Lakers Fans, a few questions:

[hpantazo]

Yeah, that's fair.  I guess Kobe throws it in the publics face a bit more maybe.  Besides sodomizing that chick, selling his team out on every possible media outlet this past summer showed a disrespect for the game itself that Jordan would have never stooped to.

Jordan quotes:

"I hate being out there with those garbagemen. They don't get you the ball."

"They've got no idea what it's all about. The white guys, they work hard, but they don't have the talent. And the rest of them? Who knows what to expect? They're not good for much of anything."

"I know what's gonna happen. We'll wait until the last minute and then they'll say something like they couldn't get a deal done because of the cap or somebody pulled out at the last minute. It happens here all the time. I don't know why I'm surprised every year."

"He can't do anything with the ball. Don't give it to him." - Michael yelling at Paxson who passed the ball to Perdue

"You ever hear of a guy, six-eleven maybe and two hundred sixty pounds, a guy big and fat like that and he can't get but two rebounds, if that many, running all over the [dang] court and he gets two rebounds? Big guy like that and he gets one rebound. Can't even stick his [expletive] into people and get more than that...Big, fat, fat guy. One rebound in three games. Power forward. Maybe they should call it powerless forward." - Michael ripping Stacey King a new one

"He was scared in there and panicking. He just lost it when Stockton scored." - Michael on B.J. Armstrong's mental fragility

I'll let them stand up and take responsibility for themselves."

"We have to do some things. We need to make some changes."

"...I call them 'the Looney Tunes.' Physically, they were the best. Mentally, they weren't even close."

"He's scared. He's got no heart...Nobody told me that. If I had spoken up, he wouldn't have been here."

"I know I can recognize what to do, but I'm not sure they can."

"It's a hell of a lot easier to make Earl Monroe look good than it is Brad Sellers."

"I hope there's a jumpshot in there." - Michael to Stacey King who was walking into the locker room with a box

"They don't need a ticket to watch you sitting on the bench. They can go to your house for that." - Michael to Charles Davis who was sorting through his tickets for his family and friends

"Give me the [expletive] ball." - Michael to Doug Collins who drew up a play for Dave Corzine

"I hate when I have to read that in the papers the next day, that I couldn't do something. It wasn't my fault."

"You're an idiot. You've screwed up every play we ever ran. You're too stupid to even remember the plays. We ought to get rid of you." - Michael to Horace Grant

"If you [pass the ball to Bill Cartwright], you'll never get the ball from me."

"We're not winning because of talent. We're just beating bad teams."

"Headache tonight, Scottie?" - Michael asks Scottie, while showing him his 2-for-16 line

"It's probably a twelve-day. He needs two days to wake up." - Michael on a ten-day contract teammate

"Five more years and I'm out of here. I'm marking these days on a calendar, like I'm in jail. I'm tired of being used by this organization, by the league, by the writers, by everyone."

"They're not interested in winning. They just want to sell tickets, which they can do because of me. They won't make any deals to make us better. And this Kukoc thing. I hate that. They're spending all their time chasing this guy."

"If I were a general manager, we'd be a better team."

"Will Vanderbilt. He doesn't deserve to be named after a Big Ten school." - Michael on Will Perdue

"I want to prove the critics wrong...I want to see some serious moves from management, which I really haven't seen that much of yet, and I want to see more serious attitudes from my teammates this year when it comes to the playoffs. In the past, it's been more or less a joking thing, sort of a 'Well, we're here, so let's have a good time.'"

"I'm sure everything will be fine if we win, but if we start losing, I'm shooting."

"I know what I would do if I were coach. I'd determine our strengths and weaknesses and utilize them. And it's pretty clear what our strength is."

"Your boy doesn't want to play. I'm tired of bailing his [Swearing is not permitted at **********. You must edit this post prior to submitting.] out." - Michael yelling at Jim Cleamons about Dennis Hopson

"I don't know about trading a 24 year-old guy for a 34 year-old guy." - Michael questioning the Oakley trade

"He's causing me too many turnovers." - Michael on Cartwright's inability to catch

"Why the hell don't you ever set a pick like that in a game?" - Michael yelling at Perdue after also hitting Perdue upside his head (led to the institution of the private curtain for practices)
_________________________________________________________________________

There is such an ABSURD double standard and application of revisionist history for Michael Jordan that I don't even know where to start. Jordan threw his teammates under the bus ALL the time. He was also a notorious adulterer and gambler.

Great, great, incredible player...but hearing people praise Jordan for his "class" or his ability to gel with teammates while chastising Kobe for the same thing BOGGLES MY MIND.

I love that one! How well did becoming a GM work out for him? LOL

[fairweatherfan06]

Just for the record I'M not a Jordan apologist.  I'm not feeling his off the court behavior either.  I dislike them both. But I will say, for the most part I remember you hear about Jordan calling out his teammates in the locker room not the press. I maybe wrong and it maybe the onslaught of the internet that marks the difference, but Jordan's "attitude" was more of something you heard through the grapevine whereas Kobe's is out on front street.  Which might account for the feelings from fans.

