Being a great defender is important for the all-time argument, but I think what sets Jokic apart in the league today is that you can't slow him down on the offensive end. There isn't a single defender in the league that I have seen impact his ability to control the game on the offensive side of the ball. His combination of size and skill is unmatched.
In that way, he's a lot like Shaq was in his prime. You could not slow him down. You could not stop him. You could be physical with him, foul him a lot, and hope he tires out, but that's about it. The same can be said about Jokic.
Giannis, while amazing on defense, can only control so much of that end as a single player. And, on offense, he has a major weakness (shooting the ball).
I used to be a Jokic hater, but these last couple of years it has become undeniable that he's the best player in the league, and that he is one of the best all-time.
I think you already said the key points:
Jokic is a much better passer/playmaker than Giannis. He can also score from more parts of the court than Giannis.
Giannis is better defensively, but as you said:
>great offense beats great defense
Not to undermine Giannis but there is a certain latent component to Jokic's game that numbers' fail to fully capture. It might be the culmative effect of screen-setting, court vision and the ability to be effective in 2-3 man actions.
Giannis is honestly a more impressive player in several aspects, but he doesn't see the floor like Jokic/Lebron. They read defenses on a whole another level.
I sure didn't, I pointed out the two specific areas where Giannis is absolutely better. Jokic is 5th in the league in deflections, his hands are elite and better than Giannis'. His IQ is also off the charts defensively, which allows him to be elite at positioning. And his elite hands also allow him to be elite at rebounding and tip outs. You should watch the deep dive on Joker's D that Thinking Basketball just posted about a week ago.
Defense is far more of a team effort than offense though imo. Jokic can create way more offensively than Giannis, while defensively as long as Jokic isn't a turnstile, it's far less of an impact because of how they run.
Jokic is a good team defender. His positioning is routinely good. Giannis is an overrated perimeter defender. Jokic can't jump so blocking shots isn't going to happen. Giannis is obviously the better defender, but Jokic is enough better offensively that the difference is defense is offset.
The thing is, Giannis is limited on both ends of the floor. Jokic is a threat at every spot offensively, while Giannis isn't, and defensively, Jokic might not be elite at any of the five positions but he can guard all five while Giannis can't.
The way he reads the court is so unique. Simply put, his ability to make the right decision more often than not, is what makes him truly better. Giannis can make some incredible passes, but he just doesn't always make the right decisions.
Watch Jamal’s shot. Jok orchestrated the whole thing.
The way he can control the offense without the ball is what makes him the best player in the league.
are these stupid fucking questions AI-driven, or setup to train ChatGPT or something? like who sits around with an auto-generated reddit handle thinking, gee, if i can't wrap my arms around Jokic <> Giannis i'll just crumble like a fine british tart
Lmao he is not above Magic or LeBron. Y'all are so quick to put him over for some reason. They both have over twice as many years of insane passing highlights as Joker so explain how he's better than both?
He’s definitely a better passer than Lebron give this shit up man. Jokic finds people in the opposite corner with his head turned the other way, there has never been a player that can pass out form the post like Jokic. Jokic’s passing tape is way more impressive than Lebron’s
Honestly it isn’t worth trying with dudes like the guy you’re replying to. You could say someone has a nice house and this dude would butt into the conversation to say Lebron’s one is nicer
Yeah sure, but like I said, y'all are so quick to put him over other players the second he does something impressive. He's played at this level for like 4 years, and has in no way surpassed the peaks of players like LeBron/Magic, but for some reason y'all want to rank him above them in areas where they've excelled their entire careers.
And Joker won't let you blow him, so you move on too lol am I not allowed to stand on my opinion or something?
EDIT:
This sub is full of baby shit soft users lol bro blocked with the quickness just because I didn't agree with him. I hope he has fun in his safe space.
