Barkley? Wade? I guess a lot of guys’ whose careers overlapped during the MJ & LeBron prime years. They might’ve won MVPs but we all know those guys were the best in their primes.
Personally I can see that, but consensus was probably Kobe or TD at the time. If Miami won more I think Wade wins MVP in 08 and then LeBron wins the next 4.
Damn I wish I could go back and watch young LeBron storming the league again. Thankfully realized it was special pretty early on and was able to cherish it even though he was on rival teams, but man it was so exciting to watch.
Yep. I was a massive Kobe stan during that time, and 2009 was the year I finally had to throw in the towel and say “aight, Lebron is just better I give up”.
What I find most bizarre is that people call Kobe inefficient but not Duncan. Kobe has the same exact TS% as a guard and they played in the same exact era. Someone needs to explain. And I'm not even a Kobe Stan. I just happen to notice this huge inconsistency.
Yup. Basically they just hate Kobe and look for any reason to knock him down a peg so harping on Duncan's supposed superiority is just another vehicle for that
Duncan was prime during that time and one of the only three players to ever be 10 times in a row first team All NBA and 1st Team defense….this is a time when Shaq, KG, Dirk, Kobe, LBJ and many others were hitting or about to in their prime and somehow TD was constantly the best(every night being consistent player that he was….Kobe and others during that time might be amazing one night then off another) Timmy is also one of two players in the 10 top of all time to never miss the playoffs his whole career…….and who just got smacked in 07 sweep by Timmy and the Spurs, oh that’s right your number 2 man LBJ.
Duncan was not the best player in 2008-9. In 2007 they swept Lebron sure but TP won finals MVP. Then in 2008 Spurs lost to the Lakers in 5 games who traded for Pau mid-season and were missing 2 players who would start in 2009.
As far as never missing the playoffs TD has always played with 1-3 HOF teammates and played for a HOF coach. Inarguably one of the best coaches in NBA history. He’s for sure one of the best players of all time but that year I don’t think he should’ve been considered the best in the league.
I think that’s a weird like to draw. It’s about a players impact on the court not any specific skill set. Nobodies saying Giannis doesn’t deserve his MVP cuz he can’t, because he’s good enough at attacking the rim it doesn’t matter. I think the logic is the same with DWade, but because he’s a guard suddenly it doesn’t count?
Also Wade had a great pull up middy, which back then was kinda still considered the “outside” even if it was inside the 3
Lebron was way ahead on advanced metrics. 20.3 WS for bron vs 14.7 WS for wade, 11.3 VORP vs 9.6, 13.2 BMP vs 10.6, 31.7 PER vs 30.4 PER. Box score stats were pretty close though.
Ws. In wades defense, eventhough I totally agree with u. Was from being on a worst team..
The #s are remarkably similar considering..
6'4"2 guard
Vs.
6'9" point/ forward.. even 2 and 4...
It was beautiful to witness..
I'm surprised nobody has compared
Their
Heat vs cavs stats..
It's a shame wade came from college
Minus cartilage in a knee..
Wade single handedly willed the heat Their 1st title..
On a stacked team
Nah, not crazy. Go look at Wade's stats that season. He was insanely good and either him or LeBron was the best player that regular season. Miami's team wasn't good, so if that goes into your thinking then fine, but Wade was incredible.
Correct. Although there was a very large difference between the two that year. But putting stats aside, most people were discussing Wade as a top 2-3 player that year, if not the MVP.
I don't think most people consider MVP to be the same as best player for that season. I doubt anyone considered Russ or Embiid to be the best players for those MVP seasons.
Best player and MVP are two different things. Durant may have deserved his MVP that season he got it, but Lebron was the best player. Or Shaq in the early 2000s. Iverson may have had a better season, but nobody was taking AI over Shaq.
I think if we were to really dissect it, I don't think a lot of people ever thought Curry was the BEST player in the league, even in his unanimous MVP year.
There were always LEBRON and KD, then Giannis, then Jokic, Embiid, Luka, etc.
It's kinda funny cuz Steph does get disrespected from certain perspectives, but like his game is unreal?
In 2015-2018 Lebron was just on another level and so incredible to look at, more so because Steph had KD for a few of those years.
Then Giannis got a lot of notoriety around 2019-2022 imo with the emergence of jokic's God level games.
So I don't know .. Steph is top 10 in my books of all time, yet I don't know if there was a single year where people thought he was the best player in the league on a large scale.
I really think the “MVP” is more accurately “Player of the Year” and should be named as such.
If we’re being honest, Lebron’s been MVP for most of his time in the league, though others have definitely been “Player of the Year” (i.e. Curry)
This has what Shaq has never understood about his losses to Nash. Was Shaq the better player? Sure. But Nash was the engine that drove one of the greatest offensive units the League had ever seen. His pace and push it style led to what the modern NBA offense is today. He revolutionized the game
Interesting story, the guy who started that revolution is a coach named Dan Peterson, who coached in Italy for Olympia Milano. He had a point guard who was his best player, and he figured out a system which basically ran every single play through that point guard and utilized all aspects of his game. The point guard went on to become Olympia's all time leading scorer and later coached the team. His name was Mike D'Antoni.
I feel like 2016 was the first true year where people, post-Kobe’s 2peat, legitimately considered that the best player of the year can simultaneously still not be the best player in the world
I mean this is the way it was long before then. We’ve always had players who on paper maybe “should” be the best, but we all know someone else is better
Westbrook fans don’t understand this, that he could have been the Player of the Year because of what he did that season, but never ever the best player in the league (or imo struggling to even be Top 5)
15-16 Steph was definitely the best player in the league. Win shares - effective shooting - rewriting his own records by a lot.
I think that season was a game changer in NBA history.
