MICHAEL JORDAN: 40 pts\15 rebs\9 asts vs New York Knicks (1989 ECSF Game 3)

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"MICHAEL JORDAN: THE LEGEND OF THE GREATEST (Final Version)"
(5 hours and 5 minutes dedicated to the G.O.A.T.
• MICHAEL JORDAN: THE LE...

[@jordanlover23]

Jordan put on a ballhandling CLINIC in this series, routinely bringing the ball up against full court pressure and breaking traps, triple teams etc. Watch any game from this series and you'll see it. Dude was making the Knicks look like stooges throughout the series with his handle, running guys into one another etc. Easily the best handling SG of his era from '85-'93.

[@cyber6sapien]

playoff average :35 pts, 7 rebs, 8 assists, 3 steals. Yet some people are saying Lebron is better.

[@danzieltaylor6394]

This was the bulls coming together for the next 3yr facing two ruff defense team the Knicks and the pistion

[@theyinkaquadri]

The man's speed, agility and footwork is remarkable. And witnessing his ballhandling is PURE art.

[@CoreyF84]

Here's a comprehensive argument I crafting concluding that Jordan was on a different level than Lebron. This game illustrates a number of points I made. Let's start the comparison between the two by looking at their respective macro accomplishments and statistics. Jordan won 6 finals and 6 finals MVPs to Lebron’s 2 and 2 respectively. Jordan won 10 scoring titles to Lebron's 1. Jordan won a defensive player of the year award to Lebron's 0. Jordan lead the league in steals 3 time to Lebron's 0. Jordan was a 5 time league MVP to Lebron's 4. In Jordan's best scoring season, he averaged 37.1 points per game. In Lebron's best scoring season, he averaged 30.0 points per game. The 88-89 season brought Jordan's best rebound and assist totals, averaging 8.0 per game in each category (he also averaged over 32 points per game that year). Lebron's best rebounds per game output in a season was 7.9, and his best assist per game output in a season was 8.6. Now let's turn to an advanced analytics discussion as it helps eliminate some confounding variables, like their quality of teammates. PER, or Player Efficiency Rating, is probably the best measure of a player's dominance over the league. Jordan tops Lebron in that area, even when including his years with the Wizards. Through age 30, Jordan had a career PER of 29.8; Lebron is 30 and has a career PER of 27.7. Anyone who is familiar with the PER statistic understands that a 2 point career difference is tantamount to an entirely different level of greatness. Advancing the advanced analytics discussion (pun intended), where PER is a measure of a player's dominance over the league, Win shares per 48 minutes looks to a player's total contributions to his team. Once again, Jordan trumps Lebron even when factoring in his two seasons with the Wizards. Through age 30, Jordan had a win share per 48 minutes of .273. Through age 30, Lebron has a win share per 48 minutes of .240. Once again, a decisive advantage goes to Jordan (9% greater win share per 48 minutes to be precise). Of course, you can clearly see how Jordan was able to attain a decisive analytical advantage over Lebron when watching his game film. Go back and watch mid 80s to early 90s game film on youtube; there are plenty of full games in addition to game highlight tapes. In each and every game you will see Jordan make a move, series of movies, and/or shots that Lebron could only dream of emulating. Jordan played with discernibly more creativity, fluidity, and agility than Lebron. In particular, pay attention to the way in which Jordan attacked double and triple teams despite the LEGAL hand checking that defenders employed against him throughout his era. Sure enough, the NBA abolished hand checking from the game for the stated purpose of "opening up the game." Lebron, by contrast, immediately passes when double teamed 95 percent of the time. Jordan routinely made Triples look like a half defender on route to scoring highlight real bucket after highlight real bucket. The game film and statistical record also unequivocally demonstrate that Jordan was a significantly more accurate jump shooter than Lebron (even when fading away over two guys). Did Lebron even hit a jump shot in this year's playoffs (facetious, but you get the point)? Indeed, Lebron is a 37% shooter on jump shots between 15-20 feet for his career (basketball reference shot finder). While the shot finder app only goes back to the early 2000s, we know that Jordan in the 2002-2003 season, at the age of 40 with the Wizards, shot over 42% on jumpers between 15-20 feet That differential would obviously be exacerbated if we could look at Jordan's mid range jump shot statistics while he was in his prime. If Lebron took his inferior jumper to Jordan's generation, you would see his points per game and overall shooting percentage vastly decrease. In the 80s and 90s teams ubiquitously stacked the paint with 3-5 defenders to stop the games best scorers (in particular, to stop Jordan). They were able to do so because the game had yet to evolve stretch 4s and 3 point specialists to spread the court. Making matters more difficult for guys like Jordan, the illegal defense rule was the only regulation designed to stop teams from stacking the paint. The rule, however, was very vague and difficult to enforce. Consequently, teams simply ignored it. As such, a late 80s/90s Lebron would have had to rely on an efficient jump shot to dominate the game. As the figures demonstrate, Lebron has seldom been able to perform on such