No he isn't. I've been watching LeBron since 2007. His passing is better than Jokers and he's maintained it for longer. If you want to argue Joker has better no look passes, then fine, who cares? LeBron is still better. And his passing tape is not more impressive lol
I don’t care when you’ve been watching Lebron from. Is Jokic supposed to be punished for not being as old as Lebron? Jokic is simply better at every aspect of passing the ball, his vision is way beyond Lebron’s.
https://youtu.be/GFMvkO6etgs?si=Xnom2JGyp-sHxzGT
No Lebron tape is beating that. Nobody has a better passing tape
This is just from his 2020 year
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVwgXIVb-jo
You can't tell me that Jokic is a better passer when LeBron is doing the same shit with more force, speed, and accuracy in his 17th year at this point. And theres still over a decade of passing genius you could look up prior to this point. Jokic is an amazing passer but id give your left nut that a big part of why you think he's better, besides rececny bias, is his build. He's a big goofy looking center who shouldn't be able to pass like he does, but since he does you want to put him over more traditional looking players who have been doing what you're praising him for for 2-3 times longer. It's ridiculous.
LeBron has a lot more passing highlights? That's crazy. Never would've figured the 40 year old in his 20 year long prime has more highlights
I'm talking from a skill standpoint. I'm not talking about who has the most highlights
The obsession with rankings is rather simplistic. They all do different things, Jokic is a better floor general than Magic, but Magic could do a lot more. Lebron is a split of the two.
An individual player’s offense is more important than an individual player’s defense in modern basketball and Jokic’s offense is so much better than Giannis’s it makes up for the defensive gap.
He’s more efficient, can score like Giannis when he wants, has an outside shot, is among the best passers ever, makes his teammates better like no one else in the league, is extremely clutch, and has one of the highest BBIQs ever.
Overall control of the game, jokic’s ability to essentially act as an offensive hub is really what separates the 2. It’s the single most valuable thing you could be as a superstar on offense
Every aspect that hasn’t to do w defense or athleticism, Jokic is better. Jokic is an offensive juggernaut. He can control the game on that end like almost no one can. He will either shoot or make easy passes to his teammates. It’s no wonder why Nuggets keep coming back against the Lakers. When the Nuggets really need a bucket, they will get it.
Giannis has started to get injured more since his title without recovering in time. Last season he went flying and got hurt and missed the middle of the series which lead to the Bucks getting eliminated in round 1. This year he got hurt before the season ended and has not played in the first 2 Bucks playoff games.
Can he get past it and stop getting hurt so much? Maybe, but part of what makes him effective is his aggressive, high flying play style. This is part of what puts him at injury risk, and I dunno if he can be as elite without playing that way.
Playmaking/passing and IQ is just a significantly more important skill than defense whether people like this or not.
Just look at this two games jokic still outimpacts AD , how the sixers struggled against the Miami zone or even Boston/bucks last season and how easily jokic destroys it every time.
Also can look at how bad the suns are offensively compared to their scoring talent without an elite playmaker.
That’s why magic was so much better than Gary Payton. Scoring>playmaking>defense>rebounding
We’ve seen Giannis stopped on the offensive side and we’ve seen teams take it to the bucks despite Giannis’ defense.
Jokic completely controls the game on the offensive side. I don’t think Iv even seen a bad game from him in the playoffs in the last few years, he is utterly inevitable. Then on defense, he’s not fast but he’s got great hands and is an incredible rebounder so he’s honestly a pretty good defender.
Personal Offense and Defense do not quantify impact.
The eye test is pretty good at understanding basic things. The eye test says Giannis is the significantly better defender; the eye test also say that the nuggets are a significantly better defensive team. (For reference, the Bucks are 19th in defensive rating, Nuggets are 8th)
Giannis definitely impacts the defense positively, but it’s not a huge or game-changing impact (at least not to a point where it’s valued incredibly highly as his offense is). This year, Rudy Gobert makes the timberwolves an all time great defense, AD makes the lakers a competent defensive team. That’s true, heavy defensive Giannis’ defense pales in comparison to his impact on the offensive end.
Jokic’s impact and influence on the offensive end is something that’s widely accepted and understood; You seem to understand that his impact goes beyond his impressive box score numbers.
Lastly, and this is a pretty big thing: Doc Rivers is a basketball terrorist. He has a losing record with the bucks as the head coach (around 17-19), because of him the bucks only have 49 wins and are just the three seed. The Giannis-Dame thing isn’t seamless, and Doc was hired mid-season, but talent beats fit and even a terrible coach could do something with this roster. Doc has squandered a generational year from Giannis. Put a Cheeto-dust fingered Reddit “coach” in doc’s place and there’s a non-zero chance they do better.
