Pippen seems to hate Kobe

[#12]

http://www.nba.com/blog/blog30.html

Can't Compare Kobe and MJ
The eras in which they played are completely different
Kobe Bryant's 81-point performance the other night against Toronto was certainly incredible, but it is unfair to try and compare what Kobe did to what Michael Jordan did in his playing career or what he could have done for that matter.

In the era when Michael played, it was a physical game. Defense was promoted. Guys took pride in it. Today defense is no longer a part of the game. Guys are driving to the basket. There are rules where you can't step in front of them. To me, it is taking away from the game seeing a guy like Tony Parker taking advantage of the rules. He is shooting 55 percent from the field. That says something about the game itself. In the history of the NBA, I'm sure a point guard has never led the league in field goal percentage. It's a different game now. It's really not about being tough and physical because the NBA isn't a physical game anymore. When you talk about how the Knicks and Bulls used to battle in the early '90s, the Oakleys, and Pat Ewings, the Masons, and how they would have the ability to use their hands to put you in a trap position. There is no way you can even triple team a guy now and stop him. Any contact is a foul. I can't compare the two players because I see it as two different games. If I'm guarding Kobe Bryant in today's game, I couldn't be the defender I was known as.

The defensive rules, the hand checking, the ability to make contact on a guy in certain areas, the ability to come over in the lane to stop guys from getting to the basket, that's all been taken away from the game. There is no contact up on the floor. The way I played Magic Johnson in the '91 Finals, I would have fouled out the first time down court. To compare how someone would have played Michael Jordan, Chuck Daly would send someone to wear him down. Even though he may get 30 or 40 points, they're going to be a hard 30 points. But in today's game, you can't put that physical wear and tear on a guy. It's a free ball type of game. If you are shooting it well, you can score 80, as you've seen because you are going to get to the foul line.

Officials have very quick whistles now because they're promoting scoring. Let's not forget, three years ago, this league was trying to figure out how they could get the scoring back up, how they could drive the fans back into loving the game, and this is what they were building on. They changed the field of rules. Those rules are huge in the game today. They benefit the perimeter guy. Back in the day, you may get one guy to score 40 points in a month. When Michael Jordan scored 40, it was all over the front page of a newspaper. Now you can pretty much have 40 points at halftime. Until the league went and changed the rules and tried to get some of that bully ball out, you couldn't come out and perform like that every night. The game was too physical. You were too sore the next day and you were just tired and physically worn down. The game seems so fun and free now. Guys are making a living just standing out there shooting jumpers.

If you want to say that Kobe could get 100, I would say that Michael could get 100. If Kobe could get 81, I think Michael could get 100 in today's game. I think the psychological style that Michael was able to master in the game, puts him far beyond Kobe. But Kobe's youthfulness has put him in a position where it looks like he is overtaking Michael. Kobe has 10 years in this league. That is a lot of experience to have and still be a very youthful player.

I would love to see what would have happened the other night if the rules had been the same as in past years. Kobe is as close to being like Mike as anybody, but you can't make the comparisons anymore. Tracy McGrady can probably, from a numbers standpoint, put up the numbers Michael Jordan put up. He has that type of ability. Dirk Nowitzki can put up those kinds of numbers. The game is built for those guys to put those shots up. If they get touched, they get to the foul line. I would say Kobe is the most polished of all of them as far as being able to handle the ball and create his own shot and opportunity. But this is what the game is going to turn into. Guys are going to start to score 40 points regularly. It may become an average.

I don't think Kobe will get 100. What he did is what like Wilt did, a once in a lifetime experience. Given the fact that he shot a heck of a percentage it could have been better, but I don't think he still could have gotten to 100. It would almost have to be perfect and the game would have to go to overtime. I think a lot of things would have to come into play for him to get that.

With that said, I am sure Phil doesn't want to coach that type of game. It's not his style. I don't expect it to happen again. Phil will probably do everything in his power to make sure it doesn't. I don't think Phil is going to try to promote what Kobe has done more than anything because he has damaged his whole team. You just scored 81 points. Do you need your teammates? Are they going to step up when you need them or are you going to continue to pound them like you've been doing and be selfish just to get some individual accolades?

From a leadership perspective I think Kobe has taken a step back. Look at what he has to live up to now. You just scored 81 points. If you scored 81 points, your team should pretty much go out and win at least 75 percent of their games the rest of the year. Is that fair to say? You just compared yourself to Wilt. Can you go out with your team and do that or are you just going to go out and score tons of points every night? Are you going to get back to the point where you are shooting a lot of shots and you're teammates are not shooting and you're losing?

