was magic johnson underrated during his 80's reign?

[Jplaya2023]

lol i dont buy it, the same isht happened with the 2000-2002 lakers. their competition was always tougher in the western conference, but they trashed the east coast teams in the finals. that tough road should sharpen the teams up, not weaken them. same as the san antonio spurs.

different situations.

The east was trash back then, there wasn't a dominant team like the lakers were in the 80's against the west.

The tough road can also be a detriment as well. Teams are beat up going into the finals.

Here's an example.

in the 87 finals, the lakers went 11-1 in the first 3 rounds of the playoffs and were relatively fresh for the finals.

Meanwhile the celtics had 2 7 game series against the bucks and pistons in back to back rounds, and were running on fumes in the finals. It didn't help that mchale had a broken foot, walton was hurting, and kc jones ran his starters in the ground playing them 42+ minutes because their bench was awful and their #1 draft pick OD on cocaine

 

[I.V.]

No. He was considered the greatest player of all time in the 80's. Everyone acknowledged that he and bird had saved the nba.


Not really sure what we're talking about here.

 

[Marvel]

no he didnt

There is a reason why you are red, cause you don't know SH!T. Magic barely shot the 3 pt shot early in his career and became a solid 3 pt shooter towards the end. He barely took the mid range jumper early on in his career too. Offensively, early in his career more like Rondo preferring shots in the paint. I noticed this myself because I actually had videotaped recordings that my uncle collected from both Bird and Magic. As I got through year to year...it was noticeable to me that he developed a better perimeter game

 

[Box Cutta]

Magic won more chips because of better teams. But Bird was seen as a more complete/better player, especially from 84-86. In the mid 80's many were saying Bird was the greatest ever. When the Lakers won in 87 and 88, that's when Magic started getting his props, and people were saying he may be the greatest. Maybe Magic wasn't seen as being Bird's equal those early years because he played with Kareem? Even though as a Rookie Magic played that game 7 at center and had a huge game. You wanna talk about another underrated player on the all time great list, Kareem is that guy.

If someone were to say Magic was better I won't argue against it. But if someone else says Bird was better I wouldn't argue against that either. To me they are pretty much even as individual players. Both played different positions and had different roles, but both could do everything on the court. If anything both guys are underrated by the younger generation (guys born in the late 80's and up)

Thank god for Jordan....