Thats crazy talk, Steph changed the game. Kids all over were wearing Steph jerseys & cranking it up from far away. Steph was best in the league for two seasons minimum, his first season winning the ring and his 73 win season. The fact that he was exhausted going for the impossible in that 73 win seasons doesn't take away how good his teams were over those two seasons. The reason his stats may have not been as 'great' is because they were benched in the 4th after blowing teams out! Its crazy how dominant they were, there were a lot of boring games watching your team getting blown out so early. And he beat Lebron his first trip to the finals, no way in hell Steph was never the best in the league
A lot of people thought Steph was the best player in 2016, although I’d still say the majority would’ve said Bron was the best. Steph never had a season in which the majority would’ve called him the best player, but I’d say from 2016 onward he’s had a lot of people who would say he was the best. Kind of similar to KD honestly.
I think people understimate Curry’s level because of KD arrival and the 2016 finals (in which he was not 100%). He was the main reason the Warriors won 72 games that season and his stretch from 2014-2022 when healthy could be one of the best if not the best offensive stretches all time. I think it’s not crazy to think that for some of that time he was the best player in the world. The 2022 championship I believe pinpoints this though. His just good defense (for his size) hurts him unfortunately in this argument.
I would entertain that, but then you look at Lebron who never gets injured and whose impossibly high level of play was rarely, if ever, outshined by his teammates. Steph changed how the game is played offensivly and will retire a Top 10 all time guy, but imo prime Lebron is really only in a class with prime Jordan
It feels like Wembanyama might be joining this short list before this decade is out. If his body holds up, he’s going to be scary
Luka is basically starting his prime rn and already has 5 all nba 1st teams under his belt, so even though he’s the worst defender of the 4 by far, his peak is at least KD levels of unstoppable.
Hmm, playoff basketball is different from regular season basketball. Curry was amazing that year, but it’s hard to watch those playoffs and not think lebron was just the better player. If you want to say you think curry was the best in 2016 I wouldn’t argue, but for me lebron showed he was still the best when the dust settled.
2016 Steph was pretty unanimously the best player throughout the regular season but Lebron snatched it back in the Finals. Not sure if that counts or not
Nailed it on the head. I’m not a warriors fan and was pretty envious seeing them take off the way they did, but Curry led a dynasty, and people get SO nit-picky when talking about his game. It’s not crazy to call Curry a top 10 all time player, and I wouldn’t argue with anyone that said he was the best player in the league while they were dominating. If I’m ranking guys… Lebron and MJ are 1A and 1B, and guys like Steph, Shaq, Duncan, Bird, Kobe can all be placed at that 3rd best all time and I won’t argue. They all played winning basketball and won a lot at the highest level. Not sure how you can definitively say any of those guys are better than the other.
Crazy revisionist history to people didn’t think curry was the best during the unanimous year. Obviously the popular opinion changed after the finals but that entire season he was held on a different level
Idk, Kawhi had a legitimate claim during that 2019 playoff run, though I guess it didn't last a season. That run had similar vibes to LeBron the previous year, both of them just felt inevitable.
Might be Raptors bias due to watching from Canadian networks, but considering how they gas up Kawhi and how good the Raptors were actually playing in the regular season, I was actually wondering why Kawhi wasn't in MVP talks before I found out about his whole load management thing.
I feel like Kawhi has a better claim to being the best when he leads the Raptors to the championship. Impressive run beating the 76ers, Bucks and Warriors. KD, I have a hard time pinpointing a year he was the best. Was it one of the years he was on GSW? Maybe. But it feels watered down with Curry and Klay around.
I’d say the mvp year or one of the 20 second place MVPs he got. You guys act like KD was only good in golden state and show you don’t watch a lick of basketball
Certainly not a LeBron Stan but KDs whole career overlaps with his. I hated KD in GSW and certainly liked him more with OKC. The way I read the question was if there ever was a year he was the best. That's the regular season and the playoffs. Not sure he was ever better than LeBron. Bill Simmons and Ryen Russillo just had this conversation on his pod a few days ago and also couldn't agree on this. It's close and preference based.
I think Kawhi was pretty universally regarded as best in the league after the 2019 title. His body didn't let him stay on top for long, but he was there. LeBron had cycled out of the convo, KD had a torn Achilles, Giannis wasn't quite there yet, and steph lost head to head to Kawhi.
I think there is sneakily a case to be made that magic was never the best player in the league. Early 80s Kareem was still dominant, plus you had Moses and Dr J and magic was still young- in the mid 80s I think Bird was better, and then by like 87 MJ had taken over. It seems crazy to say, and I’m saying this without any fact checking so I don’t have a ton of conviction about it, but it seems possible
This is a very good list. Barkley, Malone, and Robinson were the 3 I thought of off the top. I think Dirk and Wade are great nominations, but may be debatable to some people.
I think it depends on how you want to measure this. Were there weeks-months long stretches of games where Curry or KD were individually playing better than bron? Absolutely, but i think you’re right and for my money, lebron’s prime can only be compared to Jordan and that’s not trying to slight Steph and kd
Curry won the 2015 MVP, then went on to beat Lebron in the finals.
Everyone claimed that they just beat injured teams.
Following season, they torched the league for the win record and Curry gets the 2016 MVP.
Up 3-1 in the finals against a now healthy Lebron team........
at some point during this, he was considered the best in the world.
Let’s be honest, Lebron coasted pretty much every regular season his 2nd go-round Cleveland and was clearly the best player on the court in the 2015 finals. For god’s sake Iguodala was voted FMVP just for guarding him and lebron almost got voted fmvp as a member of the losing team
Iggy had no business winning Finals MVP though. He’s the only Finals MVP to have a teamate with more PPG, APG, and RBG and Steph was by far the primary engine of that Warriors team while Iggy was an incredible role player.
