Also when Jordan played (and until the early 2000s) referees still called travels. The NBA changed drastically after Spurs & Pistons slugged out games ending with scores like 68-71.
Lionel Messi is OFFICIALLY the Greatest Player of all Time (CONFIRMED OFFICIAL)
- Thread starter Pexbo
- Start date
He’s the best from my generation. I never saw Maradona so I can’t comment about that.
You'll get no argument from me there.
He's clearly in the tier below.
Or, I should say, a tier below. Because you could make an argument for him being more than one tier below the top one.
(Depending on how many tiers you operate with, of course.)
Why did you choose 60s to 2010s in football and 90s to 2010s in basketball? Why not compare Maradona to Messi? because Jordan and Maradona both played in the 80s and 90s as are Bron and Messi. This makes for a better debate. The defending in Pele's era looked woeful. Basketball in the 80s they were taking cocaine just before basketball games, they would raging party boys and alcoholics. Now dudes like Lebron spend 1million per year on his body. Basketball has had bigger rule changes since the 90s, than football which has effected both offense and defense including changing the distance of the 3 pt line to the extent that it is hard to say the past generations 3 points shooters would even be regarded 3 pt shooters in todays game. Jordan went from 37% 3pt (pretty effective rate today and similar to Harden) right down to 23% (would be one of the league worst today) when they adjusted the 3 PT line. There were also rule changes in terms of handchecking, illegal defense, which completely transformed a teams defensive schemes and also how you defend 1 vs 1. Refs call contact FAR easier meaning dudes get to the 3 throw line super easy for a free score.
Here are some: https://fadeawayworld.net/nba/11-im...ecking-allowing-zone-defense-after-banning-it
I think basketball has changed far more since the 90s than even football has. the only rules I can think are "golden goal, away goals" removal.
Only one that is true. When Jordan played point he was clocking 8+ assists per game. In the play offs Lebron averaged 7.2 assists to Jordans 5.7.
He has averaged 6 assists in the finals to Lebrons 7.8, considering Jordan is primarily a scorer. Jordan like Kobe were excellent passers when they chose to do so.
Shooting they are not even in the same class. 80% plus of Lebrons field goals are at the rim (lay ups and dunks). that isn't a shooter. he isn't making the jumpers Jordan was, spins then fade aways from 15 feet I give you the 3pt but fact is Jordan scored far more off of jump shots than Lebron it sacrilege to call Lebron a better shooter. he isn't even a shooter.
Lebron beats Jordan in stats? Lets look at per game ONLY since you are comparing a 20 year career to a 13 year one. Not scoring, nor steals and they are equal in blocks despite Lebron being 3 inches taller. Lebron absolutely should lead in rebounds since he has a 3 inch height advantage and 30lbs heavier (basically a big) and Jordan plays on the perimeter. Lebron also leads in turnovers per game.
Longevity actually goes against Lebron if he doesn't keep winning. Basically you are racking up all these empty stats. Russell Westbrook beats Larry Bird in points, boards, assists but would you agree there is quite a gap between them?
Also the KD thing is guesswork. Before KD the series was won by 4 pts in the final minute with GSW being more than capable of beating the Cavs on another day.
If the Warriors did not get KD they could just trade or get another allstar. All they needed was someone better than Harrison Barnes. It took Kyrie and Lebron having a historical series of games whilst Barnes was averaging 9 pts for the Cavs to win. It is very probable Lebron would have won no more as what is the likelihood of Kyrie and Bron doing that again and Barnes being the 3rd option on 9 pt. I dont like this argument.
No team in La Liga has 1/40th or 1/50th of the budget of Real/Barca, let’s not go ridiculous there.
Also, winning the Serie A with Napoli was an achievement but hardly unprecedented. The year after their second title, the champions were Sampdoria. Two years before their first title, it was Verona who won it. Two years before that, Roma.
A rare event, but definitely not like Leicester winning EPL, which was more or less an unprecedented event.
Looking through recent pages of this thread, looks like Ronaldo fans are now starting to cling to HGHs in their anti-Messi agenda?
