There has been several different NBA legends does not believe MJ is the greatest . For example , on October 03 , 2013 6z NBA champion , 6x MVP Kareem Abdul Jabbar stated on ESPN Radio , “ " MJ was awesome , but I believe Oscar Robertson would kick him in the behind , Oscar had the brains , skills , and talent , he could box out guys six inches bigger than him. Who can average double figures in points assists and rebounds in the same year?" Another example would be Bill Walton when asked by a reporter on who was his toughest opponent was college , or pro , he replied , " Without hesitation Kareem Abdul Jabbar was the best I ever played against. Better than Magic Johnson , better than Larry Bird , and better than Michael Jordan. Also , when asked by a reporter on Michael Jordan , 4x MVP Wilt Chamberlain expressed his opinion by saying this , " If Michael was here now , I would say this to him: When you are so great that the league tries to change the rules in an attempt to stop you , then you claim you are the best. But every rule change I have seen during your career has been meant to enhance your game."
Another quote by Kareem was in a letter to Pippen , it said , "MJ had great athletic abilities , charisma , leadership , and has made basketball more popular . But in terms of greatness, MJ has to take a backseat to Wilt the Stilt." Then on the Dan Sileo Show Oscar Robertson explained his opinion on Jordan. "Michael Jordan won after Chicago got Scottie Pippen , Horace Grant , Phil Jackson , and other players to go along with him, because for a while they couldn't beat Detroit. The media has given Jordan nothing but spotlight and call him the greatest of all time. Is he the greatest of all time? No I do not think so." And this is coming from a guy who averaged a triple double in his second season. Even 1x FMVP Dr.J said on the show ESPN First Take , "I made this list when I was 14 and this is still my top 5 all time , Wilt , Bill , Oscar , West , Baylor." Also, even Kobe Bryant said , “ I am better than Michael Jordan , but second to Wilt Chamberlain as the greatest ever.” And long time Warriors statistician Harvey Pollack said that in one game he kept track of how many blocks Wilt had , and ended up with 26 , which was shown on tv in Wilt’s first year with the Lakers. So that is plenty of of legends that say MJ is not the GOAT. Another thing is that Scottie Pippen is underrated , records show that Jordan is 5-15 in the postseason without Pippen. Based on the Bulls games I have seen , it is Scottie who is quickly rotating on defense , helping out everyone else.
Jordan is known as a great finisher by hitting clutch shots , but in the 1996 NBA Finals facing the Seattle Supersonics , led by NBA HOF Gary Payton who is a great defensive point guard that guarded Jordan. So Jordan had a 2 inch and 30 pound advantage , but in Game 6 when the Bulls led 3-2 , Jordan got shut down shooting 5 of 23 , which is about 26 % and got 5 tovs , also it was not just Game 6 that he shot horrible , the whole series he shot 41%. And that is way too low for the supposive “ GOAT” since Michael normally shoots 50% , but dropped by nearly 10%. Another thing about ‘96 when the Bulls were 72-10 is that was when the league added 6 more teams which is about 80 more players , most of those players would not make the NBA teams if the league did not add more teams , so more teams = watered down league. Another myth was he just had two good teammates and the rest were scrubs. But according to Julius Erving those scrubs were Toni KuKoc the best player from Croatia , Luc Longley one of the best Australian players there was Steve Kerr a clutch role player , and a 3x champ Robert Parish who is a HOF. Than a year later his team once again made the Finals , but this time faced the Utah Jazz led by two legends named John Stockton , and Karl Malone. Anyways again in Game 6 Chicago leads 3-2 , but once MJ got locked down by Jeff Hornacek. But let’s see how he really did overall well he shot 15 of 35 which is 43% , but he did well on rebounds by getting 11, but only 4 assists is not enough.
Once again the same two teams would make the Finals the next year for a rematch. Same situation in Game 6 Chicago leads 3-2 , and Jordan gets shut down by Hornacek shooting 15 of 35 , and another embarrassing thing is he only got 1 rebound and 1 assist. But lucky for him , he got to the free throw line 15 times. And in the previous series against Indiana in the ECF , in Game 7 , being guarded by Reggie Miller , who is not known for his defense , yet managed to make Jordan shoot 36% , he went 9 of 25 but lucky for him he again shot exactly 15 free throws , which is is a little suspicious that whenever ordan is shooting horrible , he gets a lot of free throws , which same thing happened to Kobe in Game 7 in 2010 Finals. But going back to the 1996 Bulls , according to Julius Erving once stated , “ The 80’s Laker , Celtics or even Detroit could beat any of the 90’s Bulls” This was said in ‘96 right before a game started , not to mention that Jordan is 0-6 vs Bird and the Celtics in the playoffs. And thank goodness Jordan had Pippen , who else would have guarded Magic in the ‘91 Finals? Also the Bulls got lucky that Worthy and Scott both got injured in Game 1 , but still Magic outplayed Jordan.