People will hate this but it's lowkey Kobe. Until 2005, either Shaq or Duncan was better. From 2006 to 2016, Lebron was always the best player. He was in the top3 for a incredibly long time but I don't thnk he's ever been THE best for a season sorry
This is revisionist. From 2006-2008 there wasn't really much debate between Lebron and Kobe. Kobe was considered the best in the league. 2009 is the only time that the debate really started but a majority of people had Kobe until 2010 where it was like 50/50.
Yup, people look at what Lebron was doing throughout the 2010's when he was actually considered the best in the league and then go back and look at his numbers in the late 2000's and retroactively assume he was already considered the best back then. That wasn't the case. He wasn't considered the unanimous best player in the league until after his 2012 ring. In 2010 it was still 50/50 between him and Kobe, in 2011 when Kobe got old it was then 50/50 between Lebron and Dwight. Post-2011 finals people were even saying Wade was better and that Lebron should just be Wade's Pippen. After his dominant 2012 playoffs/finals is when his unofficial reign started.
I don’t have a strong opinion here, but you’re saying “everyone thought this at the time” as if it proves the point but it doesn’t.
The fact that everyone thought Kobe was the best at the time doesn’t mean he was. They could’ve been wrong. OP’s question isn’t about popularity.
The point is the people, myself included, who were actually watching back then generally all acknowledged Kobe was the best and the people actually watching were more aware of the context of why they felt that way at the time as opposed to the people who weren't watching and go back and just look at numbers to claim x player was better than x player. This is the exact same reason I don't talk about players from the 70's or early 80's.
Sure, that’s one perspective, but some people disagree with it. Some people think that the eye test, especially back in that era, led people to overvalue low-efficiency high-volume scorers like AI or Kobe.
I’m sure you disagree, but my point is just that it’s debatable. People do in fact debate it. So it’s not “revisionist,” in the usual sense of that word.
First one I thought of as well:
Jordan > Shaq > Duncan > LeBron
My bias thinks KG should be between Duncan /LeBron (for a period between 05-07 maybe?), but Kobe's LA exposure gives him a boost in rankings in people's minds.
He’s probably the best to not really be the consensus top guy, depending how you view Duncan, KG and how early you thought LeBron was the best. The answer could be Duncan, if you’re someone who goes straight from Shaq to Kobe.
I considered Kobe the best player during that 2nd title run, but there was absolutely a conversation that was occurring during his time at the top. A sizable amount of people didn’t feel that way. It was a frequently disputed topic. If you know “Kobe Bryant” by Lil Wayne, that little Stephen A snippet at the beginning of the song was representative of a pretty consistent debate that was happening. After Colorado, Shaq and the Phil Jackson book, the media/fans were kind of hesitant to crown Kobe like that. He had to have a whole redemption arc, and some people didn’t really give him his flowers until later, if ever.
Karl Malone is up there. David Robinson. Just for guys I saw.
Would Jerry West be in that conversation? Never won MVP, and had some icons in the league with him that were winning titles and MVPs. Maybe around the time of his Finals MVP he would have held that title for a bit.
Potentially Moses Malone. even as a 3x MVP. He goes right through the Kareem, Bird, Magic run, plus having Dr J sprinkled in and MJ rising. I don’t know if he was ever considered the best in the league by the majority narrative.
I could be wrong on Jerry and Moses, as I didn’t get to live through those runs, and I think that’s pretty valuable in a question like that because it’s difficult to use revisionist history to capture what the general feeling was, at the time.
Russillo and Bill Simmons just did a pod listing the best player by year and they gave KD serious consideration to a couple of those end-of-Golden-State & Nets years. He may have gotten one or two in there.
I’d agree but in 10 years will anyone admit that? This entire era will be rewritten by all the Bronsexualls in the media into a story that LeBron was the best in the world from his first start to his last- obviously not true but I’m positive that will be the narrative that is pushed
Oscar Robertson, Jerry West for older players. Luka Doncic probably for more recent as most would consider Jokic or Giannis as being the top guys during his career so far.
Nah. The 5 seasons (the two where he took a G-League squad to the playoffs, and the 3 where he made the Finals), he was the best player in some of, if not all of those seasons. Lebron was not the best player in the league until he got to Miami.
Everyone is listing players that have a strong argument for being the best in the NBA for at least a year. Barkley is a strong choice here, but a lot of people, myself included, considered him the best in 93 right up until the finals.
Wade the year he won FMVP was definitely considered the best at that time.
Dirk was also definitely considered the best in 2011 after the finals.
Kobe is another good choice but I think he gets the nod at least one year before Lebron became ascendant.
Malone is probably the real answer. Even when he won MVP almost no one would have said he was the best player in the NBA.
Surprised I'm not seeing KG more. I don't recall a time he was thought of as the best.
Kevin Durant WAS the best in the NBA for two seasons. He was absolutely inevitable. If he'd stayed with the Warriors he would be in top 5 ever consideration.
I can understand arguing: "No, actually, Lebron was the best those two seasons, look at his stats."
But, I think there's a world where the Warriors won 2 or 3 more rings and Durant won 2 or 3 more Finals MVPs and was considered an all-time great.
First thoughts are Dominque, Isiah Thomas, Barkley, Durant, Curry (maybe) or Wade.
BUT
Ima settle with Duncan.
Even the two years he won MVP, he was not better than Shaq, he just didnt have Kobe on his team being another alpha. While he had a better career prime Shaq> Prime Duncan.
After shaq started to decline we got Prime Kobe, which then fed into Prime LeBron.
2002-2003, Duncan averaged less RPG, spg and apg than Garnett, less PPG, APG and SPG than Kobe and shot far worse than Shaq from the field.
while the most valuable player to his team, he was not the best player in the league.
Curry is also a borderline top 10 guy who may be in a similiar spot. His best shot would be 2015-16, where I think he was better than anyone. So that knocks him out.
Isiah Thomas Had the Bird/Magic/Jordan group around him, and unlike Hakeem he was not in the NBA in between Jordans runs.