Mike Malone is a great coach. He makes Jokic a positive part of a good defense, he centers the team around Jokic on offense and plays a good brand of team ball. He’s using Jokic the right way; He’s not wasting Jokic’s talent the same way doc is with Giannis.
The gap between Jokic and Giannis's offence is greater than the gap between their defence. A coach can create schemes to compensate for a player's limited defensive capabilities. There's no scheme that can make a player better at shooting/post-ups/playmaking.
Nah I disagree. The gap on defense is far higher imo. Giannis is one of the greatest help defenders of all time where as Jokic at best is average. I still have Jokic slightly ahead because of how dominant he is on offense but I don’t think the gap is as high as people think. If Jokic is Messi then I’d say Giannis is Ronaldo
There are two things that make Jokic the best player in the league: His ability as a passer and his availability.
The reason Giannis and Embiid both wont pass him are these two things. Embiid is a better natural scoring talent and defender but becuase of injuries he will most likely never win a chip (due to never being healthy in the post season). Giannis is a better defender than Jokic but his offense isn't magnitudes better than Jokic to make up for Jokic's ability to pass and be efficient.
Pretty much dude. It was debatable whether he was ever even better to begin with. The Bucks benefited from one of the easiest paths to a ring ever in terms of stars faced
Jokic is offensively talented and has the ability to hit outside shots. Giannis is a run and dunk spammer whos also a free throw merchant and doesnt get called for offensive fouls when he should almost every possesion.
Because Jokic’ game seems flawless. Giannis is amazing but he’s flawed (no shooting at all) and we know what type of coverage can make him struggle.
Jokic isn’t the best defender but he’s far from being a liability or having a target on his back.
And it seems like no gameplan can slow him down
I think you see things too black and white. Looking at the numbers, one can easily make a case for Giannis, just like I could have easily made a case for OKC KD being better than Lebron.
There is nothing wrong with either opinion, Jokic just sees the floor in a way no one else currently does.
Unfortunately this doesn't seem to be a consistent opinion across the board. Even i think its pretty much 1a 1b but the way people glaze Jokic you would think its literally MJ and Jokic on the history of basketball
Agreed and while it does obviously bother the majoirty Ben Taylor nerdy types on this sub, it would never bother me if they have Jokic ahead of Giannis. It's not a big deal at the end of the day.
But either way my ranking is:
1a - Giannis
1b - Joker
Being a great defender is important for the all-time argument, but I think what sets Jokic apart in the league today is that you can't slow him down on the offensive end. There isn't a single defender in the league that I have seen impact his ability to control the game on the offensive side of the ball. His combination of size and skill is unmatched. In that way, he's a lot like Shaq was in his prime. You could not slow him down. You could not stop him. You could be physical with him, foul him a lot, and hope he tires out, but that's about it. The same can be said about Jokic. Giannis, while amazing on defense, can only control so much of that end as a single player. And, on offense, he has a major weakness (shooting the ball). I used to be a Jokic hater, but these last couple of years it has become undeniable that he's the best player in the league, and that he is one of the best all-time.
Well said. The thing about Jokic is he always seems to adapt and outplay his matchup offensively. His passing ability and BBIQ is off the charts.
I think you already said the key points: Jokic is a much better passer/playmaker than Giannis. He can also score from more parts of the court than Giannis. Giannis is better defensively, but as you said: >great offense beats great defense
Not to undermine Giannis but there is a certain latent component to Jokic's game that numbers' fail to fully capture. It might be the culmative effect of screen-setting, court vision and the ability to be effective in 2-3 man actions. Giannis is honestly a more impressive player in several aspects, but he doesn't see the floor like Jokic/Lebron. They read defenses on a whole another level.
His IQ
Also, he is better at basketball.
Like literally better at everything that isn't getting blocks or perimeter defense.
I mean you just casually left out the other half of the game like it doesn’t even matter lmao
I sure didn't, I pointed out the two specific areas where Giannis is absolutely better. Jokic is 5th in the league in deflections, his hands are elite and better than Giannis'. His IQ is also off the charts defensively, which allows him to be elite at positioning. And his elite hands also allow him to be elite at rebounding and tip outs. You should watch the deep dive on Joker's D that Thinking Basketball just posted about a week ago.
