone, including Kobe. Jordan just went through to many re-incarnations of himself and his bag was endless

“According to Phil Jackson, athletic ability and Skill was another difference between the two. Jordan gets the nod when it comes to being a better natural athlete, He Jumped higher, hung in the air longer, and was stronger. But when it comes to skills, Bryant had the advantage. Once Kobe worked on his overall game, Jackson gave Bryant the praise on being able to tune his game to have nearly no weaknesses, which included more range, ball-handling, passing, and the ability to make tougher contested shots on double-teams.”



FROM THE MAN WHO COACHED BOTH

 

[Sccit]

LeBron lost A LOT of his athleticism and he's still saucing nikkas up at 38. At a certain point, you can't pull the "look how physically dominant he is!" card.

Said point was about 4-6 years ago.

 

[inndaskKy]

lol at 90% of responses being the 0.08% of the population that is 6'6" or taller and half of those are extraordinary athletes on top of that. Shows how many people can't evaluate basketball for shyt. Less than 1 in 1000 men are over 6'6", and probably less than 1 in 10,000 men are over 6'6" and transcendent athletes besides, but we're supposed to believe that the most skilled bball players ever just happen to be in that tiny 1 in 10,000 pool of athletic tall guys and not somewhere in the 99.99% of other guys?

MJ said his own brother was better than him but just never grew tall enough. MJ is one of the greatest athletes in NBA history and that turbo'd all his other skills but none of those skills by themselves were next level - without the size and athleticism neither MJ's shooting, nor his ballhandling, nor his passing, nor his defensive technique are next-level. 6'9" Magic getting named despite not being a notable shooter, ballhandler, or defender. Hakeem getting named because he has good footwork and touch for his SIZE, but when Hakeem came into the league he was known as raw as fukk with remarkable agility for a center but not a fraction of the skill that a lot of smaller, less athletic players needed to make the league.

For every 6'6" transcendent athlete with skill, there are 100 other guys under 6' who were just as skilled but didn't have the height or the athleticism to make it.


Players like CP3, Steph, and Kyrie are far more skilled than Kobe, MJ, and LeBron. Duncan or Hakeem don't remotely belong in the discussion. Having a height advantage or having supreme athleticism is not a skill. 6'2" Steph is a back-to-back MVP, whereas a 6'2" MJ with Steph's hops wouldn't even be an all-star. 6'0" CP3 is a first-ballot hall of famer. 6'0" Kobe is maybe a starter, maybe not. 6'2" Kyrie makes All-NBA teams. 6'2" LeBron with Kyrie's speed/vertical is carving out a career as a pass-first PG on an ensemble cast.

But this goes both ways. If the game were played in a way where little guys would post each other up underneath the basket each possession or where little guys were asked to protect the rim consistently from guys their own height or slightly taller, they wouldn't be as good at it in terms of timing and footwork as the bigs who have developed those skills for years and years.

In fact, bigs are now learning to shoot the three well and even dribbling more as well as passing, whereas guards for the most part still aren't developing those big skills that I mentioned above. So one could argue that guys like Embiid and Jokic are more all round skilled than guys like Irving and Curry. Especially Embiid 'cause he can really dribble.

LeBron's chasedown blocks also shouldn't be undervalued in terms of requiring great skill on top of the athleticism.

 

[MJ Truth]

Defense doesn't matter? Only mj is elite on d

How was LeBron not elite on defense?

 

[MJ Truth]

Beside the obvious answers, I wanna throw guys like Rasheed Wallace, Joe Johnson and Cat Mobley.

 

[rbksNgirbauds]

Kobe was essentially an evolution of Jordan

No he wasn't. In any way...I don't think you know what the word evolution means

 

[Shadow King]

LeBron lost A LOT of his athleticism and he's still saucing nikkas up at 38. At a certain point, you can't pull the "look how physically dominant he is!" card.

Said point was about 4-6 years ago.

On top of the fact that Jordan was just as much of a physical outlier.

 

[Black Man of the Nile]

No he wasn't. In any way...I don't think you know what the word evolution means

So you think Kobe was just a carbon copy of Jordan then?

 

[CP3.]

Chris Paul needs to be on there.

Name a weakness in CP3's game in terms of skill or ability. Great shooter, insane handle, amazing passer, quality defender, even got good post game... any deficiencies he has are related to physique which has nothing to do with skill.



People forget how good he was back in the New Orleans day before the injury. Even had that insane athleticism