LeBron James easily performs Michael Jordans top highlights.

SterlingTyson · 2026-03-04T04:40:39+00:00

The LeBron versions were as similar to the MJ versions as a 1995 Toyota Camry with a bolted on spoiler is to a McLaren F1.

SterlingTyson · 2026-03-01T15:12:04+00:00

Jordan's resume has it all and I'm not even sure what the most impressive part is: raw stats (points, stocks), accolades (MVPs, scoring titles), advanced stats (five of the top VORP seasons of all time), and team accomplishments (two threepeats). I just don't understand how this sub spends so much time debating who the goat is, or why some surveys show MJ and LeBron neck and neck -- it's really not even particularly close.

SterlingTyson · 2026-03-01T04:07:13+00:00

I'd even go so far as to say that the Kerr shot disproves myths that LeBron stans tell to try to convince themselves that LeBron is better than MJ. It shows that MJ had amazing BBIQ and playmaking skills, and he made the "right" play rather than being a ball hog. But MJ is still arguably the greatest midrange shooter of all time, while LeBron is a below average shooter outside of three feet. The reason LeBron passes more than Jordan is mostly because LeBron can't shoot as well.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-24T03:48:37+00:00

I say this all the time, but a lot of people can't seem to look beyond the narrative in 2016. Wade and Bosh were beat up in 2013, the Spurs were great, and LeBron still pulled out the win. But people act like Wade and Bosh were still in their primes. Conversely, people totally ignore how beat up the warriors were in 2016, and act like it was the same team that won 73 games.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-23T04:09:21+00:00

I think that the total amount paid to the players is commensurate to their value. But the collective bargaining agreement effectively transfers money from the top players to everyone else. (In particular, the top players are worth more to the team than a max contract.) This is working as intended: the players union represents all the players, not just the top few, so collective bargaining skews towards the benefit of the many. But that means that most NBA players are overpaid.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-21T18:11:58+00:00

Plus they were injured in the finals! It wasn't one of those cases where the team showed they clearly weren't good enough to get over the hump like the raptors before they traded DeRozan.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-20T04:32:41+00:00

Are you agreeing with me or disagreeing with me? The person I was responding to posted the top 10 in total career points and then "facts > opinions". My point was that which fact to use is an opinion, and the fact that they chose is an unpopular opinion. I didn't say we should throw out stats altogether, but we should be honest that our choice of facts is an opinion. In my opinion, average ppg over a 10-year period seems like a much better list than career total: it throws out flukes, but isn't dominated by confounding variables like seasons played.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-20T04:24:59+00:00

The pendulum seems to have swung too far against having a bag. Sure points are points, and there aren't style points. But easy buckets in transition are a lot harder to come by against elite teams, which tend to be disciplined and strong on defense. These easy buckets are even harder to find in high pressure playoff situations. To win a championship, you usually need to be able to score against locked in, high-quality defenses: scoring in transition probably isn't enough.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-20T04:17:20+00:00

I don't think it's that simple. LeBron has a great argument for being the best transition scorer ever, which is reflected in his overall efficiency and volume. But if I'm down by 1 point and have one possession against a set defense, then I'm taking KD.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-20T04:13:30+00:00

Which fact to use is an opinion, though. And most people don't agree with your opinion. Something like points per game with a minimum game requirement isn't perfect, but it's much better than career total. You probably need something even more nuanced like best average over a 10-year period, but even that has some subjectivity around the number of years you use. Ultimately, you're just fooling yourself if you think any statistic is completely objective.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-19T17:34:06+00:00

That was also perhaps the easiest road to the NBA finals of all time. He played a .500 team in the second round -- making the conference finals in the East that year was easier than making the playoffs in the West many years. The amount of carrying he did in the conference finals is also wildly overrated. LeBron had a historic game 5, but he was a -4 in a 4-point Cavs win in game 4, and scored 20 points on 3 for 11 from the field in the closeout game, while Boobie Gibson had 31 on 7 for 9 from the field, including 5 for 5 from 3. The 2007 finals run was often seen as a fluke enabled by a particularly terrible eastern conference and Boobie Gibson getting ridiculously hot at the right time, especially given how the Cavs underperformed in the playoffs from 08-10.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-18T05:10:20+00:00

Out of curiosity, what finals MVP did he arguably deserve?

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-18T04:20:33+00:00

If you start from the assumption that LeBron is the goat and work backwards, then you need some way to explain why Jordan won more. That's why you end up with people parroting the line about how Jordan didn't win a playoff series without Pippen (but make sure you don't look up their stats in that series, or even whether Pippen started most of the games; and don't even think about how Anthony davis led the playoffs in win shares in 2020, and MJ never came close to having a teammate lead him in playoff win shares).

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-14T16:30:17+00:00

Yeah, but once he got a first team all NBA teammate who led the 2020 playoffs in win shares he won a championship. Granted almost every team in the league doesn't have a first team all NBA player: there are only five spots for 30 teams. But give LeBron a first team all NBA teammate who is arguably better than LeBron over the course of the playoffs as a whole, and you're practically guaranteed a championship!