And agreed by Larry Bird that if the 80’s Lakers faced the 96 Bulls , LA would win in 6 since Kareem is such a huge factor , especially with Magic in his prime , and Worthy , Cooper , and Worthy healthy and young. And I doubt the 80’s Celtics would lose to the Bulls with a DPOY Dennis Johnson , and decent defender Ainge in the backcourt , with 2X MVP Bird , HOF McHale , HOF Parish in the front court along with 1x FMVP Walton and 1x FMVP Cedrick off the bench , with a coach named KC Jones who won 10 titles as a player. Now let’s talk about how Jordan got help by the refs in the 98 Finals , well most sportswriters has agreed Jordan did push off of Byron Russell which should be an offensive foul. Or how about when there was a bogus shot clock violation on a Howard Eisley 3 in second quarter: replays showed the shot ball was 8 feet from the end of Eisley's hand when the shot clock expired in Game 2. Or how about when Pippen’s back was in such bad shape , that if there was a Game 7 he more than likely have to sit out , but remember Jordan is 5-15 without Pippen in the playoffs , so more than likely the refs wanted the Bulls to win it in Game 6 while Pippen was playing. But let us not forget that once he retired in 1993 , Chicago only lost 2 more games!!! So despite losing the “greatest” the Bulls only lost 2 more games , you would think after losing an all time great like MJ you would lose more games.
The officiating has been a joke for years now , for example , just look at how the refs treated the Milwaukee Bucks in game 5 of the 2001 Eastern Finals after they took a 16 point lead. Not to mention how David Stern was seen hugging Dikembe Mutombo after the Sixers won game 4 in Milwaukee. Stern was quoted as saying "The Bucks will get respect next year" what is that supposed to mean? Further more , Scott Williams of the Bucks took a flagrant foul on Allen Iverson in Game 6, after which the officials did not feel it warranted ejection from the game. After the Bucks won game 6 David Stern suspended Williams from game 7 in Philadelphia. Why did Stern suspend Williams from game 7? The Game 6 refs felt he did not need to be tossed out when the foul occurred. The answer is simple: Stern wanted Philadelphia and not Milwaukee in the 2001 NBA Finals. since he knew more people rather see Shaq and Kobe vs Allen Iverson and Dikembe rather than Ray Allen. Wilt also went on further to discuss how players of his day did not have the luxury of regular National T.V. broadcasts to promote their talents to the public. Modern players have the luxuries of chartered jets, first class hotels, modern sports medicine, fewer games on back-to-back nights, illegal defenses, looser rules governing assists, the 3 point line and superstars getting preferential treatment from referees. 1960's refs such as Don Murphy and Tom Birch freely admit that they let players foul Wilt Chamberlain when he did not have the ball "to help them"defend him.
What records does Jordan even hold , and what is it that makes him so over hyped? He does not have most points , rebounds , assists , steals , blocks , most minutes or games played , not the best defensive guard , not the most clutch player. So if Jordan is not the greatest , then who is? Well that is debatable , but one great example would be Wilt Chamberlain. Just let the numbers speak out. Wilt led the league in scoring seven times , led the league in rebounds 11 times , and also led the league in assists at an average of 8.7 , which became to the only center even to this day to lead or even come close on being the assists leader. Also in his second year Wilt broke more records by averaging just over 50 points a game , playing 48 minutes a game , and shooting around 72% a game. He also hold the record for most points scored in a game which is 100 , most rebounds 55 , most assists by a center which is 21 , first and only person to get a 20 20 20 game. Chamberlain also led the league in minutes played 8 times!!! But most Jordan supporters would reply with Wilt's height advantage , but let us not forget that Kareem was bigger than most centers back in his day , also that Shaq was bigger and stronger than all centers in his career , which was also a time where all the big men had disappeared . So does that mean their success does not count since they too had a height advantage?
