Riley and Jon,
You guys need to check your NBA history. Hakeem is a great center but Kareem is greater. What substantive argument can you provide against Kareem's play, numbers, MVP awards, and legend?
Kareem:
Games played - 1560 (2nd most in NBA history)
Field goal % - 55.9 (10th highest in NBA history)
Free throw % - 72.1
Three-point % - 05.6
Rebounds - 17,440 (3rd most in NBA history)
Rebounds per game - 11.2 (23rd highest in NBA history)
Assists - 5,660 (34th in NBA history)
Assist per game - 3.6
Steals - 1,160
Steals per game - 0.74
Blocks - 3,189 (3rd most in NBA history) (Note: blocks were not officially tabulated until the 1973–74 season)
Blocks per game - 2.57
Points per game - 24.6 (14th highest in NBA history)
Holds NBA career record for:
Most points (38,387)
Most minutes played (57,446)
Most field goals made (15,837)
Most field goals attempted (28,307)
Most All-Star selections (19)
Most All-Star games played (18)
Honors: Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame (1995); NBA champion (1971, '80, '82, '85, '87, '88); NBA MVP (1971, '72, '74, '76, '77, '80); 10-timeAll-NBA First Team; Five-time All-NBA Second Team;Five-time All-Defensive First Team; Six-time All-Defensive Second Team; 19-time All-Star; One of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History (1996).
Kareem Stats: see http://www.nba.com/history/players/abduljabbar_stats.html
Hakeem:
Honors: NBA champion (1994, '95); NBA Finals MVP (1994, '95); NBA MVP (1994); Defensive Player of Year (1993, '94); All-NBA First Team (1987, '88, '89, '93, '94, '97); All-NBA Second Team ('86, '90, '96); Third Team (1991, '95, '99); All-Defensive First Team ('87, '88, '90, '93, '94); 12-time All-Star; One of 50 Greatest Players in NBA History ('96); Olympic gold medalist ('96).
Hakeem Stats: see http://www.nba.com/history/players/olajuwon_stats.html
The numbers speak for themselves. I'll let you read through them and compare. You'll find that Kareem dominates in almost every major category. Hakeem has more blocks but you'll see that they were not tabulating blocks as a stat until four years after Kareem began playing. There are a number of other stats that were not tabulated until later in Kareem's career. Even still, you'll find that he dominates Hakeem on the stats.
Can you argue with Kareem's six MVP awards againts Hakeem's one MVP award? Though Kareem's six Championships against Hakeem's two is a striking stat, I won't argue the championship stat because it is more of a team stat than an individual player stat.
Further, check the NBA analysts and historians. They concurr that Kareem is greater. Hakeem is usually ranked behind Wilt Chamberlain and, in many cases, after Bill Russell. In some cases, he is ranked behind Shaq but I would disagree. I'd put Hakeem at third or fourth all-time:
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/dailydime?page=dailydime-GreatestCenters
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/65759-top-10-nba-centers-of-all-time
http://www.geoclan.com/sports/articles/06/TopFiveCentersinNBAHistory.htm
I'll accept your concession unless you can provide substantive arguments to refute me, Mike Swenson, and pretty much every other credible NBA historian/analyst out there. In other words, you cannot argue that because I didn't watch TV during Kareem's entire career, Kareem is not greater than Hakeem. We all see fallacy in that argument. Give me something substantive or I will accept your concession that Kareem is greater than Hakeem.