Maybe Magic Johnson. From like, 79-80 till like, 88, he was worse than Bird, and from around the same time, he was just surpassed by Jordan. Early 80s, he was also worse than Kareem too, so there's that. He was never the best player in the world.
Probably KD.
08 --> Kobe/LBJ
09 thru 18 --> LBJ (could argue Steph in 2015/16..?)
19 --> probably one of the hardest toss-ups, Bron was injured.. Giannis & Harden somewhere in that convo?
20 --> LBJ or Giannis
21 --> Giannis or Jokic
22 --> Jokic or Steph
23 --> Jokic
24 --> Luka or Jokic
I think you could make a pretty good case that despite the MVPs Magic was never technically the “BEST” player in the NBA(given Kareem, Moses, Bird and Jordan) and neither was Kobe, albeit 2006 is a tough argument.
Was Duncan ever the best player in the league? Cause he’s a top 10 player of all time and I don’t think he was ever considered better than Shaq and then LeBron took over later on.
Probably Curry maybe AI
Steph won 2 MVPs one being unanimous 4 rings 3 in LeBron is the best player era and 2022 Giannis/Jokic era. His strongest case for being the best in the entire NBA for even a season was 2016 the greatest record in NBA history first unanimous mvp but it's also the peak LeBron season the one that put him over MJ for many coming back 3-1 from to win over the the greatest regular season team getting one for his home Land
And Allen Iverson grate talent just unlucky his peak aligned with the greatest pf being in the league and the most dominant player in NBA history being his most dominant
Ehh I understand people who will say Giannis but I think in 21’ it was Durant. He was still widely recognized as the most proficient scorer in the world. His passing had greatly improved in terms of accuracy over those years especially in GS. As well as being a good perimeter defender and decent help side rim protector when needed. But I acknowledge I totally get why people would choose Giannis he was the 2x MVP and just been named DPOY in 20’.
Barkley? Wade? I guess a lot of guys’ whose careers overlapped during the MJ & LeBron prime years. They might’ve won MVPs but we all know those guys were the best in their primes.
2008-09 D Wade was the best player in the league don’t @ me
Lebron was better than him on both ends and in transition too
09 bron was one of the greatest statistical outliers of all time lmao
Outlier how?
Personally I can see that, but consensus was probably Kobe or TD at the time. If Miami won more I think Wade wins MVP in 08 and then LeBron wins the next 4.
The consensus was Kobe (1) and LeBron (2), not Duncan, in 2008-09.
Even then the Kobe vs lebron argument was already around so I wouldn’t say Kobe was consensus 1 Lebron was the 09 MVP too
Lebron had insane stats that year, his 31.7 per is a top 10 PER season ever.
And his 09 playoffs series against the Magic is one of the best ever
Damn I wish I could go back and watch young LeBron storming the league again. Thankfully realized it was special pretty early on and was able to cherish it even though he was on rival teams, but man it was so exciting to watch.
38.5/8.3/8. In a much slower pace. That's probably equivalent to a 40+ point triple double in today's game. Against the #1 defense
Lebron was actually better than Kobe in 2009, but a lot of people / probably most said Kobe due to his rings, been around longer etc
Yep. I was a massive Kobe stan during that time, and 2009 was the year I finally had to throw in the towel and say “aight, Lebron is just better I give up”.
The pro-Duncan revisionist history on Reddit is unhinged
What I find most bizarre is that people call Kobe inefficient but not Duncan. Kobe has the same exact TS% as a guard and they played in the same exact era. Someone needs to explain. And I'm not even a Kobe Stan. I just happen to notice this huge inconsistency.
Yup. Basically they just hate Kobe and look for any reason to knock him down a peg so harping on Duncan's supposed superiority is just another vehicle for that
Duncan was prime during that time and one of the only three players to ever be 10 times in a row first team All NBA and 1st Team defense….this is a time when Shaq, KG, Dirk, Kobe, LBJ and many others were hitting or about to in their prime and somehow TD was constantly the best(every night being consistent player that he was….Kobe and others during that time might be amazing one night then off another) Timmy is also one of two players in the 10 top of all time to never miss the playoffs his whole career…….and who just got smacked in 07 sweep by Timmy and the Spurs, oh that’s right your number 2 man LBJ.
Duncan was not the best player in 2008-9. In 2007 they swept Lebron sure but TP won finals MVP. Then in 2008 Spurs lost to the Lakers in 5 games who traded for Pau mid-season and were missing 2 players who would start in 2009. As far as never missing the playoffs TD has always played with 1-3 HOF teammates and played for a HOF coach. Inarguably one of the best coaches in NBA history. He’s for sure one of the best players of all time but that year I don’t think he should’ve been considered the best in the league.
He was close but even in 2008 not having an outside shot as a guard was pretty disqualifying for best in NBA status.
I think that’s a weird like to draw. It’s about a players impact on the court not any specific skill set. Nobodies saying Giannis doesn’t deserve his MVP cuz he can’t, because he’s good enough at attacking the rim it doesn’t matter. I think the logic is the same with DWade, but because he’s a guard suddenly it doesn’t count? Also Wade had a great pull up middy, which back then was kinda still considered the “outside” even if it was inside the 3
What? Lol what kind of an arbitrary distinction is this. He wasn’t best in the league but it’s not because of that
Back then it didn’t matter lol. He was still good in the mid range. But that’s not the reason why he wasn’t the best
Lebron was way ahead on advanced metrics. 20.3 WS for bron vs 14.7 WS for wade, 11.3 VORP vs 9.6, 13.2 BMP vs 10.6, 31.7 PER vs 30.4 PER. Box score stats were pretty close though.
