Isiah Thomas shed some light on what went into his decision to rank Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the greatest of all time. The Detroit Pistons legend had also recently ranked longtime NBA rival Michael Jordan as only the fourth-best player he has ever gone up against.
During a chat with Los Angeles Lakers shooting guard Danny Green, the Pistons great reasoned that Abdul-Jabbar managed to dominate the sport at every level:
Via TalkBasket:
“My GOAT is Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. There is no person in the history of all sports, from grade to school to high school, to college, to the NBA that had a better basketball playing career than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. And then when you take into account what he’d done in terms of social justice during that period of time, the stance he took outside off the playing field, those are big things in my mind in terms of what the GOAT was,” he said.
“When I look at Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s six championships, six or seven MVPs, scored the most points than anybody in the NBA, lost one game in college, lost one game in high school and didn’t lose in grade school. To me that’s the GOAT.”
Thomas has a good argument on his hands. Setting aside his college dominance, Kareem won six NBA titles, six MVPs, two Finals MVPs, was an All-Star for 19 seasons, and was named to the All-NBA First Team 10 times. Those numbers can surely compete with Jordan and even surpass them, considering he's also the all-time leading scorer in league history.
Some might have an issue with Thomas saying Jordan was only the fourth-best player he has ever faced, but his support for Abdul-Jabbar's greatness is well substantiated, given the regalia of accolades to his name.
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