In conclusion, http://www.yougotdunkedon.com/2009/04/kevin-johnson-dunks-on-hakeem-olajuwon.html
Ryan
Monday, December 28, 2009
Kareem vs. Hakeem
Posted by cobrakaidojo at 10:49 AM
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5 comments:
Ryan, Ryan, Ryan,
Typical basketball fan mentality - it's all about the offense! This is where your argument is seriously flawed. The topic is best center of all time. The center position is first and foremost a defensive position. And when it comes to defense Kareem isn't even on the same level as Hakeem!! It's embarrassing to even mention them in the same sentence when it comes to defense! But since you are a typical basketball fan who doesn't see the whole picture we'll compare the two on offense as well. Here is the statistical evidence that Hakeem is the better all around player: First when comparing statistics you need to normalize the data, so that you aren't trying to compare apples to oranges. To normalize the data we will take statistics per 48 minutes (length of a NBA game) played. Kareem takes a slight edge over Hakeem on offense statistics: PTS/48 32.07 vs. 29.25 or 9% difference AST/48 4.7 v.s 3.3 or 30% diff FG%/48 55.9 vs, 51.2 or 8% diff and finally FT% 72.1 vs. 71.2 or 1% diff. Kareem barely leads offensively over Hakeem. Rebounding we will consider both defense and offense since I am not differentiating between off rebounds and def rebounds; Hakeem takes the crown: 14.9 vs. 14.6 or 2%. Finally Hakeem smokes Kareem at defense: Steals 2.35 vs. 1.27 or 85% diff that's right! 85%!! Blocks 4.16 vs. 3.50 or 20% diff. Clearly Hakeem is the best defensive center hands down! Offense slightly goes to Kareem, but if Hakeem had Magic giving him assists like Kareem had, then Hakeem would best Kareem there as well. Now let's look at the playoffs or crunch time! Kareem's numbers go down in the playoffs under pressure in every statistical category with FT% being the only exception! Hakeem improves in points, assists, FG%, and FT% in the clutch playoff environment. Hakeem overtakes points barely 31.35 vs. 31.25 for Kareem. Hakeem trims the assist difference down to 8% from 30% (4.16 for K and 3.82 for H). Hakeem still takes boards 13.53 to 13.45. Defensively Hakeem dominates Kareem even more in the playoffs with a 100% difference it steals (2.05 vs. 1.02) And in blocks H increase the difference from 20% up to 53% (3.94 vs. 2.58) FG% lead for K goes down from 8% diff to 1%. Clearly Hakeem is better on defense by a large margin, so let's end that part of the argument right now. Offensively he barely trails while playing with Kenny SMith as a PG meanwhile Kareem had a top-5 player of all time in Magic Johnson feeding him the rock. Hakeem is also more clutch come playoff time; when it really matters!
Every argument you have is based on championships (accomplished by teams and not individuals; and later in this comment I will show that Hakeem's two championships were far more impressive than any of Kareem's) and on career totals; which don't mean anything except that he played more minutes on the court. When selecting the best center of all time, you are selecting the player with the best skills, not which center played with better teammates or stayed in the league longer. If you took both players in their prime and put them on a team with the same exact 11 other players, who will excel more. The answer is Hakeem.
Let's look at titles:
Kareem had 6; Hakeem had 2
Hakeem's were more impressive; particularly his first was far more impressive than any of Kareem's. IF you take the top 5 supporting players of each championship team for each player and add up each statistical category per 48 minutes - Hakeem did much more with much less help.
continued on next comment
Let's look at Kareem's worst supporting championship cast in 79-80 versus Hakeem's in 93-94 (these stats are the top 5 other players only and doesn't include Hakeem or Kareem's numbers). 79-80 team averaged 111 pts/48min vs. 93-94 92.72 pts/48; 79-80 had 29.00 ast/48 vs. 93-94 28.21/48; 79-80 had 9.6 STL/48 vs. 93-94 8.6; 79-80 had 43.81 Rebound/48 vs. 93-94 35.95 rebound/48; 79-80 had 4.4 BLK/48 vs. 93-94 2.7 blk/48; 79-80 shot 51% FG while 93-94 shot 47%; and finally 79-80 shot 78% FT vs. 93-94 77%. Kareem had a better supporting cast in every single statistical category! His best teammate was Magic Johnson while Hakeem's was Otis Thorpe!!!
The next year Houston gets Drexler who played less than half a season in his old age being injured and this team when compared with Kareem's worst cast still gets bested in 4 of 7 categories including 111 to 105 in points. If you take Kareem's best supporting championship cast (84-85) versus Hakeem's best (94-95)it's an absolute joke how much better the Laker cast was: 123.5 to 105.6 on points 37.7 to 34.9 on assists 34.1 to 27 on boards 3.3 to 2.1 on blocks 54% to 46% on FG.
The bottom line is that the center position is defense first and Kareem is no match for the shorter (two inches shorter) and more athletic Hakeem. Kareem is slightly better in the regular season on offense though not enough better to make up the huge gap on defense. Playoff time is when Hakeem picks up his game while Kareem rides Magic's shirttails. Hakeem wins a championship with Otis THorpe while Kareem needs hall of famer Magic Johnson for his! It's clear that if you take who's better based soley on individual skills and not on team accomplishments Hakeem is the better center! CASE CLOSED.
Thank you for trying to give substantive responses and not resorting to the argument that Abdul-Jabar is not the greatest because Ryan never saw him play live on TV.
You failed to rebut Kareem's MVP count because you can't.
You can fabricate stats any way you want; they will always be fabricated, unauthentic stats. Therefore, I won't respond to the stats that you created because they are hypothetical and full of statistical calculation flaws and missed margins of error(because of tabulation practices of the NBA).