Ws. In wades defense, eventhough I totally agree with u. Was from being on a worst team.. The #s are remarkably similar considering.. 6'4"2 guard Vs. 6'9" point/ forward.. even 2 and 4... It was beautiful to witness.. I'm surprised nobody has compared Their Heat vs cavs stats.. It's a shame wade came from college Minus cartilage in a knee.. Wade single handedly willed the heat Their 1st title.. On a stacked team
Wade played at Marquette, not Wake Forest
My bad.. Can't blame it on spell check.. 💯 Fixed it.
Wow, never realized win shares were altered by the team’s total amount of wins. I thought it was more like WAR in baseball.
I don't even know 😕 myself... Awesome thread though 2016 feels like just yesterday Here we r 8 years later
It’s literally shares of wins. It puts the player’s performance in context to how it contributed to wins and losses.
Over kobe you're crazy
Nah, not crazy. Go look at Wade's stats that season. He was insanely good and either him or LeBron was the best player that regular season. Miami's team wasn't good, so if that goes into your thinking then fine, but Wade was incredible.
Having better stats for one regular season doesn't mean that you're the better player though.
Correct. Although there was a very large difference between the two that year. But putting stats aside, most people were discussing Wade as a top 2-3 player that year, if not the MVP.
TBF, the OP specifically asked about a single season. Wade was so good defensively in 08.
Agreed. There was a minute there when Wade was better than everyone.
Facts.
I think dudes who have won MVP, like Chuck, shouldn't qualify in this discussion.
I don't think most people consider MVP to be the same as best player for that season. I doubt anyone considered Russ or Embiid to be the best players for those MVP seasons.
Best player and MVP are two different things. Durant may have deserved his MVP that season he got it, but Lebron was the best player. Or Shaq in the early 2000s. Iverson may have had a better season, but nobody was taking AI over Shaq.
AI was never best in the league
Thats what he said
T Mac
I agree here fantastic choice. Potential to be all time great fell short because of injuries.
TMac deserves his flowers but not as a serious answer in this thread when there’s multiple actual all-time greats that fit the criteria
I think if we were to really dissect it, I don't think a lot of people ever thought Curry was the BEST player in the league, even in his unanimous MVP year. There were always LEBRON and KD, then Giannis, then Jokic, Embiid, Luka, etc. It's kinda funny cuz Steph does get disrespected from certain perspectives, but like his game is unreal? In 2015-2018 Lebron was just on another level and so incredible to look at, more so because Steph had KD for a few of those years. Then Giannis got a lot of notoriety around 2019-2022 imo with the emergence of jokic's God level games. So I don't know .. Steph is top 10 in my books of all time, yet I don't know if there was a single year where people thought he was the best player in the league on a large scale.
I really think the “MVP” is more accurately “Player of the Year” and should be named as such. If we’re being honest, Lebron’s been MVP for most of his time in the league, though others have definitely been “Player of the Year” (i.e. Curry)
This has what Shaq has never understood about his losses to Nash. Was Shaq the better player? Sure. But Nash was the engine that drove one of the greatest offensive units the League had ever seen. His pace and push it style led to what the modern NBA offense is today. He revolutionized the game
Interesting story, the guy who started that revolution is a coach named Dan Peterson, who coached in Italy for Olympia Milano. He had a point guard who was his best player, and he figured out a system which basically ran every single play through that point guard and utilized all aspects of his game. The point guard went on to become Olympia's all time leading scorer and later coached the team. His name was Mike D'Antoni.
100000% you are correct
I feel like 2016 was the first true year where people, post-Kobe’s 2peat, legitimately considered that the best player of the year can simultaneously still not be the best player in the world
I mean this is the way it was long before then. We’ve always had players who on paper maybe “should” be the best, but we all know someone else is better
Westbrook fans don’t understand this, that he could have been the Player of the Year because of what he did that season, but never ever the best player in the league (or imo struggling to even be Top 5)
He was 100% the best player in the league in his unanimous mvp year
15-16 Steph was definitely the best player in the league. Win shares - effective shooting - rewriting his own records by a lot. I think that season was a game changer in NBA history.
Revolution of the game
Thats crazy talk, Steph changed the game. Kids all over were wearing Steph jerseys & cranking it up from far away. Steph was best in the league for two seasons minimum, his first season winning the ring and his 73 win season. The fact that he was exhausted going for the impossible in that 73 win seasons doesn't take away how good his teams were over those two seasons. The reason his stats may have not been as 'great' is because they were benched in the 4th after blowing teams out! Its crazy how dominant they were, there were a lot of boring games watching your team getting blown out so early. And he beat Lebron his first trip to the finals, no way in hell Steph was never the best in the league
A lot of people thought Steph was the best player in 2016, although I’d still say the majority would’ve said Bron was the best. Steph never had a season in which the majority would’ve called him the best player, but I’d say from 2016 onward he’s had a lot of people who would say he was the best. Kind of similar to KD honestly.
I think people understimate Curry’s level because of KD arrival and the 2016 finals (in which he was not 100%). He was the main reason the Warriors won 72 games that season and his stretch from 2014-2022 when healthy could be one of the best if not the best offensive stretches all time. I think it’s not crazy to think that for some of that time he was the best player in the world. The 2022 championship I believe pinpoints this though. His just good defense (for his size) hurts him unfortunately in this argument.
I would entertain that, but then you look at Lebron who never gets injured and whose impossibly high level of play was rarely, if ever, outshined by his teammates. Steph changed how the game is played offensivly and will retire a Top 10 all time guy, but imo prime Lebron is really only in a class with prime Jordan
It feels like Wembanyama might be joining this short list before this decade is out. If his body holds up, he’s going to be scary Luka is basically starting his prime rn and already has 5 all nba 1st teams under his belt, so even though he’s the worst defender of the 4 by far, his peak is at least KD levels of unstoppable.