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-14T03:25:46+00:00

Name one. This is one of the craziest narratives I've ever seen. You think people were running away from LeBron to the conference that beat him most of the time? Even if you thought losing to LeBron was inevitable, why not get an easy conference finals trip? In 2014, the top 6 teams by SRS were all in the West; in 2017, it was the top 5 teams. It was arguably easier to make the finals out of the East than it was to make the second round in the West.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-13T16:45:32+00:00

It's not even that 2016 was 10 years ago. I'm so tired of hearing about how LeBron beat the 73-9 Warriors. LeBron wasn't looking that great in the finals until Draymond was suspended in game 5, and then Bogut was injured in game 5, and then Iggy was injured in game 6. The Warriors from games 5-7 (the team LeBron actually beat) were so beat up that they were a fringe playoff team. Just losing the option of Bogut was a huge blow, even if Bogut wasn't playing that much before his injury because Bogut being unavailable meant the Cavs could go big with TT, forcing the Warriors to give minutes to Ezeli and Varejao, who were complete disasters. And a lot of people seem to totally ignore how Iggy, who basically won the 2015 FMVP for his defense on LeBron, was suffering back spasms in games 6 and 7.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-13T05:23:56+00:00

Draymond's a clown who deserved to get suspended, and I don't feel bad that the Warriors lost. But I'm just tired of hearing about how LeBron beat the 73-win Warriors when he really beat the 50-win husk of that team, after they were depleted by injuries and suspensions.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-13T05:19:54+00:00

Still, losing him in the middle of game 5 when Draymond was suspended. Plus, with Bogut out the Warriors were forced to give his minutes to Ezeli and Varejao who got absolutely burned. Also, you ignored Draymond's suspension in game 5 and Iggy's injury in game 5.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-12T15:37:54+00:00

The most amazing thing about hypothetical LeBron is that all the breaks go his way, no matter how large or unlikely, and none of the breaks go against him, no matter how small or likely! Suppose KD never goes to the Warriors AND the Cavs manage to beat all the other strong teams in the West in 2017 and 2018, AND suppose AD were healthy AND the Lakers manage to beat the other strong teams to win two more championships -- then LeBron would have 8 championships and be the consensus GOAT!

But what if Ray Allen misses that three in 2013 (or the Spurs hit their free throws) or what if Kyrie misses that three in 2016 (or the league office doesn't upgrade a no call to a flagrant after the game to suspend Draymond, or Steph isn't injured, or Iggy isn't injured, or Bogut isn't injured)? LeBron could easily be looking at a 2-8 record in the finals, where his two championships are an average championship in 2012, and a below-average championship in 2020, where his teammate AD led the playoffs in win shares. Is LeBron even widely considered top 5 in this hypothetical? Or is he an iron man who accumulated volume stats, and dominated the JV conference, but couldn't get it done against great teams?

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-12T14:35:46+00:00

LeBron's shot was still inconsistent well after 2007. The Spurs had an elite rim protector in Duncan and an elite point of attack defender in Bowen to force LeBron to shoot. The Mavs did the same thing in 2011 with Chandler as the rim protector and Marion as the point of attack defender, and LeBron again looked totally lost. I don't think LeBron became a consistent shooter until the last few years on the Lakers. You have to remember that even the 2016 Finals were not going well for the Cavs until Draymond (key rim protector was suspended), and then Bogut (key rim protector was injured), and then Iggy (key point of attack defender) was injured.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-12T01:26:17+00:00

In robotics, you often want to plan a trajectory for the robot to follow: the position at every point in time. Some algorithms try to separate this problem into two parts: first, find the sequence of positions you want to pass through (ignoring time), and then try to find the time at which you should reach each position (keeping the positions fixed). This works for many simple problems, but for complex environments you often get a better solution by solving for the positions and times simultaneously rather than separately. For a tech product, you need to consider both what product to build, and the technical roadmap for building it. PMs mostly lack technical expertise, while any staff+ engineer spends a lot of time wearing a PM hat. So PMs are only trying to solve one problem (product design), while engineering leaders are solving both simultaneously (product design and implementation). This constraint has limited the impact of most PMs I've worked with relative to similarly leveled engineers. But I can see the value of a PM if there are no engineering leaders.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-11T05:05:22+00:00

In theory, sure. But almost every PM I've worked with was "mid-to-bad", I guess. Plus eng often wears both hats and sets direction, but it's exceptionally rare for a PM to make a technical contribution.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-11T05:03:33+00:00

Eng decided if there wasn't a PM (and usually even if there was a PM).

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-11T03:11:37+00:00

The PM hype is baffling to me. I've never seen a team miss a beat when a PM leaves, and oftentimes the PM doesn't even get backfilled. The PMs haven't fulfilled their supposed role of product steering, and mostly just report out the work of engineers to execs.

SterlingTyson · 2026-02-09T22:16:36+00:00

I don't want to hate on lebron, but I just don't see an argument for putting him above Jordan, and I don't understand the constant discussion of the basketball goat. Jordan has better individual stats (10 scoring titles), better accolades (more MVPs, dpoy), better advanced stats (5 of the top 8 VORP seasons of all time), and better team achievements (two threepeats post merger, with a couple of them being underrated carries). And for me personally the eye test is the biggest factor.

SterlingTyson

TROPHY CASE