My take as well. Messi is hands down the best I've ever seen, but I can understand why someone who watched Maradona or Pele would think otherwise.
Best ever is impossible to say as the comparison across generations is futile.
That he's the best in the last 2-3 generations (by a country mile) should not have been debated by anyone who has eyes.
Messi is out-of-this-world good, a one-in-a-million footballer. Ronaldo isn't, with all due respect.
But, the fact that C. Ronaldo was even in the conversation is a huge credit to him.
His numbers and achievements are absolutely insane,
and I'd even say that the fact that quite a number of people consider him to be a Top 2/3/5 of all-time player,
is possibly more impressive than Messi being the GOAT / equal to Maradona, given the talent he possesses.
I have a huge disdain for Ronaldo that goes way back, but you just have to take your hat off for him.
That he's the best in the last 2-3 generations (by a country mile) should not have been debated by anyone who has eyes.
Messi is out-of-this-world good, a one-in-a-million footballer. Ronaldo isn't, with all due respect.
But, the fact that C. Ronaldo was even in the conversation is a huge credit to him.
His numbers and achievements are absolutely insane,
and I'd even say that the fact that quite a number of people consider him to be a Top 2/3/5 of all-time player,
is possibly more impressive than Messi being the GOAT / equal to Maradona, given the talent he possesses.
I have a huge disdain for Ronaldo that goes way back, but you just have to take your hat off for him.
The trophy cabinet
Tend to agree with all of this. Ronaldo was extremely talented, a player that with hard work, you would have expected to be a consistent top 5 - top 20 of his generation. A bit like Rooney, maybe even less.
Yet he somehow managed to get 5 Ballon D’Ors in the Messi era, and is likely the fourth greatest player ever (you can put him as low as 6, after Di Stefano and Cruyff but anything below that is not being objective), and the unanimous No. two of his era. Massive credit to his hard work and dedication.
Messi, on the other hand, was supremely talented. A player that was supposed to be the best in the world since he was 16 years old or so. As a dead cert player as you might even see. Add to that hard work, and you end with the greatest player ever.
I think that both overachieved, but Ronaldo even more so. We probably expected him to be just as good as Ryan Giggs, not better than Cruyff and Best. Messi overachieved too, but the Maradona comparisons were even before he kicked a ball as professional.
Wonder what other great we will downplay next 
@Revan yeah, very well put
Messi has officially platinumed football.
As someone who has watched basketball since the 90s, the outlawing of hand-checking changed basketball drastically. Late 80s era Pistons, mid-90s era Knicks, and mid-90s Sonics would man handle point guards and wing players without picking up fouls.
Well not if you decide to switch your brain on for a couple of minutes.He’s absolutely dismantled you there @SportingCP96
Club football you can add quality to your team, hence Madrid had to do that to attempt to catch Barcelona.
Or as a better example PSG had no history, they were nothing. Boom they get bought out invest billions and now are a top side. If Mbappe can’t win a CL with PSG you know what he can do? He could transfer to Madrid or another competing side and give him a better opportunity to win.
international football is not that, Ronaldo can’t wake up and say I want to go to Brazil and switch teams to have a a equal opportunity as Messi and compete in a weak cup or have a better chance at a World Cup.
So no that example was actually awful hence it didn’t even warrant a reply from me.
For me it's the other way around.
Look at Garrincha - he was an alcoholic who had a deformed spine, one leg 6cm shorter than the other and was bow-legged. He didn't start playing professionally until he was 19 years old, yet he was one of the best players of his (and Pele's) generation.
Do you really think someone like this could make it top level in this day and age?
Yet in the current day, with all the modern nutrition, PEDs, sport scientists etc to optimise every player's performance at the top level - at a time where scouting networks take the best talents from every corner of the globe and train them in world class facilities every day, Messi has been head and shoulders above everyone else for 13+ years.
He competes against elite athletes every game, against teams that have staff who watch hours of footage trying to find ways to stop him, yet he's dominated.