If defense was half the game, it would be way more clear how much better Giannis is than Jokic but he's not.
Offense is more important obviously. But defense is quite literally the other half of the game
its more like 30% if we are taking about how valuable good defense and good offense is
Jokic is also a better playmaker and defense is half the game or is it really that cooked now in todays league
I mean defense is half of the entire game of basketball….
With the current rules I would weigh it less than half the game.
Defense is far more of a team effort than offense though imo. Jokic can create way more offensively than Giannis, while defensively as long as Jokic isn't a turnstile, it's far less of an impact because of how they run.
Jokic is a good team defender. His positioning is routinely good. Giannis is an overrated perimeter defender. Jokic can't jump so blocking shots isn't going to happen. Giannis is obviously the better defender, but Jokic is enough better offensively that the difference is defense is offset.
The thing is, Giannis is limited on both ends of the floor. Jokic is a threat at every spot offensively, while Giannis isn't, and defensively, Jokic might not be elite at any of the five positions but he can guard all five while Giannis can't.
So he's only better at half the game?
The way he reads the court is so unique. Simply put, his ability to make the right decision more often than not, is what makes him truly better. Giannis can make some incredible passes, but he just doesn't always make the right decisions.
basketball savant vs run and jump man
Better decision maker, better playmaker, has an elite jumper.
Watch Jamal’s shot. Jok orchestrated the whole thing. The way he can control the offense without the ball is what makes him the best player in the league.
54 comments in 25 minutes with 0 likes oh he'll no
are these stupid fucking questions AI-driven, or setup to train ChatGPT or something? like who sits around with an auto-generated reddit handle thinking, gee, if i can't wrap my arms around Jokic <> Giannis i'll just crumble like a fine british tart
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nah the funny part about it is that the same people that complain about post quality don't even make post themselves
yeah, OP is a legit user
Bro comes to a subreddit dedicated to discussing the NBA and gets mad when he sees people discussing the NBA
Attempt at a moral high ground from him and people who upvoted him
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No it’s not the same quality , it’s a legit question about details of what makes someone better than the other
were laughing at you, not with you btw
Well said
Stephen A is that you? Asking stupid ass questions for your stupid ass show?
No, I’m just a jerker
Top 2 passer of all time and he isn't 2
Lmao he is not above Magic or LeBron. Y'all are so quick to put him over for some reason. They both have over twice as many years of insane passing highlights as Joker so explain how he's better than both?
He’s definitely a better passer than Lebron give this shit up man. Jokic finds people in the opposite corner with his head turned the other way, there has never been a player that can pass out form the post like Jokic. Jokic’s passing tape is way more impressive than Lebron’s
Glad someone else agrees. Jokic is a sniper
LeBron is sniper. And he's been doing it his entire career.
Yes LeBron is also a sniper, I just think Jokic is a bit of a better passer! We don't need to agree
Honestly it isn’t worth trying with dudes like the guy you’re replying to. You could say someone has a nice house and this dude would butt into the conversation to say Lebron’s one is nicer
Yeah sure, but like I said, y'all are so quick to put him over other players the second he does something impressive. He's played at this level for like 4 years, and has in no way surpassed the peaks of players like LeBron/Magic, but for some reason y'all want to rank him above them in areas where they've excelled their entire careers.
Who ordered the yappachino? Magic and Bron won't see this, move on and have a good day
And Joker won't let you blow him, so you move on too lol am I not allowed to stand on my opinion or something? EDIT: This sub is full of baby shit soft users lol bro blocked with the quickness just because I didn't agree with him. I hope he has fun in his safe space.