reliance. Today, perimeter players, like Lebron, are the beneficiaries of stretch 4s, like Chris Bosh, and a clear-cut, easily-enforceable defensive 3 seconds rule. The Jordan advantage is just as salient with respect to their defensive abilities. Jordan had the quickest hands and most adept anticipation skills in the game. He was also a tenacious shot blocker. Jordan lead the league in steals three times and won a defensive player of the year award, neither of which Lebron will ever accomplish. In terms of advanced analytics, Jordan's steal percentage was greater than Lebron's has been, and, through the age of 30, his block percentage was greater as well. I don't even think you can give a rebounding edge to Lebron, despite his size. Yes, his defensive rebounding percentage is greater than Jordan's was, but how often does Lebron work for his rebounds? He usually just cherry picks easy boards that could easily be picked up by his teammates (I will concede that it makes sense for his teammates to let Lebron grab the rebounds so that he can begin to initiate the offense going the other way). Indeed, one's ability to garner OFFENSIVE rebounds is a much better metric for evaluating a player as a fundamental, physical rebounder, and Jordan's offensive rebounding percentage was greater than Lebron's has been. The one, and only, decisive advantage that Lebron has over Jordan is his assist percentage. Having said that, Jordan routinely made just as phenomenal of passes as Lebron has. The distinction arises from Jordan's score first mentality his relative lack of playing time at the point guard position. To substantiate that claim, you just need to look at the series of 11 games in the 88-89 season in which Doug Collins experimented with Jordan at the point guard position. During that stretch, Jordan had triples doubles in 10 of the 11 games, including a run of 7 consecutive triple doubles. Further, Jordan didn't play with stretch 4s and a multitude of 3 point specialists to cheaply boost his assist totals. To give Lebron credit, I have ENORMOUS respect for the way in which he took himself out of his comfort zone in the 2015 NBA Finals. He needed to become a score first leader for his team to have a chance, and that mentality manifested as 2 victories. Having said that, he shot under 40% despite getting tons of isolations and great looks throughout the series. The dude just couldn't hit anything outside of 5 feet. People want to compare Lebron's 2015 Finals to Jordan's 93 finals. The media loves generating these comparisons to gain viewership, and, after all, this was the statistically most impressive finals Lebron has had. Well, Jordan averaged 41 points per game in 93, 6 points higher than Lebron in 2015. More importantly, Jordan shot 50.8% from the field in 93, 11 percent higher than Lebron in 2015. While 2015 Finals Lebron out rebounded Jordan's 93 Finals' effort, most of Lebron's rebounds were easy, cherry picked boards. Jordan had a 6.3% OFFENSIVE rebound percentage in the 93 Finals compared to Lebron's 4.2% offensive rebound percentage in the 2015 Finals. As such, the series comparison simply isn't legitimate. Lastly, Jordan decidedly trumps Lebron in the clutch/killer instinct category. Jordan never lost a finals series because of his ability to close out games in the last few minutes of the fourth quarter. NBA fans during the Jordan era knew that when the Bulls were playing and the game was on the line, Jordan would take over the game and, more often than not, succeed in doing so. With Lebron, you never know what you're going to get. Sometimes he'l play aggressively down the stretch, whereas other times he will persistently pass off the game's most important possessions to his team's more ancillary players. This style of play has not gone without consequence. Indeed, Lebron's inability to raise his game in the 4th quarter cost his team the 2011 NBA Finals. Throughout that series, he averaged just 3 points a game in the final period. When Lebron has taken the clutch shots, he has failed significantly more often than not; he has shot 37-122 in the regular season, for just over 30%, when shooting to tie or take the lead with 24 or seconds or less in 4th the quarter or overtime and his team tied or tailing by 3 or less. In the playoffs, he is 8/23, for 34.7%,, under the same circumstances. Jordan, in the playoffs under those circumstances was 9 of 18 for 50% (regular season stats not available to my knowledge). Indeed, in basketball, the definition of clutch is shooting the same percentage in clutch situations as in non-clutch situations. Given that Jordan was a roughly 50 percent career jump shooter with the Bulls, his 50% clutch shooting percentage in the playoffs is what you would expect from an all time clutch player. Lebron, by contrast, has shot the ball significantly worse than his average when the game has been on the line. In summation, Jordan was a more tenacious offensive and defensive player than Lebron. He played the game with more creativity, versatility, fluidity, and agility than Lebron. Perhaps most importantly, Jordan was a greater winner than Lebron will ever be. All of these claims can be objectively substantiated through a detailed review of the statistical and game film record. For all of the aforementioned reasons, the career comparisons between the two are completely unfounded. It's simple; Jordan was on a different level than Lebron has ever been. p.s. Jordan didn't have to announce to the media that he was the greatest player in the NBA. His game spoke for itself.