In short, Pele was peers with an alcoholic cripple - Messi is peers with Cristiano Ronaldo, a guy who has dedicated his life to the sport to an obsessive degree. The game has moved on and it undoubtedly takes more talent to compete now than the 60s, otherwise we'd see more deformed alcoholics becoming top scorers in the WC.
The best counter-argument to Messi being the best is simply "I watched Maradona/Pele play and I subjectively think they were better". It's not a particularly nuanced argument, but it's a fair argument that is quite hard to argue against.
Fair enough and that's a perfectly valid sidenote. But I don't think it changes my overall point at all which is that comparing Jordan to James isn't really a valid comparison to Pele vs Messi in how much the sport has changed.
Even maradona to Messi is massively different than Jordan to James because of training, medicine, etc and how different the leagues were in the 80s compared to now.
Comparing Messi to earlier greats is still far more like comparing Brady to Bart Starr or Fran Tarkenton than Jordan to James.
People heavily overestimate that and always use CR7 who is a freak in that regard as an example.
I'll give you a counterexample: Who is this club's all-time top scorer, and do you think his performance was even close to optimized? Or how about Eden Hazard?
Backpass rule, bosman rule, EU rights to work, etc. What you said about refs in basketball also holds very much true for football - Messi never had to deal with a Gentile for example
Football has changed just as much, if not more, than basketball from the 80s/early 90s to now
LeBron has higher % at the rim(i think) and from beyond the arc. MJ was only a better shooter from midrange
Hyperbole much?
Sampdoria of Vialli, Mancini, Vierchowood, Lombardo....who made the EC final. Roma of Falcao, Pruzzo, Conti, Cerezo, who also made the EC final. Hellas was very much a Leicester, an aberration, a perfect storm
Maradona won a league title over Platini's juventus and another over Sacchi's milan. And those teams for all their quality don't compare to how stacked modern superteams are, because they were limited in the number of foreign(non-italian) players they could play. Essentially no, Maradona winning 2 Serie A titles with Napoli, in that era, was an incredible accomplishment. What's more, Maradona joined Napoli when they were a lower midtable side. He got them to the top
Oh yeah, i agree
Despite Rooney's or Hazard's lack of professionalism, neither were literally deformed. Rooney and Eden Hazard were pretty much finished in their late twenties, Garrincha won the World Cup golden ball, golden boot and the trophy at 29 years old despite being an alcoholic for the entirety of his career.
MJ vs Lebron being debated here
Ronaldo got to the semi-final in 2006
I do think he's underachieved with Portugal in the world cup though. They obviously underachieved in this world cup and had a really good chance of going deep.
I think the difference with Portugal and Argentina too (not defending Ronaldo here, Messi is the GOAT to me).
Portugal have no real expectation, because they aren't really successful as a NT, Argentina have won WCs so there's expectations.
Messi:
Of course Messi has the massive burden of being compared to Maradona and they were against Messi for a very long time.
Messi has changed public opinion, got the weight of Maradona off him, won a COPA, 3 other COPA finals. Won the WC, been a runner up in the WC. 2 Player of the tournaments in the WC too.
Ronaldo:
Maybe the only real figure in history is Eusebio, who he eclipsed quite fast IMO, won the EUROs but wasn't instrumental. Took a lucky strike from Eder really, not really built a legacy.
They have won titles with him but take medals out of this argument. Even if you take the medals away, Messi reached 4 Copa finals and 2 WC finals, Ronaldo reached 2 Euro finals.
It's not even close (don't even mention the Nations League).
Performances, don't even get me started too, night and day.
Gazza is the best English midfielder of the last 20-30 years and is an alcoholic. Have you been around top level professional footballers?A lot of the modern ones would still drink you under the table.
Its not called soccer so they go back to ballbasket.MJ vs Lebron being debated here
Yeah, i don't think Ronaldo built much of a legacy in the Euro 2016, because outside of group stage his performances were not great, same as Messi in WC 2014.
As a matter of fact Griezmann (rightfully)was chosen best player of Euro 2016 despite France losing the final to Portugal.
He was playing for Rangers at the same age Garrincha was winning the Golden Ball at the World Cup. For all his talents, it's obvious his alcoholism ruined his potential. Plus, as I keep having to state, he wasn't literally disabled (other than being Geordie).