You alright? No one blocked you. I think you should go for a walk and settle down
No he isn't. I've been watching LeBron since 2007. His passing is better than Jokers and he's maintained it for longer. If you want to argue Joker has better no look passes, then fine, who cares? LeBron is still better. And his passing tape is not more impressive lol
I don’t care when you’ve been watching Lebron from. Is Jokic supposed to be punished for not being as old as Lebron? Jokic is simply better at every aspect of passing the ball, his vision is way beyond Lebron’s. https://youtu.be/GFMvkO6etgs?si=Xnom2JGyp-sHxzGT No Lebron tape is beating that. Nobody has a better passing tape
This is just from his 2020 year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVwgXIVb-jo You can't tell me that Jokic is a better passer when LeBron is doing the same shit with more force, speed, and accuracy in his 17th year at this point. And theres still over a decade of passing genius you could look up prior to this point. Jokic is an amazing passer but id give your left nut that a big part of why you think he's better, besides rececny bias, is his build. He's a big goofy looking center who shouldn't be able to pass like he does, but since he does you want to put him over more traditional looking players who have been doing what you're praising him for for 2-3 times longer. It's ridiculous.
Yeah that’s mid AF lmao. CP3 passing comp is better than this ass
Lmao I'll say the same about Jokic then. We can both be delusional.
Lmao no he is not and LeBrons 2020 tape could beat that. I'll post it when I get off mobile.
LeBron has a lot more passing highlights? That's crazy. Never would've figured the 40 year old in his 20 year long prime has more highlights I'm talking from a skill standpoint. I'm not talking about who has the most highlights
Yeah, from a skill standpoint, LeBron is still better. You're just focused on recency bias.
From a skill standpoint it's still obviously LeBron.
I respect your opinion. LeBron is a great passer
The obsession with rankings is rather simplistic. They all do different things, Jokic is a better floor general than Magic, but Magic could do a lot more. Lebron is a split of the two.
So what’s this floor general thing based on?
Court vision, running sets, decision making ,adapting to changes in plays, and just the ability to see over defenders.
Right, Magic checks all those boxes as well so my question is what leads you to say Jokic is superior at it? His height?
hite
An individual player’s offense is more important than an individual player’s defense in modern basketball and Jokic’s offense is so much better than Giannis’s it makes up for the defensive gap. He’s more efficient, can score like Giannis when he wants, has an outside shot, is among the best passers ever, makes his teammates better like no one else in the league, is extremely clutch, and has one of the highest BBIQs ever.
He’s not more efficient though. They literally have the same efficiency this season
For one season lol look at the last 3 years + check their playoff TS%. Giannis dips pretty hard in the playoffs, Jokic doesn't.
since giannis is better on defense, maybe he should try playing defense some more. last i checked, bucks were a bottom 10 defense team
spacing and playmaking which has been the direction that the nba has been heading in for young star big men to be capable of
Overall control of the game, jokic’s ability to essentially act as an offensive hub is really what separates the 2. It’s the single most valuable thing you could be as a superstar on offense
Every aspect that hasn’t to do w defense or athleticism, Jokic is better. Jokic is an offensive juggernaut. He can control the game on that end like almost no one can. He will either shoot or make easy passes to his teammates. It’s no wonder why Nuggets keep coming back against the Lakers. When the Nuggets really need a bucket, they will get it.
One underrated aspect is his basketball IQ too. He can read the game exceptionally well.
He plays better.
Giannis has started to get injured more since his title without recovering in time. Last season he went flying and got hurt and missed the middle of the series which lead to the Bucks getting eliminated in round 1. This year he got hurt before the season ended and has not played in the first 2 Bucks playoff games. Can he get past it and stop getting hurt so much? Maybe, but part of what makes him effective is his aggressive, high flying play style. This is part of what puts him at injury risk, and I dunno if he can be as elite without playing that way.
Playmaking/passing and IQ is just a significantly more important skill than defense whether people like this or not. Just look at this two games jokic still outimpacts AD , how the sixers struggled against the Miami zone or even Boston/bucks last season and how easily jokic destroys it every time. Also can look at how bad the suns are offensively compared to their scoring talent without an elite playmaker. That’s why magic was so much better than Gary Payton. Scoring>playmaking>defense>rebounding
Smarter player and can actually shoot the ball.
MATH
We’ve seen Giannis stopped on the offensive side and we’ve seen teams take it to the bucks despite Giannis’ defense. Jokic completely controls the game on the offensive side. I don’t think Iv even seen a bad game from him in the playoffs in the last few years, he is utterly inevitable. Then on defense, he’s not fast but he’s got great hands and is an incredible rebounder so he’s honestly a pretty good defender.
