The Last Dance has once again opened up the door for the never-ending debate among NBA fans. Which era’s better? When has it been more difficult to win a championship? Would modern-day players thrive in the eighties?
According to Isiah Thomas, players of the likes of Kevin Durant and LeBron James would be far ahead in the GOAT conversation if they’d played back in the day, as they’re far superior athletes with superb skills and brains. However, Jalen Rose isn’t that sure about it.
That’s why he discussed the matter in ESPN’s Get Up, claiming that even though Durant and James are good enough to thrive in any era, that doesn’t exactly mean they could take down legends like Magic Johnson, Michael Jordan, and Larry Bird when it came to winning championships:
“(There are) A couple of words since this documentary has come up that I think that are being used wrong. One is dominant, the other is greatness. To me, yes, you put KD and LeBron in that era – LeBron is the same size as Karl Malone, so I’ll give him Karl Malone’s points and LeBron James’ rebounds. He’d still be an all-time great player. Kevin Durant, I’ll give him Jordan’s girth and tight buckets. He’d be scoring 35, he’d be amazing. But when you say dominant, to me that means basically having an opportunity to win a championship every year. (…) from 2010 to 2019 LeBron has won three championships, that’s dominance over his era. KD has won two, that’s dominance over his era. But it’s not like teleporting them into the eighties and all of a sudden everybody would be winning the kind of championships that Magic and Bird won, I just don’t see that happening,” Rose claimed.
Notably, both Durant and James have the kind of skill to thrive in any era. They’re just once-in-a-lifetime kinds of players that could adapt, adjust, and thrive. But I guess we’ll just never know whether they’d actually be better back in the day.
