Former MVP winning point guard and Sixers superstar Allen Iverson recently put Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan as his greatest player of all-time.
With the playoffs coming back around for the NBA at the moment, the discussion for how some of the top players in this day and age stack up with the Chicago Bulls legend Michael Jordan should also start back up. The Bulls are not in the playoffs this year, which is the third straight season in a row of this occurrence. The Bulls haven’t made a run to the playoffs since the last year of star small forward (now with the Miami Heat) Jimmy Butler playing in the Windy City during the 2016-17 season.
At least the Jordan years still provide plenty of opportunity for Bulls fans to reminisce on better times in the past, and hopefully for better times ahead in the near future. Jordan himself is unquestionably one of the greatest, if not the, playoff performers in NBA history. He is also still widely considered the best player in NBA history.
Other legends like Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James, Boston Celtics sharpshooting forward Larry Bird, and Lakers point guard Magic Johnson, among many others, had some great playoff memories and performances. But it would be difficult to consider them above Jordan in terms of the greatest player in the regular season, or the playoffs, in the history of this league.
A former NBA superstar that spent most of his career with the Philadelphia 76ers and Denver Nuggets, point guard Allen Iverson, agrees with the sentiment that MJ is the best player in NBA history. According to a piece that Iverson had released on The Players Tribune over the weekend in regard to former Lakers legendary shooting guard Kobe Bryant, he mentioned what his pecking order is in terms of the greatest players of all-time.
It would’ve been Kobe’s 42nd birthday over the weekend, more specifically on Aug. 23.
Iverson gave credit to Kobe as his No. 2, but still said that MJ was his best ever. There’s a good argument that Jordan and Kobe are definitely the two best shooting guards in NBA history, but it gets more complicated when talking about the two best overall players of all-time.
Kobe was a five-time NBA Champion during his lengthy career with the Lakers. He also was an 18-time All-Star selection, 15-time All-NBA Team selection, two-time scoring champ, two-time NBA Finals MVP, and 2007-08 MVP. Meanwhile, Jordan did take home five MVP awards and six titles.
Iverson does have a valid point that Kobe and MJ could be the two best of all-time. The accolades for each doesn’t put that statement out of the question. There’s also no doubt that those two created some of the most memorable moments in the NBA over the course of the last 30 years.