[D Dub]

Yeah, that's fair.  I guess Kobe throws it in the publics face a bit more maybe.  Besides sodomizing that chick, selling his team out on every possible media outlet this past summer showed a disrespect for the game itself that Jordan would have never stooped to.

Jordan quotes:

"I hate being out there with those garbagemen. They don't get you the ball."

"They've got no idea what it's all about. The white guys, they work hard, but they don't have the talent. And the rest of them? Who knows what to expect? They're not good for much of anything."

"I know what's gonna happen. We'll wait until the last minute and then they'll say something like they couldn't get a deal done because of the cap or somebody pulled out at the last minute. It happens here all the time. I don't know why I'm surprised every year."

"He can't do anything with the ball. Don't give it to him." - Michael yelling at Paxson who passed the ball to Perdue

"You ever hear of a guy, six-eleven maybe and two hundred sixty pounds, a guy big and fat like that and he can't get but two rebounds, if that many, running all over the [dang] court and he gets two rebounds? Big guy like that and he gets one rebound. Can't even stick his [expletive] into people and get more than that...Big, fat, fat guy. One rebound in three games. Power forward. Maybe they should call it powerless forward." - Michael ripping Stacey King a new one

"He was scared in there and panicking. He just lost it when Stockton scored." - Michael on B.J. Armstrong's mental fragility

I'll let them stand up and take responsibility for themselves."

"We have to do some things. We need to make some changes."

"...I call them 'the Looney Tunes.' Physically, they were the best. Mentally, they weren't even close."

"He's scared. He's got no heart...Nobody told me that. If I had spoken up, he wouldn't have been here."

"I know I can recognize what to do, but I'm not sure they can."

"It's a hell of a lot easier to make Earl Monroe look good than it is Brad Sellers."

"I hope there's a jumpshot in there." - Michael to Stacey King who was walking into the locker room with a box

"They don't need a ticket to watch you sitting on the bench. They can go to your house for that." - Michael to Charles Davis who was sorting through his tickets for his family and friends

"Give me the [expletive] ball." - Michael to Doug Collins who drew up a play for Dave Corzine

"I hate when I have to read that in the papers the next day, that I couldn't do something. It wasn't my fault."

"You're an idiot. You've screwed up every play we ever ran. You're too stupid to even remember the plays. We ought to get rid of you." - Michael to Horace Grant

"If you [pass the ball to Bill Cartwright], you'll never get the ball from me."

"We're not winning because of talent. We're just beating bad teams."

"Headache tonight, Scottie?" - Michael asks Scottie, while showing him his 2-for-16 line

"It's probably a twelve-day. He needs two days to wake up." - Michael on a ten-day contract teammate

"Five more years and I'm out of here. I'm marking these days on a calendar, like I'm in jail. I'm tired of being used by this organization, by the league, by the writers, by everyone."

"They're not interested in winning. They just want to sell tickets, which they can do because of me. They won't make any deals to make us better. And this Kukoc thing. I hate that. They're spending all their time chasing this guy."

"If I were a general manager, we'd be a better team."

"Will Vanderbilt. He doesn't deserve to be named after a Big Ten school." - Michael on Will Perdue

"I want to prove the critics wrong...I want to see some serious moves from management, which I really haven't seen that much of yet, and I want to see more serious attitudes from my teammates this year when it comes to the playoffs. In the past, it's been more or less a joking thing, sort of a 'Well, we're here, so let's have a good time.'"

"I'm sure everything will be fine if we win, but if we start losing, I'm shooting."

"I know what I would do if I were coach. I'd determine our strengths and weaknesses and utilize them. And it's pretty clear what our strength is."

"Your boy doesn't want to play. I'm tired of bailing his [Swearing is not permitted at **********. You must edit this post prior to submitting.] out." - Michael yelling at Jim Cleamons about Dennis Hopson

"I don't know about trading a 24 year-old guy for a 34 year-old guy." - Michael questioning the Oakley trade

"He's causing me too many turnovers." - Michael on Cartwright's inability to catch

"Why the hell don't you ever set a pick like that in a game?" - Michael yelling at Perdue after also hitting Perdue upside his head (led to the institution of the private curtain for practices)
_________________________________________________________________________

There is such an ABSURD double standard and application of revisionist history for Michael Jordan that I don't even know where to start. Jordan threw his teammates under the bus ALL the time. He was also a notorious adulterer and gambler.

Great, great, incredible player...but hearing people praise Jordan for his "class" or his ability to gel with teammates while chastising Kobe for the same thing BOGGLES MY MIND.

At least your not biased  

i still don't recall Jordan sodomizing anyone or uttering any of those quotes on back to back to back radio interviews with ESPN.

You know as well as I, that your opinion is of the vast minority, and for good reason.

