Larry Bird vs Hakeem Olajuwon

[K Xerxes]

Honestly? Hakeem. Better two way player for my money, but I didn't seen Bird play in his prime/peak (though I've seen a lot of footage) so take it with however much salt you want.

[Kblaze8855]

The 95 Rockets were talented if only for the addition of Drexler.

You can talk about 94 as a bad team by champ standards...95?

Hakeem and Drexler is a hell of a duo and they had a solid cast behind them. 94...he didnt have anyone who should be a #2.

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

Peaks are close; primes are not. Bird was THE offensive weapon - arguably the most skilled player ever.

His defense in his early prime gets a bit underrated too. Bird was a VG defensive rebounder, above average man defender, and played the passing lanes exceptionally well.

When you add stuff like intangibles: leadership, clutch play, in-game iq (as per Hakeem), I just don't think its all that close.

Only my opinion of course.

[fpliii]

1) Better peak/prime?

2) You get to draft one of them, who do you choose to build around? You have hindsight. Assume you have the same level of $$$, supporting talent, and coaching to work with. Also...in this scenario let's say Bird's injuries act more abruptly than they really did. So he's still retiring in 92, but in those last years he's not limited, the injuries just end his career immediately after that 92 season.

I'd ordinarily say this is clearly Hakeem, but (2) is interesting.

Does this mean that 89, 90, 91, 92 are all now high quality seasons, on par with his 80-88? If that's the case, I think it has to be Bird.

[Audio One]

how overrated are we going with olajuwon? will it ever ever stop

[CJ Mustard]

Bird clearly. Prime, peak, career, etc. And I'm a huge fan of Hakeem. What's with the downplaying of Bird lately? The guy was a 28/10/7 guy on 50/40/90 in his prime, and he led his team to 3 rings on top of that. He peaked higher than Magic, who is consistently put in the top 5, while Bird is between 7-10 with only slightly worse career accomplishments.

[Audio One]

The 95 Rockets were talented if only for the addition of Drexler.

You can talk about 94 as a bad team by champ standards...95?

Hakeem and Drexler is a hell of a duo and they had a solid cast behind them. 94...he didnt have anyone who should be a #2.

And watching both postseasons, ironically the '94 team had a more convincing run, and would have better matched up w/ any Chicago team imo. The closest Houston came to losing was against New York, and game 6 and 7 saw them come as close as ever to losing, however blocking Starks' shot and shutting down Ewing was all of Olajuwon and Houston's control. If Wesley Person makes that wide-open three, were not even having this discussion

[Audio One]

Hakeem dragged arguably the worst supporting cast out of any of the top 11 ATGs, arguable with 2003 Duncan, to the championship...with:

35/9/4/3/1 on 61% TS against the 60 win Jazz
30/9/4/2/1 on 53% TS against the 59 win Suns
35/13/5/4/1 on 59% TS against the 62 win Spurs, destroying Robinson
33/12/6/2/2 on 51% TS against the 57 win Magic

Overall 33/10/5/3/1 on 56% TS with incredible defense en route to a championship, with again, one of the worst supporting casts for any ATG in history, beating 4 straight 57+ win teams and at least 1 HOFer every round.

Bill Russell beat a 49-win team and 54-win team to win his title in '62, your own Milwaukee team beat 48-win team in '71, and the '72 Lakers beat a 48-win team in the final round. Those teams were MUCH, much better than any team Olajuwon faced in '94 or '95, and any objective b-ball fan imo will tell you those runs were better

[chocolatethunder]

Has nothing to do with the injuries..I'm not asking for an all time list, nor am I asking about longevity and how injuries play into that. Bird is ahead of Hakeem on the AT list for most of us. I'm asking for peak/prime, and who you'd build around with equal supporting talent. And Hakeem has reached an insane level of play at his peak and took a substantially (it's not even close) inferior supporting cast to titles against nightmarish competition.

Do you or do you not think that Hakeem over his career could win 3+ rings with Bird's supporting talent? Not the players exactly, but the same level of talent built around Hakeem.

I don't understand why on this board by a bunch of children who never saw the 95 rockets play, this team is thought of as a bad team? That team was really good. Both of the Houston teams that won championships were really good teams. Horry was a total beast back then. I saw these teams play and they were both really really good.

[chocolatethunder]

The 95 Rockets were talented if only for the addition of Drexler.