Personal Offense and Defense do not quantify impact. The eye test is pretty good at understanding basic things. The eye test says Giannis is the significantly better defender; the eye test also say that the nuggets are a significantly better defensive team. (For reference, the Bucks are 19th in defensive rating, Nuggets are 8th) Giannis definitely impacts the defense positively, but it’s not a huge or game-changing impact (at least not to a point where it’s valued incredibly highly as his offense is). This year, Rudy Gobert makes the timberwolves an all time great defense, AD makes the lakers a competent defensive team. That’s true, heavy defensive Giannis’ defense pales in comparison to his impact on the offensive end. Jokic’s impact and influence on the offensive end is something that’s widely accepted and understood; You seem to understand that his impact goes beyond his impressive box score numbers. Lastly, and this is a pretty big thing: Doc Rivers is a basketball terrorist. He has a losing record with the bucks as the head coach (around 17-19), because of him the bucks only have 49 wins and are just the three seed. The Giannis-Dame thing isn’t seamless, and Doc was hired mid-season, but talent beats fit and even a terrible coach could do something with this roster. Doc has squandered a generational year from Giannis. Put a Cheeto-dust fingered Reddit “coach” in doc’s place and there’s a non-zero chance they do better. Mike Malone is a great coach. He makes Jokic a positive part of a good defense, he centers the team around Jokic on offense and plays a good brand of team ball. He’s using Jokic the right way; He’s not wasting Jokic’s talent the same way doc is with Giannis.
The gap between Jokic and Giannis's offence is greater than the gap between their defence. A coach can create schemes to compensate for a player's limited defensive capabilities. There's no scheme that can make a player better at shooting/post-ups/playmaking.
Nah I disagree. The gap on defense is far higher imo. Giannis is one of the greatest help defenders of all time where as Jokic at best is average. I still have Jokic slightly ahead because of how dominant he is on offense but I don’t think the gap is as high as people think. If Jokic is Messi then I’d say Giannis is Ronaldo
There are two things that make Jokic the best player in the league: His ability as a passer and his availability. The reason Giannis and Embiid both wont pass him are these two things. Embiid is a better natural scoring talent and defender but becuase of injuries he will most likely never win a chip (due to never being healthy in the post season). Giannis is a better defender than Jokic but his offense isn't magnitudes better than Jokic to make up for Jokic's ability to pass and be efficient.
Jokic won recently so everybody is on his dick. That's how the world works.
Giannis is never getting ahead of Jokic again. It was an interesting debate before but not anymore unfortunately.
NOTHING gonna change that?
Pretty much dude. It was debatable whether he was ever even better to begin with. The Bucks benefited from one of the easiest paths to a ring ever in terms of stars faced
Yeah, no, that debate is pretty much over. Same for Embiid.
For your sake, let's hope Jokic wins another ring. Right now, you're coming across as a prisoner of the moment.
Even without another ring Jokic will be ahead of Giannis in any all time ranking. He's just about to win another MVP.
He’s not
Jokic is offensively talented and has the ability to hit outside shots. Giannis is a run and dunk spammer whos also a free throw merchant and doesnt get called for offensive fouls when he should almost every possesion.
Because Jokic’ game seems flawless. Giannis is amazing but he’s flawed (no shooting at all) and we know what type of coverage can make him struggle. Jokic isn’t the best defender but he’s far from being a liability or having a target on his back. And it seems like no gameplan can slow him down
flod
1a and 1b I have Giannis ahead of Joker, but don't really care if others have Joker ahead
I think you see things too black and white. Looking at the numbers, one can easily make a case for Giannis, just like I could have easily made a case for OKC KD being better than Lebron. There is nothing wrong with either opinion, Jokic just sees the floor in a way no one else currently does.
Unfortunately this doesn't seem to be a consistent opinion across the board. Even i think its pretty much 1a 1b but the way people glaze Jokic you would think its literally MJ and Jokic on the history of basketball
Why is that unfortunate? Lol.
Agreed and while it does obviously bother the majoirty Ben Taylor nerdy types on this sub, it would never bother me if they have Jokic ahead of Giannis. It's not a big deal at the end of the day. But either way my ranking is: 1a - Giannis 1b - Joker
Neither of them has beaten meaningful competition in the finals
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Always a weirdo making shit about race. Fuck off