[@PowerGearPerformance]

Love you man.. very complete and comprehensive anaylsis. In summation, Jordan was/is the better player.

[@CoreyF84]

Appreciate dude!

[@1CHOZN7]

Awesome bruh! I never could understand the comparison to anyone especially not LeBron! MJ was on a different level!!

[@peacefulmind1409]

+Corey D Some People saw Lebron has done a lot of crazy drives and dunks, so they start to think Lebron is probably better than MJ. And at the same time, they know nothing about how the rule changes in the past 20 years that can affect how player could play today. Many people do not know that today’s rules protect guards SF and help them to attack the rim, that is why you see today‘s drives, layups and dunks are more often. The former NBA president Stu Jackson also have confessed the fact that rules changed to help outside players to attack the rim and this makes today‘s game looks better to attract more audiences globally. So most people watch NBA only for fun, it is difficult for them to understand deeper. I watched tons of MJ and Lebron's game, and I am pretty sure that MJ is better than Lebron in terms of individual ability.

[@CoreyF84]

Yep. I condensed my argument and cleaned it up a bit for publication. Therein, I emphasized the valid point you have raised. www.drinkfive.com/general/item/292-michael-jordan-v-lebron-james-the-verdict-is-in-and-jordan-wins

[@boogieloo1831]

What's amazing is that these incredible performances are in the playoffs. Magic Johnson called MJ the greatest ever because he always elevated his game on the highest stage.

[@AHMAD-2324]

The greatest Athlete/Basketball player of All-time!

[@stephcurrytheg.o.a.t]

Ahmad2423 he not a better athlete than LeBron. You could argue basketball tho

[@AHMAD-2324]

Steph Curry The G.O.A.T Nowhere near the athlete that Jordan was. Bigger yes, but the combination of speed, strength, agility, leaping ability, endurance and stamina. I'll take a prime MJ over any Athlete in his Prime. IMO he was that dominant on both ends of the floor.

[@larryg1481]

Jordan's passing skills are very underrated dude threw no look passes like Magic Johnson with ease

[@mikemcgrath6150]

Did that but I thought his passing out of double team to shooters was sometimes lazy. Not crisp and allowed defense to recover.

[@tokingcircle]

after looking at the comments below...yes 7 finals appearances is better than 6 but remember 2009 and 2010 finals? kobe bricked (about 41% FG)..and 6-0 is better than 5-2 and better yet, 6 finals mvp is better than 2..

[@lauwc1997]

Leborn? No where near.

[@peacefulmind1409]

Some People saw Lebron has done a lot of crazy drives and dunks, so they start to think Lebron is probably better than MJ. And at the same time, they know nothing about how the rule changes in the past 20 years that can affect how player could play today. Many people do not know that today's rules protect guards SF and help them to attack the rim, that is why you see today's drives, layups and dunks are more often. The former NBA president Stu Jackson also have confessed the fact that rules changed to help outside players to attack the rim and this makes today‘s game looks better to attract more audiences globally. So most people watch NBA only for fun, it is difficult for them to understand deeper. I watch tons of MJ and Lebron's game, and I am pretty sure that MJ is better than Lebron in terms of individual ability.

