Scottie Pippen: LeBron ‘may be the greatest player to ever play’ - Ball Don't Lie - NBABlog - Yahoo! Sports
Surprised to hear this from a guy who although admittedly a first class player , owes his true success to Jordon. Without Jordon , the Bulls win zero championships during Pippens career.
Anyway , the way I see it , there are two distinct kinds of great players. Guys like James and Bryant and Jordon who as individuals had super skills and took matters into their own hands to win games. The other class is guys like Magic and Larry who although totally capable of stealing the spotlights for their individual skills , stressed teamwork as the ultimate achievement in BBall. Everyone around Larry and Magic looked twice as good just because these two guys knew how to use them as part of their teams to get the job done. And yes , with 10 seconds left in a tie game , they both were as or more dangerous to score a winning basket than James or Jordon or Bryant.
Another thing to point out is how strong the league was in the early and mid 80's when Bird and Johnson made their mark. Does anybody who knows BBall think that any team in the last 10 years could have survived a 7 game series against the 83 to 85 Celtics or Lakers? Not even a contest in todays watered down league and talent pool.
Anyway , I always remember the Pan Am games just before the first "Dream Team" Olympics. That was the only time Larry and Magic ever got to play significant minutes together on the same team. It was the most incredible BBall you will ever see. Bird and Magic passed the ball to eachother so well that even great players like Jordon and Barkley could not even follow the ball. I remember a stretch of lightning fast passes between Larry and Magic and then to Jordon where the ball hit Jordon in the face. He could not keep up with where the ball was going between Larry and Magics passes. Had some twist of fate put those two guys on the same NBA team in the 80's , they would have won all the championships in a row like Russels teams did in the late 50's and all through the 60's.
So anyway , people always think the highest scorers are the "Best Ever". In fact the best ever guys are the ones who made everyone on their team better in the effort to win the championship year after year after year. You give me Larry, Magic, Walton, Russel and Havlicek and you can have MJ, Lebron, Kobe and any other two guys you want and I'd bet my house on the team player's team , not the individual all stars.