[GoldenThroat]

I  generally agree with your assessment of talent in the 90's versus now, however let's look at the teams the Bulls faced and who the Shaq/Kobe Lakers faced.  You can be the judge.

First the Bulls

Bulls 3-peat (#1)

the Lakeshow: Magic, Byron Scott, Divac (and Jordan's college teamates) Perkins and Worthy I'm sure you know the roster well...
Clyde Drexler's Trailblazers featuring Terry Porter, Duckworth, Buck Williams, Jerome Kersey, Cliff Robinson and Rick Adelman as coach (not a bad team)
Barkley's Suns: with Dan Marjele, Danny Ainge (LOL), Tom Chambers, and Kevin Johnson

3-peat (#2)

Supersonics: featuring PRIME Payton and Kemp and Detlef Shremp, Sam Perkins (again) and Hershey Hawkins
Jazz:  Malone, Stockton, Hornacek, Byron Russell and Greg Ostertag
Jazz (again) more or less the same roster

Now the Lakers

Pacers: Reggie Miller, Jalen Rose, Rik Smits, Dale Davis, Mark Jackson (I just have bring this up again SAM PERKINS...man this dude could not catch a break!) Chris Mullin, Al Harrington...wow on paper this was a loaded team.

Sixers: AI, Mutumbo, Aaron Mckie, Eric Snow and a cast of nobodies
Nets: Jason Kidd, Kenyon Martin, Keith Van Horn, Kerry Kittles, Richard Jefferson..gasp...Brian Scalabrine, and Byron Scott as Coach.

Last but not least....Kobe's one finals loss

Pistons: basically the same roster of the team we just beat (except younger and hungrier) replace McDyess with Prime Ben Wallace and weaker bench than they have now...seriously


My take: I think the Sonics had a weak bench but a very good starting five, Those Jazz teams had a drop in talent past Stockton/Malone but were well coached (Jerry Sloan) and had good schemes.

Of the teams the Lakers beat, only the Pacers were anywhere near as loaded as the teams the Bulls beat in the first three-peat and still might not have been good enough to beat the Jazz or Sonics in that era.

The Sixers were a great defensive team with no offensive punch past AI not even as good as the worst team the Bulls beat in the two 3-peats.

Those Nets were a decent team but again still not as good as the least talented team the Bulls beat.

And the Pistons well hey, they were good no arguments with that we just had a tough series against them. 

Have fun

That's only part of the story though. During that Laker title run, the Finals were anti-climactic. The top teams were in the West, and the WCF's were (rightfully) considered the actually championships. The Trailblazer squads with Pippen (just two years removed from his title in Chicago), Sheed, Sabonis, a young & effective Stoudamire, an excellent 2 guard in Steve Smith.....Duncan's Spurs....The Sacramento Kings. THOSE were the actual Finals, not the sacrificial lambs that the Eastern Conference were serving up at the time.

With that being said, that was 5-8 years ago. The difference between the talent then and during Jordan's era was marginal, because only a couple of years had gone by. Now, I think it's much more pronounced.

And while Shaq was the "man" during those days, Kobe wasn't far behind. I think his contribution to those teams gets marginalized far more than it should. Due to Shaq's free throw difficulties, Kobe was our #1 option in the 4th quarter of close games, along with providing extraordinary perimeter defense (that he shows less of now due to an increased offensive burden). I think that counts for a lot. 

[GoldenThroat]

At least your not biased   

I have no illusions about who Kobe Bryant is. I don't think he's a "good guy", by any means. It's the revisionist history of the kind of guy that JORDAN was that cracks me up. They're both jerks. Incredible basketball players, but let's not act as though Michael Jordan has a modicum of moral superiority over Kobe or just about anyone else, k?

i still don't recall Jordan sodomizing anyone or uttering any of those quotes on back to back to back radio interviews with ESPN.

Ah yes, the rape case. If can provide an argument or evidence as to why the case was erroneously dropped, I'm all ears. You should work for the Colorado DA's office if that's the case. It's not like he was acquitted...they flat out dropped the case. Cheated on his wife? Definitely, and that's weak. Rape? I'd like to hear the argument.

You don't recall Jordan trashing his teammates in the media? ****. Okay. All of those quotes were from Sam Smith's book "The Jordan Rules". Smith was and is the beat writer for the Chicago Bulls. He ABSOLUTELY trashed his teammates to the media. Look it up for yourself. 

You know as well as I, that your opinion is of the vast minority, and for good reason.

Yes, and that reason is one of the most skillfully crafted "images" of the 20th & 21st centuries. Marketing perfection. Jordan trashed his teammates, cheated on his wife, was a compulsive gambler, and I'll let you be the judge of what's going on here.

http://www.serioussportsnewsnetwork.com/admin/wp-content/gallery/ssnn/jordan_stoned.jpg

And all of those things were artfully swept under the rug. 

Yes, my opinion's in the minority. I'm sorry I'm not as susceptible to carefully crafted images as many people are. I definitely don't want my son to "be like Mike".