Right now, Kobe has willed the Lakers to a 22-19 record. It will be interesting to see what happens the rest of the way.

[hipn]

Pippen is right, its a different era. And you can't compare the two. Kobe is a very good player, but he doesn't play the sam as MJ, and MJ did a lot of things that Kobe hasn't done or will never do.

[Matthew]

Care to elaborate how thats hate? He wrote in depth analysis with examples of how its a different game now to the early 90's and how you cant compare Mj to Pippen. Its not like he wrote "Kobe suxors, and Mike is numba 1 becuase i dun like KoBi", did he?

[kevC]

Scottie has a very VERY good point. One can only imagine how many points MJ could've had if hand checking was a foul back then...

[dada]

lol @ misleading topic.



I still see hand checking in todays game. It gets called every now and then but I dont see the big deal why people believe if it wasnt in place back then we would see alot more scoring outbursts in those times.

Also, if the defense is so bad today and the players can score so much in spurts easier today, then why is it that teams back then averaged more points per game compared to today? Just out of curiosity I went and looked up highest team ppg since like 1984 (I think), and the closest team to our days thats on the list is Orlando in 94-95 (ranked 31st) that averaged 111. I'm not saying today's game is superior defensively but its not like we are offensive juggernauts.

[Axel]

Scottie is right... and what makes it even more amazing is the fact that MJ did shoot such a high percentage, 52-53% even with the increase physicality of the game. Kobe isn't even close to that in a much less physical game. It would be interesting to see what his shooting percentage would be with the types of defenses MJ had to go up against.

[BIG GREEN]

Pippin makes a good point there...though it's debatable that he isnt just touting opinion. He sounds like the typical jaded retired player...cause people said the same things about jordan when he was compared to magic and kareem and Dr. J. Times change...whether it's for the better or not is relative...but that doesnt take away from the fact that what kobe did ...compared to his peers atleast...is ground breaking.

[fgrep15]

He's kinda just telling the truth....

[air_edwards23]

Pippen is right, its a different era. And you can't compare the two. Kobe is a very good player, but he doesn't play the sam as MJ, and MJ did a lot of things that Kobe hasn't done or will never do.

EXCATLY!! thank you thats what i've been trying to say to my friends but dey all like oh kobes the next jordan and all this shit like damn kobe's kobe and he has his style of playing(recently being kinda selfish) and jordan had his way.
Even Kobe said he doesnt like the compairson of him and mj because they were both in different eras

[Andrew]

Some interesting points, especially about the league looking to increase scoring. It probably comes off as being jaded, but the 80s/90s era, especially the 90s, is one that has been unfairly (and somewhat ignorantly) maligned by individuals before and since. Perhaps it's a backlash to all the hype that grew during that era. Or maybe it's too soon for people to become nostalgic about it.

[kinokong]

agree with pippen there... jordan could have scored 40/50 on a regular basis if hand checking wasn't allowed back then.... but back then teams (excluding rileys knicks and heat) scored a lot of points that they didn't need it

[Dirtdog1- David]

Very interesting article! I don't see this as Pippen hating on him?

81 points is 81 points, not taking any of that away.......But he did put that 81 up pretty easily.

[BIG GREEN]

agree with pippen there... jordan could have scored 40/50 on a regular basis if hand checking wasn't allowed back then.... but back then teams (excluding rileys knicks and heat) scored a lot of points that they didn't need it

yea..and Dr. J coulda scored 200 points in the days of jordan...and wilt coulda scored 300 in the days of Dr. J...coulda coulda coulda. Maybe i'm being a little subjective here...but i believe in progression and looking to the future. I'm 22 years old and while ive been an NBA fan since the 80's...i refuse to act like a jaded 80 year old man. I wish people would learn to accept things for the way they are....look to the past for inspiration..not direction.

[fgrep15]

Also, if the defense is so bad today and the players can score so much in spurts easier today, then why is it that teams back then averaged more points per game compared to today? Just out of curiosity I went and looked up highest team ppg since like 1984 (I think), and the closest team to our days thats on the list is Orlando in 94-95 (ranked 31st) that averaged 111. I'm not saying today's game is superior defensively but its not like we are offensive juggernauts.

He's talking about the 90's, not 80's. In 92-93, the Bulls played the same pace as the Raptors did last season, but scored 11 more PPG.

You look at Jordan and he went to the line 10+ times a game twice in his career. Right now every guy that knows how to penetrate can get to the line 10 times a game because the refs are so quick on the whistle.

