Isn't one of the hallmarks of an all-time great sportsman how they transcended their sport or had influence outside of their sport? IMO, to be an all-time great sportsman, you have to be a transcendent sportsman. For example, Jordan's greatness transcended beyond just what he did on the court. The same goes for other all-time greats... Just my humble opinion
Completely disagree. The mark of a great sportsman is how good at their respective sport(s) they are. Once you get away from that you are looking at great people who played sport rather than great sportsmen.
But that was based on the quality of performance, not breakthrough of social barriers. Otherwise Arthur Wharton or Artur Friedenreich would be the best players ever, rather than Pele et al.
Kobe Bryant is arguably a better basketball player than Jordan was, but is he a greater basketball player? There is a difference between best and greatest.
To me there isn't at all. I would consider the greatest sportsman to be the person who was the best at his sport. Anything other than that is not a view of someone as a sportsman but rather as a person. There have been some extremely unpleasant people who have been undeniably great sportsmen.
To keep to a baseball context, was Eddie Cicotte any less of a player because of the 1919 World Series?
Totally agree. Some people take sports way beyond sports... ...and that sport is furthered beyond simple statistics like goals, points, or knockouts. Pele scored 1000 goals, Romario scored 1000 goals. What's the difference?
It is an interesting point. One can't help but wonder what everyone's stance towards Muhammad Ali would be had he not been blessed with such a vibrant personality; a personality which made him a cultural icon and thus increased the aura of greatness surrounding him.
Ty Cobb was aguably the best baseball player but from what you read, he was the biggest piece of shit. Everybody hated him and when he died in 1961 only 3 baseball players showed up to his funneral. And this is a guy who played and coached for over 20 years in baseball.
Kobe is in absolutely no way an arguably better basketball player than Jordan. Its not even especially close, actually.
Kobe is a better free-throw shooter, a better 3-point shooter, a better jump shooter, and an overall more versatile scorer than Jordan was. Kobe is also a more fundamentally and technically sound player than Jordan was.
1. Their free throw percentages are virtually identical. .835 vs. .839. Basically Kobe was less than half of a percent better, and that's after you take into account Jordan's averages dropping his last two seasons with the Wizards. There is no real argument that Kobe's better 2. Kobe has shot .34% from 3 for his career, Jordan shot .327. Again, statistically almost identical. However, 2 points. Fist, Jordan's averages were, again, dragged down by his last two seasons with the Wizards (where he shot below his average, in one year, significantly below). Second, Jordan never relied on the 3 - he shot, on average, 1.7 3s a game, while Kobe shoots 3.7. Which means that not shooting the 3 well wasn't very relevant, because he didn't do it as often. Although when he did, he shot it at basically the same rate as Kobe. 3. Despite Kobe and Jordan being almost identical in both their 3 point and FT shooting, Jordan actually has a significantly higher overall shooting percentage - .497 as opposed to .455. (That's basically the difference between shooting 50% and 45%.) Based on that, there is absolutely no reason to assume that Kobe is a better jump shooter. In fact, you can probably assume that he's worse. 4. What does "more versatile scorer" mean? Kobe gets his shots on drives to the basket, free throws, jump shots and post ups. Jordan did all of those at least as well as Kobe, and in nearly all cases, better. Jordan was also significantly better in transition. How is Kobe more versatile? 5. "More fundamentally sound and technical" - this is basically mumbo-jumbo. It has no real meaning. Jordan was a better defender (he was voted to the all defense team repeatedly and was, together with Gary Payton and Pippen, the best perimeter defender of the 90s), he was a better rebounder (6.2 vs. 5.3 career) and averaged more assists per game (5.3 vs. 4.7) than Kobe. Jordan averaged almost a steal more per game (.8), more blocks (by a very small margin, granted) and even committed fewer turnovers per game. In addition, Jordan was able to will a team with significantly less talent than Bryant's to a record 72 wins and three consecutive championships in 2 separate spans. That's despite retiring for nearly two full seasons in the middle of his prime and that's despite his numbers suffering significantly after he came back again for the Wizards; Kobe's per game numbers have yet to suffer any decline because he's still in the middle of his career. By any possible metric, Jordan was a better player than Kobe. Its not debateable.
TBH, I was grasping at straws trying to defend an argument I didn't even believe in myself. "10 Reasons Michael Jordan is Better Than Kobe Bryant" This article is a pretty comprehensive argument in favor of Jordan and uses scoring, rebounding, steals, FG%, assists, blocks, turnovers, off-court drama, marketability, and hardware to separate the two. Really though, the MJ vs. Kome debate is just taking us away from what the original debate was: Jordan's transcendency of the simple sport of basketball is what makes him one of the greatest athletes in American sports history.
Jordan was like Pele, in football ... yet so far no one had come close to be equal ... I'm glad you realize that ,,, Jordan was Maradona and Kobe was like Messi Jordan was like real Ronaldo and Kobe was like CRonaldo
Thank you Nice. I let that one slide as I generally refrain from discussing NBA history on BS. Along the lines of Hendrix's "transcendency" discussion, it is interesting how the person has to be matched with the time and the narrative of the period. An apolitical Jordan wouldn't have cut it in the late 1960's, just like a loud mouth braggart like Ali would have trouble today. I once read an article speculating that Ali couldn't be Ali today; how do you play the role of angry, defiant Black Man with Obama as president? And if he grew up today, Ali would be much more concerned with his global branding and licensing opportunities than anything else.
Yeah. Agree his antics would likely have harmed him today more than anything else (at least in the USA) since things have changed considerably since 2001.
Yes. He and Jesse Owens and Jack Johnson & Joe Louis too. When those guys did their thing they literally represented blacks, punch by punch, because there were very few others to do it in any walk of life. Even in documentaries, when I know the result, I get freaked out when they lose, knowing the importance to large parts of society. It went waaaaay past sports. Pele did something very similar for an international audience; I love all the hardcore Brazil fans in places like Haiti and Nigeria and the like. It was Pele/Brazil v The Man. If you just got your independence from a European colonial power, I would imagine it was nice to see a fellow homeboy kicking their @ss.
Pele is definitely the winner. Athlete of the Century, by Reuters News Agency: 1999 Athlete of the Century, elected by International Olympic Committee: 1999 FOOTBALL is more popular universally than basketball, and the competition through history much greater. billions of people all over the world play football. just compare the World Cup with the world championship in baskeball. the world cups have audiences as big as the olympic games!!! Pele also managed to stop a war in Nigeria in the 1960s