You can talk about 94 as a bad team by champ standards...95?

Hakeem and Drexler is a hell of a duo and they had a solid cast behind them. 94...he didnt have anyone who should be a #2.

I guess you can say that but Thorpe balled his ass off for that team and although Horry was young both him and Cassell came up big when it counted. Apart from you, I'm not sure many other people on this board know who Otis Thorpe is but he was pretty damn good in Houston. For my money those Houston teams were really good.

Edit: and Vernon Maxwell could be pretty good too. He was a hot head and took crazy shots but he had a pretty nasty streak in him. Him and Thorpe were like a really good number two guy. Like the two of them combined made a really good second guy.

[3ball]

do i have to state the obvious here?

olajuwon would have zero or 1 ring had it not been for the anomalous occurance of jordan's retirement when he was defending 3-peat champion - so this shouldn't be a conversation.

also, olajuwon only became the unstoppable offensive force that had 1000 moves and footwork in the mid-90's... he didn't have nearly as much of that in the 80's and even entering the 90's.

he really developed and fine-tuned his offense around that time and it took him up closer to that Bird level.

[chocolatethunder]

do i have to state the obvious here?

olajuwon would have zero or 1 ring had it not been for the anomalous occurance of jordan's retirement when he was defending 3-peat champion - so this shouldn't be a conversation.

also, olajuwon only became the unstoppable offensive force that had 1000 moves and footwork in the mid-90's... he didn't have nearly as much of that in the 80's and even entering the 90's.

he really developed and fine-tuned his offense around that time and it took him up closer to that Bird level.

Hakeem also benefitted greatly from Tomjanovich's system which ran the ball though him. His numbers went up as soon as Tomnanovich was coach. That being said, Hakeem is one of the best ever and one of my favorite players. I loved those Rocket teams but they weren't winning shit without Rudy T and his system and that's a fact.

I actually think that they would have beaten the Bulls w Jordan but that's just my opinion.

[3ball]

Hakeem also benefitted greatly from Tomjanovich's system which ran the ball though him. His numbers went up as soon as Tomnanovich was coach. That being said, Hakeem is one of the best ever and one of my favorite players. I loved those Rocket teams but they weren't winning shit without Rudy T and his system and that's a fact.

I actually think that they would have beaten the Bulls w Jordan but that's just my opinion.

i could see it happening, just because the reason Jordan retired in the first place was partially because he had nothing left to prove... so if he had decided to keep playing instead, he wouldn't have been high on motivation.

but this scenario would still be the less likely one - vegas would still favor jordan heavily.

something to consider is that olajuwon came out of nowhere in 1994 - maybe jordan's absence inspired him to step up more than he would have.. in all reality, we don't know what would have happened if jordan had played in 1994, other than him being the prohibitive favorite to win again.

i'm guessing that if jordan had his streak broken in 1994, he would have come back in 1995 and done what he actually did do in 1996 - get redemtion by having one of the GOAT seasons statistically, and leading his team to the best record ever.

[chocolatethunder]

i could see it happening, just because the reason Jordan retired in the first place was partially because he had nothing left to prove... so if he had decided to keep playing instead, he wouldn't have been high on motivation.

but this scenario would still be the less likely one - vegas would still favor jordan heavily.

something to consider is that olajuwon came out of nowhere in 1994 - maybe jordan's absence inspired him to step up more than he would have.. in all reality, we don't know what would have happened if jordan had played in 1994, other than him being the prohibitive favorite to win again.

i'm guessing that if jordan had his streak broken in 1994, he would have come back in 1995 and done what he actually did do in 1996 - get redemtion by having one of the GOAT seasons statistically, and leading his team to the best record ever.

Having seen all of Hakeem's carreer it was kind of an incredible convergence of circumstances that led to him "coming out of nowhere". He was raw when he was in college and his early years. Super athletic and raw. He was never a good open court dribbler ever. He dribbled funny w his hand on top of the ball and pushed it out in front of him. He could dribble in the post just fine. He was improving pretty much every season. He was really smart and would learn and do more and more. Then Rudy T came along and realized how smart he was and how well he saw the game and decided to run the offense through him which really made his stats go up. But it was a great move. So he was peaking and had the team/offense around him at just the right time.

[ArbitraryWater]

This is turning out to be a nice history lesson for OP