The LeBron James vs. Kobe Bryant debate emerged somewhat out of the blue on Tuesday when TNT analyst Charles Barkley said that James would need to beat the Warriors (again) just to draw level with Bryant’s status. Scottie Pippen is keeping that conversation going.
Pippen appeared on Wednesday’s SportsCenter to discuss LeBron and the NBA playoffs. The comparison of Kobe vs. LeBron came up, and Pippen didn’t hesitate before ranking Kobe ahead of LeBron.
He said:
“I don’t think he’s surpassed Kobe at all, no. And I don’t think he should be compared to either of those players (Jordan and Kobe) because they’re playing different positions. Kobe and Michael are both 2 guards. They’re both scorers. They’re mostly like a Kyrie (Irving) — they’re looking to score the basketball.”
Pippen was agreeing with Barkley’s general opinion that LeBron has a ways to go before reaching Kobe’s status, but he didn’t think it was even fair to compare LeBron to Kobe or Jordan. He’d rather see LeBron get compared to Magic Johnson.
He continued:
“I like to compare him to Magic. I think he plays a lot more like Magic, a lot more like myself — how I played, but obviously he’s more dominant than both me and Magic because of the way that he plays the game. His physicality, his athleticism surpassed Magic as well as me.”
Pippen would add that he didn’t want to say that LeBron has surpassed Magic and later put LeBron’s ability to “run a team” ahead of Jordan and Bryant.