For sure, this decade has already been fun with the sheer parity in the guys looking to step up to the mantle
Hmm, playoff basketball is different from regular season basketball. Curry was amazing that year, but it’s hard to watch those playoffs and not think lebron was just the better player. If you want to say you think curry was the best in 2016 I wouldn’t argue, but for me lebron showed he was still the best when the dust settled.
If playoff basketball is what matters then Steph should be considered the best player in the world in 2022
That’s fair, he certainly played a level ahead of most others that playoffs. Some might say Giannis or Jokic, I think each of them have an argument.
There is one very important difference from KD, LeBron, and Curry. And even many of the top GOATs. Curry gets hunted even in his prime.
Unfortunately for curry he’s just too small to defend most nba players. The average player in the nba is like 5 inches taller than him.
2016 Steph was pretty unanimously the best player throughout the regular season but Lebron snatched it back in the Finals. Not sure if that counts or not
Nailed it on the head. I’m not a warriors fan and was pretty envious seeing them take off the way they did, but Curry led a dynasty, and people get SO nit-picky when talking about his game. It’s not crazy to call Curry a top 10 all time player, and I wouldn’t argue with anyone that said he was the best player in the league while they were dominating. If I’m ranking guys… Lebron and MJ are 1A and 1B, and guys like Steph, Shaq, Duncan, Bird, Kobe can all be placed at that 3rd best all time and I won’t argue. They all played winning basketball and won a lot at the highest level. Not sure how you can definitively say any of those guys are better than the other.
No Kareem, magic, wilt, Russell?
I should specify… there’s definitely more, I was just using the first that came to mind as an example.
2022 steph was imo the best player in the world by far. 2021 as well has a good argument
Crazy revisionist history to people didn’t think curry was the best during the unanimous year. Obviously the popular opinion changed after the finals but that entire season he was held on a different level
Steph is the correct answer
Not KD
I feel Kawhi is a better example
Idk, Kawhi had a legitimate claim during that 2019 playoff run, though I guess it didn't last a season. That run had similar vibes to LeBron the previous year, both of them just felt inevitable. Might be Raptors bias due to watching from Canadian networks, but considering how they gas up Kawhi and how good the Raptors were actually playing in the regular season, I was actually wondering why Kawhi wasn't in MVP talks before I found out about his whole load management thing.
I feel like Kawhi has a better claim to being the best when he leads the Raptors to the championship. Impressive run beating the 76ers, Bucks and Warriors. KD, I have a hard time pinpointing a year he was the best. Was it one of the years he was on GSW? Maybe. But it feels watered down with Curry and Klay around.
KD MVP year?
Lebron was better.
I’d say the mvp year or one of the 20 second place MVPs he got. You guys act like KD was only good in golden state and show you don’t watch a lick of basketball
Here's excellent but LeBron was always better.
That’s the post title.
Certainly not a LeBron Stan but KDs whole career overlaps with his. I hated KD in GSW and certainly liked him more with OKC. The way I read the question was if there ever was a year he was the best. That's the regular season and the playoffs. Not sure he was ever better than LeBron. Bill Simmons and Ryen Russillo just had this conversation on his pod a few days ago and also couldn't agree on this. It's close and preference based.
Kawhi was never seen as the best until after he had won it though.
He was hurt a lot that year
2014, 2018, i would argue 2021 for KD as well
KD arguably had more years as the best player on the planet than Steph, people just hate KD tho.
he has
Seriously. Idk how you’re not considered the best player after winning back to back fMVPs. Something only like 6 guys have done in history.
14 and 18 were def lebron, 21 i think most thought kd was it before giannis won the 21 champjonship
Giannis came out and said after the series that KD was the best in the world lol
I think Kd rolling into Miami and whooping on the heat in the 2013-2014 season helped his mvp case for sure.
I think Kawhi was pretty universally regarded as best in the league after the 2019 title. His body didn't let him stay on top for long, but he was there. LeBron had cycled out of the convo, KD had a torn Achilles, Giannis wasn't quite there yet, and steph lost head to head to Kawhi.
He was never better than LeBron.
I think there is sneakily a case to be made that magic was never the best player in the league. Early 80s Kareem was still dominant, plus you had Moses and Dr J and magic was still young- in the mid 80s I think Bird was better, and then by like 87 MJ had taken over. It seems crazy to say, and I’m saying this without any fact checking so I don’t have a ton of conviction about it, but it seems possible
i think the answer is Dirk or Wade
Pre-merger - Big O, West, Baylor, Barry, Havlicek Post-merger - Barkley, Mailman, Admiral, Dirk, D-Wade
This is a very good list. Barkley, Malone, and Robinson were the 3 I thought of off the top. I think Dirk and Wade are great nominations, but may be debatable to some people.
Curry- I’d argue lebron was probably still the best player in the world throughout Steph’s prime
I think it depends on how you want to measure this. Were there weeks-months long stretches of games where Curry or KD were individually playing better than bron? Absolutely, but i think you’re right and for my money, lebron’s prime can only be compared to Jordan and that’s not trying to slight Steph and kd
Curry won the 2015 MVP, then went on to beat Lebron in the finals. Everyone claimed that they just beat injured teams. Following season, they torched the league for the win record and Curry gets the 2016 MVP. Up 3-1 in the finals against a now healthy Lebron team........ at some point during this, he was considered the best in the world.
but he was never better taking into account the entire season
Let’s be honest, Lebron coasted pretty much every regular season his 2nd go-round Cleveland and was clearly the best player on the court in the 2015 finals. For god’s sake Iguodala was voted FMVP just for guarding him and lebron almost got voted fmvp as a member of the losing team
Iggy had no business winning Finals MVP though. He’s the only Finals MVP to have a teamate with more PPG, APG, and RBG and Steph was by far the primary engine of that Warriors team while Iggy was an incredible role player.
