biggest choke in nba history?

[LAZERUSS]

In no order...

Pacers Knicks Spike Lee game....everyone on the Knicks was shook.

Nick Anderson in 95' ..a great shooter like Nick shouldn't brick 4 straight FT's...

Tragic Johnson in 84'...

Lebron in 2011' he just didn't want the ball at all???

note: James Harden in 12' was shook as hell.....dude flat out was missing consecutive layup after layup.....shooked...shucked.....shoked.....dude was not himself at all.

Yep, "Tragic" Johnson in '84.

All he did in the '84 Finals was to average 18.1 ppg, lead his team in rebounds at 7.7 rpg, hand out 13.6 apg, and shoot .560 from the field. BTW, Kareem shot .481 from the floor in that series, as well. If you want "choke jobs", he would be among the leaders. And if losing is considered a "choke job", then Hakeem and his EIGHT first round exits has to be among the leaders,too.

[LAZERUSS]

And how about Kobe in his Finals?

99-00
Regular season 22.5 ppg .468 FG%
Finals 15.6 ppg .367 FG%
FG% in thelast Game of Series .296 FG%

00-01
Regular season 28.5 ppg .464 FG%
Finals 24.6 ppg .415 FG%
Last Game .389

01-02
Regular season 25.2 ppg .469
Finals 26.8 ppg .514
Last Game .438

03-04
Regular season 24.0 ppg .438
Finals 22.6 ppg .381
Last Game .333

07-08
Regular season 28.3 ppg .459
Finals 25.7 ppg .405
Last game of the series, .318

08-09
Regular season 26.8 ppg .467
Finals 32.4 ppg .430
Last game of the series, .435

09-10
Regular season 27.0 ppg .456
Finals 28.6 ppg .405
Last game of the series, .250 from the floor.


Other noteables:


97-98
Swept by Utah 4-0.
Kobe averages 10.0 ppg on a .367 FG%

98-99
Swept by San Antonio 4-0
Last game of the series : Kobe 16 points on a .438 FG%

02-03
Lose to Spurs in WCF's, 4-2.
Last game loss by a score of 110-82 (Kobe with 20 points in a season in which he averaged 30 ppg)

03-04 Finals
Heavily favored Lakers lose to Pistons, 4-1.
In the clinching game five loss Kobe shoots .333 in a 100-87 loss (and LA was down 23 going into 4th quarter)

04-05
team goes 34-48 and misses playoffs

05-06
Regular season 35.4 ppg .450
Playoffs 27.9 ppg .497
Last game (7) 24 points in a 121-90 loss (after blowing a 3-1 series lead)

06-07
Team goes 42-40
Loses in first round to Suns, 4-1.
Last game of that series, Kobe shoots .394 from the floor

07-08
Lakers are blown out by Celts in Finals.
In game four the Lakers blow a 23 point lead, and lose, in a game in which Kobe shot .316 from the field.
In the clinching game six loss, the Lakers lose by a Finals record margin of 131-92. Kobe shoots .318 from the floor.

10-11
Lakers with HCA are swept by the Mavs, 4-0.
In the clinching game four loss, LA loses 122-86, and Kobe shoots .389 from the field.

[navy]

Yep, "Tragic" Johnson in '84.

All he did in the '84 Finals was to average 18.1 ppg, lead his team in rebounds at 7.7 rpg, hand out 13.6 apg, and shoot .560 from the field. BTW, Kareem shot .481 from the floor in that series, as well. If you want "choke jobs", he would be among the leaders. And if losing is considered a "choke job", then Hakeem and his EIGHT first round exits has to be among the leaders,too.

Magic Johnson has admitted to choking that series in the 4th quarters....

[LAZERUSS]

Magic Johnson has admitted to choking that series in the 4th quarters....

"Big Game James" Worthy, who probably elevated his game in his Finals career more than any other all-time great, basically threw away game two with a horrible pass, and then missed a FT in the waning seconds of game four. Both games went into OT, and the Lakers blew both of them.

For the series, Worthy averaged 22.1 ppg and shot .638 from the field.

[tpols]

Yep, "Tragic" Johnson in '84.

All he did in the '84 Finals was to average 18.1 ppg, lead his team in rebounds at 7.7 rpg, hand out 13.6 apg, and shoot .560 from the field. BTW, Kareem shot .481 from the floor in that series, as well. If you want "choke jobs", he would be among the leaders. And if losing is considered a "choke job", then Hakeem and his EIGHT first round exits has to be among the leaders,too.

Lebron averaged 18/7/7 on good efficiency in 2011.. and everyone knows he choked hard.

Chokings about context.. those stats tell us nothing

[LAZERUSS]

Lebron averaged 18/7/7 on good efficiency in 2011.. and everyone knows he choked hard.

Chokings about context.. those stats tell us nothing

You're kidding right?

Lebron came into the the Finals in 2011 with regular season averages of 27 ppg,
7.5 rpg, 7.0 apg, .510 FG%, and a .759 FT%. In the Finals he dipped to 17.8 ppg, 7.2 rpg, 6.8 apg, .478 FG%, and a .600 FT%.