[@peacefulmind1409]

Let us forget about rings, MJ is still the better player than Lebron.

[@ricardolozano6265]

mj vs the pistons and the knicks very physical teams

[@popeyeisgood]

i love that you include that little dribbling exhibition of his at the end of the game. mj's ball handling in high speed is unreal. no one in the history of nba has that same kind of reflex and footwork plus big palms and long arm all in one player like mj had. and he is 6'6.. damn

[@kingbee1048]

Kobe = 2 finals MVP's MJ = 6

[@futureicon23]

This has got to be one of MJ's greatest games that was never mentioned...

[@CoreyT127]

The following game too!

[@suppaman12]

He has countless of these..

[@alaskanmarine1]

9:23 my all time favorite MJ move.

[@cyber6sapien]

Except Jordan did this when teams were actually allowed to play real defense.

[@adaonetube]

Jordan all over the floor this game!

[@BrunoLS09]

You got to love him. Hands down for the GOAT!

[@ChrisSr84]

A lot of highlights on "Michael Jordan's Playground" video came from this game ;)

[@cplath]

those are the people who didn't witness what greatness is all about. Were sorry for them.

[@diamenz]

love the announcer - michaaaaaeeeeel jordan!

[@brandedmcgowan9414]

The prelude to the 90s rivalry, mostly NBC has the best Knicks vs Bulls playoff drama. CBS was golden with NBA coverage but didn't care for it like NBC did, CBS Sports was thinking too much about MLB and it cost them dearly as well as the NFL's NFC package.

[@blackadam06]

@adikillah More appearances don't mean anything if U don't win 'em...

[@Byun_David]

Jordan lookin like a ballerina out there dancing his way to victory sheesh

[@lokey987]

Jordan is better than Lebron but there was a playoffs where Lebron avg 35pts 9 reb 7 ast 1.6 stls for the whole playoffs (14 games). Thats pretty impressive.

[@colemanmichaelwhite3167]

Thanks for you tube u will never see a player like Jordan again

[@cdplaya1973]

35-7-8-3 hell of a stat line

[@tommybrown187]

this when it was AIR jordan

[@nihatkayar3170]

Share the GOAT.

[@archerseo]

One of the most amazing things about MJ was how he never seemed to phone it in. Like on EVERY SINGLE PLAY! He was going to kick you butt on every play and try to dunk on the whole team. Aggressive Basketball play is MJ in the dictionary

[@cplath]

Monster numbers or shall i say Jordan numbers, damn

[@omardabo1287]

That shot at 8:00 mark. "How do ya like that"? . They're crazy to think any player is close this 😳 man. He is the best to ever play the game of basketball

[@lopiaz123]

Alberto why don't you upload videos of a famous basket ball player den you little troll

[@leonblack751]

This guy is worth every penny .Goat

[@ninjabomb9346]

playoff Jordan 4's.... the dopest

[@part6133]

New York did not play Bad boy defense they just played regular defense. That usually loses to Jordan next level offense

[@brandedmcgowan9414]

Not til Pat Riley arrived in 1991-92 to copy the Chuck Daly Jordan rules defense

[@HOTRAILProductions]

02:03 "Oh Shit!"

[@goodvibrations6]

i think jordan never had triple double in playoffs. correct me if i am wrong.

[@purplemonkeydishwasher4241]

Just off the top of my head, Jordan had a triple double in game 1 of this same series against the Knicks.

[@CoreyT127]

Man Jordan would shoot 25 ft's a game in today's creampuff league!

[@skinom23]

@adikillah MJ = 6 finals appearances all won finals mvp,all won the finals Kobe= 7 finals apperances,2 finals mvp,currently swept by the Mavs..

[@cacak1234]

@skinom23 so u say 6 appearances are better then 7 in the finals ..thats rediculous ! m.j wasnt in the NBA for 6 season , so that it would be a perfect 100%

[@simonheester]

@AlbertoEntertainment Be happy these are being uploaded punk!

[@h0opman]

@adikillah yea dude, what is your point?

[@h0opman]

what are jordans stats for this game?

[@FlockaDebo]

@adikillah and you're point is!

[@rmur23]

"MJ could never put up 40/15/9 like Lebron!!" ummm....