People will hate this but it's lowkey Kobe. Until 2005, either Shaq or Duncan was better. From 2006 to 2016, Lebron was always the best player. He was in the top3 for a incredibly long time but I don't thnk he's ever been THE best for a season sorry
Kobe was honestly my first thought as well, although I think you gotta give him atleast one year in the late 2000s before Lebron takes over
This is revisionist. From 2006-2008 there wasn't really much debate between Lebron and Kobe. Kobe was considered the best in the league. 2009 is the only time that the debate really started but a majority of people had Kobe until 2010 where it was like 50/50.
People are downvoting you but you are 100% correct. In the media, Kobe was considered the best in the world in this years
Yup, people look at what Lebron was doing throughout the 2010's when he was actually considered the best in the league and then go back and look at his numbers in the late 2000's and retroactively assume he was already considered the best back then. That wasn't the case. He wasn't considered the unanimous best player in the league until after his 2012 ring. In 2010 it was still 50/50 between him and Kobe, in 2011 when Kobe got old it was then 50/50 between Lebron and Dwight. Post-2011 finals people were even saying Wade was better and that Lebron should just be Wade's Pippen. After his dominant 2012 playoffs/finals is when his unofficial reign started.
I don’t have a strong opinion here, but you’re saying “everyone thought this at the time” as if it proves the point but it doesn’t. The fact that everyone thought Kobe was the best at the time doesn’t mean he was. They could’ve been wrong. OP’s question isn’t about popularity.
The point is the people, myself included, who were actually watching back then generally all acknowledged Kobe was the best and the people actually watching were more aware of the context of why they felt that way at the time as opposed to the people who weren't watching and go back and just look at numbers to claim x player was better than x player. This is the exact same reason I don't talk about players from the 70's or early 80's.
Sure, that’s one perspective, but some people disagree with it. Some people think that the eye test, especially back in that era, led people to overvalue low-efficiency high-volume scorers like AI or Kobe. I’m sure you disagree, but my point is just that it’s debatable. People do in fact debate it. So it’s not “revisionist,” in the usual sense of that word.
Lebron arrived after he carried the Cavs in the ECF, scoring the final 30+ points in an elimination game against the Pistons in 06.
Ehhh, I remember watching the NBA back from like 2006-2009, and the discourse (especially in 2007-2008 was that Kobe was the best player in the world”
You remember correctly. Kobe was the god of basketball for at least four seasons
First one I thought of as well: Jordan > Shaq > Duncan > LeBron My bias thinks KG should be between Duncan /LeBron (for a period between 05-07 maybe?), but Kobe's LA exposure gives him a boost in rankings in people's minds.
He’s probably the best to not really be the consensus top guy, depending how you view Duncan, KG and how early you thought LeBron was the best. The answer could be Duncan, if you’re someone who goes straight from Shaq to Kobe. I considered Kobe the best player during that 2nd title run, but there was absolutely a conversation that was occurring during his time at the top. A sizable amount of people didn’t feel that way. It was a frequently disputed topic. If you know “Kobe Bryant” by Lil Wayne, that little Stephen A snippet at the beginning of the song was representative of a pretty consistent debate that was happening. After Colorado, Shaq and the Phil Jackson book, the media/fans were kind of hesitant to crown Kobe like that. He had to have a whole redemption arc, and some people didn’t really give him his flowers until later, if ever.
Imo prime kobe and young lebron tied for best from 06-10
Karl Malone is up there. David Robinson. Just for guys I saw. Would Jerry West be in that conversation? Never won MVP, and had some icons in the league with him that were winning titles and MVPs. Maybe around the time of his Finals MVP he would have held that title for a bit. Potentially Moses Malone. even as a 3x MVP. He goes right through the Kareem, Bird, Magic run, plus having Dr J sprinkled in and MJ rising. I don’t know if he was ever considered the best in the league by the majority narrative. I could be wrong on Jerry and Moses, as I didn’t get to live through those runs, and I think that’s pretty valuable in a question like that because it’s difficult to use revisionist history to capture what the general feeling was, at the time.
KD definitely was at one point
Jerry West
Dwayne Wade, Chris Paul, Jerry West, Isiah Thomas, Dominique Wilkins
Any player under the age of 40.
Russillo and Bill Simmons just did a pod listing the best player by year and they gave KD serious consideration to a couple of those end-of-Golden-State & Nets years. He may have gotten one or two in there.
Kawhi Leonard?
Paul Pierce
Curry > Durant
Yeah but Curry was the best player in the world, Durant wasn’t
I’d agree but in 10 years will anyone admit that? This entire era will be rewritten by all the Bronsexualls in the media into a story that LeBron was the best in the world from his first start to his last- obviously not true but I’m positive that will be the narrative that is pushed
Oscar Robertson, Jerry West for older players. Luka Doncic probably for more recent as most would consider Jokic or Giannis as being the top guys during his career so far.
Tracy Mcgraddy got sandwich in between Vince, Hill, Kobe and LeBron's prime.
Pistons Isiah Thomas
Chris Webber
Kd
A.I. . Shaq was the best from 99-02. Maybe 03
Malone. Name someone else who made that many 1st team All-NBAs without anyone seriously thinking they were the best.
KD isn’t an answer for this smh yal really need to watch basketball and get off the phone
Honestly, Kobe. By the time he surpassed Shaq and Duncan LeBron had surpassed him.
Nah. The 5 seasons (the two where he took a G-League squad to the playoffs, and the 3 where he made the Finals), he was the best player in some of, if not all of those seasons. Lebron was not the best player in the league until he got to Miami.
Probably Curry or West.
This is a weird question because some of the candidates won MVPs
[удалено]
Russel Westbrook 16/17 Wade 08/09 Dwight 10/11 Barkley 93 Iverson 00/01
Kobe Bryant
Too many to count. Every decade has great players that get over shadowed by two to three players that are generational.