Gazza only managed 339 games during his whole career - not the best example if you're trying to pretend alcoholics can reach the pinnacle of the sport in the modern day. Gascoigne retired nearly 20 years ago - football has moved on a lot since then.
What does any of that have to do with the refutation of your argument?
Your point is that Ronaldo's international record is more impressive than Messi's because Argentina has been more successful than Portugal prior to the pair coming on the scene. The counterpoint is that Madrid were historically far more successful than Barcelona (especially in the CL) so by that logic Ronaldo's success there should be equally downplayed.
You wrote a bunch of words that have nothing to do the point being made.
I'm surprised it didn't happen until nowMJ vs Lebron being debated here
No my point is that it is infinitely easier to win international trophies with Argentina then Portugal. White is literally not even debateable.
My point is that Argentina won many trophies without Messi and will continue winning them After him. Portugal might not win a trophy after Ronaldo.
Portugal won 0 before Ronaldo and never even played in a final before Ronaldo, in fact they barely even qualified to international competitions.
With Ronaldo Portugal won their first major trophy And have qualified to ever major international event. The only two trophies Portugal have were with Ronaldo.
What he has done with Portugal holds a lot more weight. International trophies are very lopsided.If Ronaldo played for Brazil in 02 or Argentina or France etc he would have a world cup.
Would that make him a better player ? No it would mean he plays for a better team.
Cedric Soares, André Gomes, Adrien Silva, João Mário. Ronaldo won a Euro with these guys being starters in that team…. This ain’t even worth comparing.
He didn’t even play in the final for gods sakes. It’s such a ridiculous argument when they went to European championship and World Cup semi finals before he was even their best player. It’s such a ridiculous argument when he wasn’t their best or even second best player at Euro 2016. And don’t get me started on including the Nations League
Portugal have been producing top talent for a while now. The fact you want to play all of that down for the benefit of one solitary player is just plain weird. And your point seemed to be that having a historical record of winning trophies makes it easier to win something with a given country, which is clearly nonsense.
feck Ronaldo. Utterly delighted to see his fanboys getting ended for good.
I think you can put him alongside Pele and Maradona. Impossible to compare them and confirm one is better than the other. Can maybe throw Georgie Best in there as well. Of course, Messi and Pele have the advantage of playing a lot more games than the other two, in terms of career stats. Maybe Maradona and Best had better absolute peaks but Messi and Pele made up for it in longevity, thanks to looking after themselves.
The Euro before 1996 had only 4 and 8 teams.
Portugal missed most of the old Euros also cause the qualifiers were more difficult due to less spots available
Also there was no Lithuania,Estonia, Azerbaijan,Latvia, Kazakhstan, Armenia,Slovenia, playing Euro qualifiers etc before 1990, which made the groups more stacked and difficult.
Check the groups Portugal had before 1996 in the Euro qualifiers,most of the groups were stacked back then, and less poor teams to stad pad.
As a matter of fact, Portugal qualified to the first 2 editions of the Euro with 16 teams (1996 and 2000) without Ronaldo.
And Portugal qualified to Euro 2004 as host, so that shouldn't be counted as Ronaldo's midas touch.
@SportingCP96 fair play to you. We were all taught to respect the opinions of others and you are entitled to yours.
I watched that final. It would be more accurate to say that these Portuguese players (who you seem strangely keen to downplay) won the match FOR Ronaldo. He has a medal because the team won the game against top quality opposition almost entirely without him.
Also, Portugal had great players in 2016. As they have had throughout Ronaldo’s entire career. Hell, their team was more talented than Argentina’s at this very World Cup.
Argentina don’t have a CB better than Dias. Or a FB better than Cancelo. Or a CM better than Silva. Or a CF better than Leao.
The mental gymnastics must become tiring at some point, surely?
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You don't know what 'infinitely' means.
He's obviously been the best player of the modern era long before this World Cup win, his intelligence and skill have been unmatched. This World Cup win just cements it for those who think trophies matter most.