hella handsome
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- Oct 7, 2007
Originally Posted by DoubleJs07
Hmmmm....
[h3]Magic Johnson sought elite teammates too[/h3]
By Henry Abbott
Archive
Magic Johnson joins the cavalcade of those saying, essentially, hey LeBron James, real men don't play with superstars.
"We didn't think about it 'cause that's not what we were about," Johnson said at Baruch College in New York, according to Bloomberg News. "From college, I was trying to figure out how to beat Larry Bird."
This past weekend, Jordan said at a celebrity golf event that he never would have played with Johnson or Bird, his two main rivals during his playing days.
"There's no way, with hindsight, I would've ever called up Larry [Bird], called up Magic [Johnson] and said, 'Hey, look, let's get together and play on one team,'" Jordan said after playing in a celebrity golf tournament in Nevada. The interview aired on the NBC telecast of the event. "But that's ... things are different. I can't say that's a bad thing. It's an opportunity these kids have today. In all honesty, I was trying to beat those guys."
TrueHoop reader Mike, however, takes special exception to the idea that Johnson would stick with a mediocre roster over playing with superstars. He e-mails:
As much as I admire and respect these players, it becomes hard to take them seriously when none of them had situations comparable to LeBron, and all of the them got to play with other great, Top-50 All-Time players. The quest to play with other elite talent is basically universal amongst stars, be it Wilt going to join Hal Greer and later Jerry West and Elgin Baylor or all the way up to Kobe openly flirting with the Bulls and Clippers and threatening trade demands until the Lakers acquired Pau Gasol.
The fact that LeBron simply exercised his rights as a free agent to leave Cleveland to do what countless other players have done, rather than demand trades or refuse to play for the team that drafted him, should not be held against him.
I'm not even a fan of LeBron, but at this point I think he's getting dumped on pretty unfairly.
And in the case of Magic Johnson, Mike has done his homework. He found a Mike Downey L.A. Times article from 1991
Magic Johnson would have returned to Michigan State rather than play for the Chicago Bulls.
"I'd have stayed in school," he said here Tuesday, standing alone outside Gate 3 1/2 of Chicago Stadium, the house that could have been his. "A coin toss changed the course of my whole life." Chicago called heads in a 1979 coin flip with Los Angeles for the No. 1 pick in the NBA college draft. It came up tails.
Johnson signed with the Lakers after his sophomore year of college and proceeded to win five championships. The Bulls picked second, took UCLA's David Greenwood and have won no championships.
"I wouldn't have played here," Johnson said on the eve of Game 2 of the NBA finals between his team and the team that could have been his. "The only reason I came out was to play with Kareem and the Lakers."
Then Mike gets to comparing the Lakers who played with Johnson in his first seven years to the Cavaliers who played with James over the same period. Johnson's teammates, in aggregate, had:
Mike does a similar analysis on James' Cavs' rosters:
- Two first team All-Rookie selections (Byron Scott, James Worthy)
- 11 All-Star appearances (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar seven times, Norm Nixon twice, Worthy, Jamaal Wilkes)
- Four All-NBA first team selections (Abdul-Jabbar)
- Two All-NBA second team selections (Abdul-Jabbar)
- Five All-Defensive first team selections (Michael Cooper three times, Abdul-Jabbar twice)
- Four All-Defensive second team selections (Cooper three times, Abdul-Jabbar once)
- One MVP Award (Abdul-Jabbar)
- In addition, Abdul-Jabbar, Worthy, Wilkes, Nixon, and Cooper all got votes for MVP at one point in time or the other during Magic's first seven years, and Cooper won defensive player of the year in Johnson's eighth year.
Mike adds, in conclusion:
- Zero first team All-Rookie Selections
- Two All-Star game appearances (Mo Williams, Zydrunas llgauskas)
- Zero All-NBA first team selection
- Zero All-NBA second team selections
- Zero All-Defensive first team selections
- One All-Defensive second team selection (Anderson Vareajo)
- Zero MVP Awards
In order to have a situation even comparable to Magic's, LeBron would have needed to be drafted onto, say, Tim Duncan's team (to parallel Abdul-Jabbar), played the last six years with a prime Bruce Bowen (to parallel Michael Cooper), and had the Cavs draft Danny Granger in his third year (as a parallel to Worthy), and that's ignoring guys like Scott/Wilkes/McAdoo etc.
I mean, let's be real, if LeBron had been in a situation like that does anyone doubt that he would have stayed? That he would already have multiple titles and that we'd be talking about his place amongst the top 10-15 players of all-time instead of dumping on his competitive fire? Magic had it easy, which make his comments seem absolutely ridiculous.
Link
realest @!+$ i've read throughout this thread, everything i've been hearing in the media, and convo's i've had about this with people I know.
Lebron had no real support... everyone who's mad just wants to see a "superman" save the day by himself so he can have the "throne of greatness" by himself
people need to get their heads out of this "a superstar needs to lead his team by himself" cloud that they are stuck in and realize that there was a reason why they called the Lakers of the 80's the "SHOWTIME LAKERS". they had a squad filled with superior talent. hall of fame caliber players, and an amazing coach (the same mastermind that put this miami situation together)
ask any rookie what they would want coming into the league, and they would say the same thing Magic said about Kareem. the reason Mike, Larry and Magic would never team up to play together is because the knew they had teams that were more than capable of supporting them and that was the fire they needed behind them to take each other down.
Lebron, Wade, and Kobe are the equivalent of Mike, Larry, and Magic in this day an age. Out of the three, Kobe is the only one that really has a team suitable to support them to championships (obviously, given the back to back championships these past 2 years). If these three have been going at each other for this long, and Kobe is the only one who comes out on top every year, what do you expect Wade and Lebron to do? Sit back and let Kobe get 2-3 more rings and then after he retires they try to scoop up draft picks and subpar trades to build championship teams now that Kobe is gone? then all you all will be saying is "they couldn't do it while kobe was around, so they had to wait and build teams. they dont have what it takes to be great, blah blah blah." or "Mike wouldn't sit back and wait for Magic to retire to build a team, Mike wouldn't do this, Mike wouldnt do that, blah blah blah"
all of you are just complaining. half of you are just mad because Lebron didn't go to your team, and the other half are just stuck in 1993's nostalgia.
nobody would have cared if Lebron, Wade, and Bosh ended up on the same team when they were all drafted... why is it such a big deal now? out of the three, Wade is the only one with a ring, so why are you all putting Lebron on this high pedestal complaining about how he will never really be great when Wade is the one who has already started a legacy?
and I bet if CP3 and Melo end up on the Knicks NOBODY will complain. so half of you just need to admit that you're really just Bron Bron haters and leave it at that. you don't care about the mans legacy, you just don't want him on a championship team. you're too used to him being on Cleveland and not making it all the way. now he's in a position to legitimately get a ring, and you're salty.
longest #%@$%$* response i've ever typed, but thank you DoubleJs for posting that article. some people needed that clarification...