According to Bill Simmons Wilt is the greatest in the regular - season , but many ignorant NBA fans try to minimize Wilt's greatness by claiming Wilt shrunk in the playoffs by saying his scoring average dropped , but his fg% went up , and Jordan’s fg% dropped in the playoffs. But of course they never do their research and ignore the facts I will share. Wilt has the the highest Total Offensive Production in playoff history by averaging 22.5 points , 24.5 rebounds , and 4.3 assists. Also , Wilt led the league in scoring in his first seven seasons , and led the Warriors to the playoffs six out of his first seven years , and he averaged 33 and 27 with a fg% of 51 , in which statistics show that during that time span the average player shot 43%. He is ranked 5th all time in triple doubles in postseason history with 9. But one interesting thing that gained my interest was out of the 142 times Bill Russell faced Wilt , Wilt averaged 29 and 29 , while Bill averaged 24 and 14. And I always thought Bill was such a great defender. The most points Wilt scored on Bill was 62 in 1962 , and scored more than 50 points in six other games. WOW.
Another funny thing is Wilt holds the record for most rebounds in a game, which is 55 , but it turns out that that happened against Bill Russell in 1960. Now a lot of fans say Kareem is better than Wilt , but in the 11 playoff games they faced against each other Wilt had the best game 7 of those 11 games. And when they faced in the 1971'72 WCF Wilt averaged 22 and 20 shooting 49 % , while in Game 3-6 Wilt has blocked exactly 33 shots in 4 games , which is an average of 8.25 blks a game. Also to show how much of a great defender Wilt was , he held Kareem to shooting 42% during Game 3-6. And that is why the Lakers won that series. Out of all the Game 7's Wilt has played which is 9 , he averaged 25 and 27 , shooting 62% , and averaged 27 and 26 in 35 games facing elimination games. While holding his opponent to 14 points and he is 24-11 facing elimination.
Wilt has faced HOF centers 105 out of 106 playoff games , and was never out rebounded in any series which was 29 series. People also say that Wilt didn't have much competition , but let's look at all the games Wilt faced another HOF center in his rookie season. When facing Willis Reed the 1970 FMVP , Wilt averaged 38 points , compared to Reed's 22. When facing Walt Bellamy Wilt averaged 44 points while Walt averaged 27 points. Now when whenever Wilt faced Wes Unseld he never actually dropped 30 points due ti Wes's great defense , but Wilt still got 22 points holding Unseld to 11 points. Then to the final match up between Kareem and Wilt , Wilt averaged 25 points , and Kareem averaged 23 points.
Here is more proof that Wilt did not shrunk in playoff time. In the 1967 Eastern Division Semis vs Oscar's Royals , Wilt averaged 28, 26, 11, 10.2 and shooting 62%. Then in the Eastern Divisional Finals vs Bill Russell's Celtics , he averaged 21, 30, 7.4 and 10 on 56% , which ends in a loss to the San Francisco Warriors in the Finals led by NBA legend Nate Thurmond , but still averaged 18, 28, 10 and 7 on a fg% of 56. Just his playoffs stats in '67 is 22 , 29 , 9.2 , 9,4 . Now let us look at his achievements and accomplishments that I did not mention such as 2x champ , 1x FVMP , 4x MVP , 13x All Star , won ASG MVP , ROY , 7x All NBA Team , 3x 2ND NBA TEAM , GS's all time leading scorer , retired jersey number by Warriors and Lakers , the list can go on. Not to mention he never fouled out of a game before.
Here is more quotes on Wilt's dominance " He can score anytime he wants to. How can we defend him?" - Ed MacAuley. "Nobody can or will accomplish what Wilt has done. He is the greatest all around center of all time" - Rick Barry. When asked on who would he pick to build a team , Rick Barry replied , " Wilt Chamberlain , because he is the greatest big man of all time. Jordan is the greats two guard , but to say he is better than Chamberlain is ludicrous , it is ludicrous , nobody will ever come close to what Wilt has done. Now we’ll compare MJ to Wilt. Scoring goes to Wilt , rebounding goes to Wilt , passing is close , but Wilt did led the league in ast and got 21 assists in one game. Blocks it goes to Wilt , and Wilt got more steals in one game than MJ , but steals go to Jordan. Chamberlain owns 71 NBA records; he has sole possession of 62 of them. Even at age of 36 , Wilt averaged 47 minutes a game!!!!! And still managed to get 20 rebounds.
People will say well he only averaged 10 points in the playoffs , but what they do not realize is that he only attempted 7 shots when he was 36. Plus he played with other great scorers such as Jerry West , Elgin Baylor , and Gail Goodrich.