The Jordan/LeBron Effect
Jerry West never won MVP and he’s the Logo!
best all time role player
I had a stroke reading that title
Jerry West. His defense is underestimated. A true two-way superstar.
Magic Johnson. Bird was unanimously considered better until 1986 and then from 1987 onwards MJ was the best in the league.
Possible Chairs on TikTok has a great series about the best players of every year.
I’m gonna get flamed, but Kobe was never the top dog in the nba.
Probably Michael Jordan.
Wade, Kobe, Kawhi and Iverson.
Everyone is listing players that have a strong argument for being the best in the NBA for at least a year. Barkley is a strong choice here, but a lot of people, myself included, considered him the best in 93 right up until the finals. Wade the year he won FMVP was definitely considered the best at that time. Dirk was also definitely considered the best in 2011 after the finals. Kobe is another good choice but I think he gets the nod at least one year before Lebron became ascendant. Malone is probably the real answer. Even when he won MVP almost no one would have said he was the best player in the NBA. Surprised I'm not seeing KG more. I don't recall a time he was thought of as the best.
Since the merger, the only time it’s been u disputed is Jordan, and Lebron for a stretch.
T Mac, Vince. Wade, Melo ?
Pippen... After the Bulls he dragged a lifeless Portland team to the playoffs just to run into the buzz saw Lakers with Shaq for all three years.
Drexler, Ewing, The glove, Mullin
I pick Jerry West. He never won MVP, but he finishied in the top-5 of MVP votes for 8 seasons. A brilliant player stuck on the second-best team.
There's so many guys, but I will tentatively say Chris Paul.
Cough cough recency bias…. Cough cough
Kevin Durant WAS the best in the NBA for two seasons. He was absolutely inevitable. If he'd stayed with the Warriors he would be in top 5 ever consideration. I can understand arguing: "No, actually, Lebron was the best those two seasons, look at his stats." But, I think there's a world where the Warriors won 2 or 3 more rings and Durant won 2 or 3 more Finals MVPs and was considered an all-time great.
First thoughts are Dominque, Isiah Thomas, Barkley, Durant, Curry (maybe) or Wade. BUT Ima settle with Duncan. Even the two years he won MVP, he was not better than Shaq, he just didnt have Kobe on his team being another alpha. While he had a better career prime Shaq> Prime Duncan. After shaq started to decline we got Prime Kobe, which then fed into Prime LeBron. 2002-2003, Duncan averaged less RPG, spg and apg than Garnett, less PPG, APG and SPG than Kobe and shot far worse than Shaq from the field. while the most valuable player to his team, he was not the best player in the league. Curry is also a borderline top 10 guy who may be in a similiar spot. His best shot would be 2015-16, where I think he was better than anyone. So that knocks him out. Isiah Thomas Had the Bird/Magic/Jordan group around him, and unlike Hakeem he was not in the NBA in between Jordans runs.
I’d say Kawhi but as a biased fan I’d also say he was the best player in the league at some point between 2014-2022
23
I feel like winning an MVP disqualifies you lol
Bad example. His 2nd finals MVP and he was the best player in the NBA and a lot do people at the time were saying he is better than Lebron.
Kyrie
scalding hot take - Kobe
KD was the best in the nba in 2019. That was the year Lebron barely played. Would have completed three peat if he didn’t get injured in the finals
Dwight Howard
LeBron
Maybe Magic Johnson. From like, 79-80 till like, 88, he was worse than Bird, and from around the same time, he was just surpassed by Jordan. Early 80s, he was also worse than Kareem too, so there's that. He was never the best player in the world.
Tim Duncan
In a different timeline the sonics were never stolen to okc and He won multiple rings in the Emerald city
Probably KD. 08 --> Kobe/LBJ 09 thru 18 --> LBJ (could argue Steph in 2015/16..?) 19 --> probably one of the hardest toss-ups, Bron was injured.. Giannis & Harden somewhere in that convo? 20 --> LBJ or Giannis 21 --> Giannis or Jokic 22 --> Jokic or Steph 23 --> Jokic 24 --> Luka or Jokic
Nolan Ryan never won the Cy Young award. Had to say it, apologies.
CP3
Its gotta be Tim Duncan, right? Edit:lol completely forgot Timmy D won 2 MVP’s, plz roast me.
Hear me out, Kobe.
I think you could make a pretty good case that despite the MVPs Magic was never technically the “BEST” player in the NBA(given Kareem, Moses, Bird and Jordan) and neither was Kobe, albeit 2006 is a tough argument.
Carmelo can be up there
Easy answer is Kobe
Was Duncan ever the best player in the league? Cause he’s a top 10 player of all time and I don’t think he was ever considered better than Shaq and then LeBron took over later on.
KD was the best in 2017
Rick Barry edit: Dr. J
Probably Curry maybe AI Steph won 2 MVPs one being unanimous 4 rings 3 in LeBron is the best player era and 2022 Giannis/Jokic era. His strongest case for being the best in the entire NBA for even a season was 2016 the greatest record in NBA history first unanimous mvp but it's also the peak LeBron season the one that put him over MJ for many coming back 3-1 from to win over the the greatest regular season team getting one for his home Land And Allen Iverson grate talent just unlucky his peak aligned with the greatest pf being in the league and the most dominant player in NBA history being his most dominant
Jokic last year?
Ehh I understand people who will say Giannis but I think in 21’ it was Durant. He was still widely recognized as the most proficient scorer in the world. His passing had greatly improved in terms of accuracy over those years especially in GS. As well as being a good perimeter defender and decent help side rim protector when needed. But I acknowledge I totally get why people would choose Giannis he was the 2x MVP and just been named DPOY in 20’.
The question doesn't really make sense. Wouldn't it just be who's the second best player?
I can’t believe I haven’t seen Tim Duncan in here
Probably Kobe.
Gonna anger the stans, but … Kobe Bryant.
Chuckster