Center is not "first and foremost" a defensive position. Wilt Chamberlin, Shaquille O'neal, Bill Russell, and Kareem would disagree. The players who would agree with your proposition that center is a primarily defensive position would be Shawn Bradely, Manut Bol, and Dikembe Mutumbo. The bottom line is that any position and player in the NBA must be first and foremost both an offensive and defensive weapon (unless you are a role player like Rodman or Wallace). You cannot rely upon a rule of the game that NBA teams do not rely on.
You argue that Kareem is considered the greatest because of his supporting cast. I am sure his NBA finals success in the 80s is due in part to his supporting cast. But I am also sure that you underestimate Hakeem's teams.
You are basically arguing that Hakeem had no supporting cast. You are failing to realize though that neither did the other teams he played really have a supporting cast of any kind.
For example, the '94 NBA Finals was basically a showdown between Hakeem and Ewing. The Knicks were basically the same team as the Rockets. It went seven games. Hakeem averaged 26 points for the series. Hakeem shut Ewing down (held to an average of 18 points for the series). So Hakeem must've singlehandedly won the series for the Rockets because he averaged 8 points more per game by playing holding Ewing to less points, right?
It's a little more complicated than that.
You are also assuming that the 80s teams against which the Lakers played were not equally matched and that the Lakers were always advantaged and more successful in the finals because they had Magic and Abdul-Jabar together. This was the Celtics-Lakers era, possibly the most competitive NBA era. So I won't respond to that faulty assumption.
Olajuwan briefly thrived in the post Jordan era, when he left to play baseball. This era is not among the most competitive in NBA history.
Finally, you failed to rebut every credible NBA historian and analyst because you can't.
You are making a fringe argument that no credible historian agrees with. I know the appeal to do this. I know that Sports fans do this; they come up with creative arguments that go against what the overwhelming consensus is to make a compelling argument. You've done it here but I'm not sold. I wish I could buy it because I am a bigger fan of Olajuwan because, as you point out, I watched him growing up and he is great. I hate the Lakers. But the reality is that Abdul-Jabar is the greatest center to play.
Another interesting stat is that the only NBA basketball player to play more games than Abdul-Jabar is Robert Parish. That adds another dimension to Abdul-Jabar's legacy that you cannot refute.
Ryan
It's late and I just got done playing a new game with my brother in law til 1:45 in the morning (I'm going to hate myself in the morning), so I will be brief on my comment. First, my stats and calculations are not flawed because I adjusted Kareem's stats to reflect steals and blocks per 48 minutes only in the years after they starting keeping tabs on them. So I didn't spread them out over his entire career minutes only those minutes during which the stats were tabulated. So the stats are legit and are normalized to get a true comparison. The stats tell the truth that Hakeem was a far better defender than Kareem and that Kareem was a slightly better offensive player (though we both know he only gets this edge because he played with Magic). Next, you can't argue MVP tally as a measure of who's the greatest. This is another award that depends too much on the competition of a given year. It's just like the NBA finals, it's not solely dependent on the individual player, but rather on him and also the other great players in the league. If another player can impact it and it's outcome, you can't use it to measure a single indivdual. Hakeem played in the Jordan era and his best years were also Jordan's best years, and neither of us is crazy enough to say Hakeem was a better player than Jordan. This clearly affects Hakeem's chances for MVP awards. Also MVP awards are based on media bias toward the east coast and LA. Houston gets no media respect. Lastly, NBA analysts saying they think Kareem is better doesn't make it so, it's merely an opinion. It doesn't make it a fact. You can't argue that because Kareem's career total stats are greater that he's better. It simply means he played longer and more games. It doesn't make his skills any better. If we go simply on career stats then nobody could argue against Malone or Stockton for best PF and PG ever. ANd you couldn't argue Jordan over Kareem either. So if you want to try to pull out career stats then you'll need to explain to me how Jordan is better than Malone and Kareem, because they both have more points and career stats than him. Career total stats is a seriously flawed way to compare stats. You have to normalize the stats so that you can compare them, and the best way to do that is to go stats per 48 minutes of basketball played over a career.
yeah I guess MVP awards don't mean anything.
You are right. Just because the experts, achievments, and the stats show that Kareem is greater than Hakeem doesn't mean Kareem actually is greater than Hakeem. They never faced eachother so we'd never know who would outplay the other. But because the actual stats, achievments, expert opinions, and play are all on my side, my opinion is only more correct than your opinion.
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