Also he's not actually reffering to pace of the game anyways. He's just talking about actual defense. Playing extremly slow does not mean you're playing good defense, it just means you're playing extremely slow. You can play a good pace and defend a lot better than a team that plays a really slow pace and just looks like they're defending. Right now perimeter players can get their teams into the bonus in no time because of tick tack fouls.

But he did put that 81 up pretty easily.

Well that's actually more related to the Raptors coaching not doubling Kobe and at half time deciding to "let him get his", they just didn't expect him to take all the shots. In addition to that, the Raptors already attrocious defense, and extremely poor help defense didn't help.

[bludgeon]

I don't see Pippen hating Kobe, he just claimed that it's unfair to compare Kobe and Jordan as Kobe in no way has surpassed Jordon. That's truth and everyone( but the nonsense homers maybe) knows about it.

[Nel]

Dirk Nowitzki in the same sentence with kobe and mac?

[John WB]

Dirk can have big scoring games..

Scottie's exactly write.

I've seen MJ score 36 points off strong defensive teams like the Seattle SuperSonics, back when GP was a defensive player of the year candidate, and he got the toughest 36 points I've ever seen. The team did everyhthing they could to stop him and he took and made impossible shots. And the Bulls won.

Kobe doesn't have things like that to dal with today. Those 81 points were awesome, yes, but if you look at how he got them. He got them off clean looking shots. Players don't defend the way they used to.

I'd like to see Kobe get 81 off the Spurs or Pistons. That'd be 100x more imrpessive to me.

[Jackal]

Pippin is indeed right, I just read this & headed over to post it. Alas a thread was already made.

Pippin really makes a good point, todays game does seem softer, the battle element seems to be gone from the game.

[Matthew]

I'd like to see Kobe get 81 off the Spurs or Pistons. That'd be 100x more imrpessive to me.

Dude, you cant get anymore impresive than what Kobe did against toronto. Seriously, team down 18 points, he drops 55 points in one half to give his team the W. That speaks volumes. Sure you could make it a perfect situation, but if you're not satisified with what he did, i pity you as a fan.

[Sauru]

first of all i think what pippen said holds alot of truth. i have always said that it was a tougher game back then and i will continue to say that until the nba changes again. now that being said i do not think jordan could have dropped 40 or 50 a night. maybe he would have added a point or 3 to his average but thats it. also i think what kobe did was amazing. i hate the guy, have hated him, will always hate him, but what he did was amazing. first thing i did was check the box scores to see what his FG% was and it was damn nice. there is not 1 thing about what he did that i can or will conplain about, if you ever wanted to compare him to jordan(which i still think is a joke) this would be the time. i dont mean compare him cause he dropped 81, i mean you could compare them in how kobe pretty much just said "fine you guys dont want to win this game, then i will". jordan had many games like that and now kobe has 1 HUGE game like that.

[John WB]

I'd like to see Kobe get 81 off the Spurs or Pistons. That'd be 100x more imrpessive to me.

Dude, you cant get anymore impresive than what Kobe did against toronto. Seriously, team down 18 points, he drops 55 points in one half to give his team the W. That speaks volumes. Sure you could make it a perfect situation, but if you're not satisified with what he did, i pity you as a fan.

Those 81 points were awesome.

You might want to read everything I post next time before criticizing.

I loved what he did and would have loved to see the game, but you're crazy if you think 81 points off the Toronto Raptors are the same as 81 points off the Pistons or Spurs.

Regardless, 81 points off anyone is simple awesome.

[those]

So much has changed since the days when Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points that you really can't compare this event to Kobe's 81 points ... in an ordinary way.

Maybe you could compare the results by calculating the avarage score of a player in the year of wilt's 100 point performance and evaluate the difference to wilts 100 points, percentage-wise.
And then you calculate the average points scored by an nba player this season and also calculate the difference to kobes 81 points, percentage-wise.
To calculate the "average points per player", you should measure it on a 48 minutes per game base!

So I have to support Mr. Pippen's comments on that: not (really/easy/meaningfull) comparable!

[those]

I forgot to mention that the person (wilt vs. kobe) with the higher percentage (= difference to avg. player) wins!

[beau_boy04]

I thought back in the days new rules were implemented to help out MJ and perimeter players to score more. I know some rules were placed when MJ was playing. I remenber Wilt mentioning once that rules were implemented in his days to stop him for scoring so much and when Jordan came into the league the rules changed in his favour to help him score more. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

[And 1]

12# you are sick!

PIP was an exellent player and it was a good point from his view but why do you think that he hate Kobe?I can't find any hate in this article-obvious is that your hate is bigger then you so you just posted a tittle like this one, i know guys like you who wake up and first what you think is-I hate KOBE more and more! 12# you're so patetic!