Magic came into the '84 Finals after a regular season of 17.6 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 13.1 apg, .565 FG%, and an .810 FT%. Again, in the '84 Finals... 18.1 ppg, 7.7 rpg, 13.6 apg, .560 FG%, and a .744 FT%.

So, while Lebron hid in the '11 Finals, Magic was unstoppable in the '84 Finals.

[Stringer Bell]

Lebron in 2011 Finals was far worse than the 1984 Finals performance by Magic. And Worthy for that matter.

Magic had key screw-ups in games 2 and 4 of the 84' Finals. Worthy had a big screw-up in game 2 as well. But both of them played very well in the series otherwise. The games would not have been close if they hadn't been playing so well. Worthy had 29 pts on 11 of 12 shooting in game 2, and had 30 pts on 14 of 17 shooting in game 4. He had like 10 points in OT. Magic was putting up monster numbers in those games too. 27, 10, 9 on 10-14 FG in game 2. 20, 11, 17, on 8-12 FG in game 4.

Lebron, on the other hand, underperformed (to say the least) throughout whole games, and routinely disappeared throughout the 4th quarters. And 3 of the games they lost were very winnable. They choked away a 15 point lead in game 2 and Lebron did nothing in those last few minutes. They lost by 3 in game 4 when Lebron scored 8 points....in the whole game on 3-11 shooting. They were up 3 by 3 minutes left in game 5 when Dallas went on a 8-0 stretch in which Lebron had 2 missed shots and an offensive foul.

There's a difference between playing very well throughout the game and having some errors late in the game (and the games were still winnable regardless) as opposed to giving underwhelming performances for 3 quarters and then disappearing in the 4th. Or playing perhaps the worst game of your career in a game that could pretty much wrap up the series for you, and your team still only loses by 3.

If Lebron played in 2011 like Magic did in 1984, the Heat win easily. It doesn't even go down to the wire like that. If Magic in 1984 played like Lebron did in 2011, the Celtics defeat the Lakers in less than 7.

[stalkerforlife]

Lebron 2011.

Kobe 2004? How can you choke while injured and going through a rape trial?

Lebron had no reasonable excuses.

[Stringer Bell]

Phoenix blowing a 3-1 lead in the 1995 WC Semifinals. With Home Court Advantage.

Portland blowing a 15 point lead in game 7 of the 2000 WC Finals. If they hadn't blown that, then we'd be talking about the Lakers. They would have blown a 3-1 lead with Home Court Advantage.

Seattle in 1994, the first seed, blowing a 2-0 lead to Denver and losing in 5.

[riseagainst]

06 lakers losing in 7 after being up 3-1

[SouBeachTalents]

LeBron in the 2011 Finals
Nick Anderson
1994 Sonics
2000 Trail Blazers
2006 Mavs
2013 Spurs
Ewing in '95

[Stringer Bell]

Lakers vs. Boston, 2008 Finals, Game 4.

Magic '84
Jordan '94
Kobe '04, '08, '10, '12
Lebron '11
Wilt - too many to count
Karl Malone - '97, '98
Ewing - '95
Rose - '11 - though he's not really a superstar
Durant - '13

I think some of these are a little too harsh.

Already talked about Magic in 84'...Jordan in 95', well he screwed up in game 1 no doubt, and he and the whole team fell apart late in game 6. Jordan had a couple of monster games in that series though...The Bulls were weak at the 4 spot which hurt them with rebounding and interior defense. That hurt them more than Jordan's "rustiness".

Kobe was atrocious in the 04' Finals (outside of game 2), no doubt. Shaq was very efficient and playing well, yet Kobe continued to try to take over games and had brickfest after brickfest. 2010? No doubt he stunk up the joint in game 7 with his shooting, as did most of the players. It's not like he had a bad series overall though. Obviously it helps that the Lakers won. 2012? He was still averaging 31 a game, but the Thunder were just a lot better? 2008, well I sort of agree. The Lakers pulled off a horrendous choke job in game 4, and Kobe was definitely part of that as he didn't play well.

Definitely agree with Lebron in 2011.

Ewing in 95? He got destroyed by Rik Smits in game 1, although Mason had the complete brain-fart by passing it the one player who was actually standing upright, the guy on the OTHER TEAM. Ewing was also getting destroyed in game 5 by Smits, but kept the series going with his game winner after taking 5 steps. The missed layup? Yah I suppose you can say that was a choke job. It would have forced OT. I thought the 94' Finals was worse. Good shot-blocking and rebounding, but absolutely dreadful offense. 19 PPG on 23 FGA per game. Very costly since two of the defeats were so close, with Ewing going like 9 for 30 in one of those losses.

I think Malone sometimes catches a bit too much flack for those defeats in the finals (more so in 1998). He did play very well in the last 2 games. But he's such a scumbag POS, so whatever. I love watching the deadbeat dad, hebephile Failman lose in the postseason.

I won't blame Russell too much for getting beat by Michael Jordan of all people in the clutch, but someone should have give him some help on that first layup that cut the lead to 1. He blew past Russell....no help defense.

[jayfan]

Man, it kills me to say this about (otherwise) 'Mr. Clutch', and one of my all-time favorite players, but Isiah's pass that Bird intercepted at the end of game 5 was a pretty big moment of choke. By his own admission, he just panicked in that frenzied moment. Completely changed the fate of that series.




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