i don't see luka's mavs making the finals then, either, but i don't agree that just "all teams were better because the league was smaller". there was a lot of concentrated talent still in the 80s (don't talk to me about the 60s lol). bird landed on one of the teams with a ton of talent around him. so did magic. this is why you see the same teams showing up in the finals year after year for like, a decade. it wasn't until very recently that this kind of thing became basically impossible, and that's going to have to factor into these conversations, as it's going to get harder and harder to win--much less stack--rings, no matter how good you are. like, jokic could definitely finish with one ring, total. same with giannis. durant would have zero without a really weird thing happening.
I guess that’s why I don’t bother using the rings argument as the be all end all. There’s context to everything including how teams are built and competition. I guess some really good players like Barkley, CP3, Malone are penalised because of that, but I do believe that all time greats should be able to will their team to one or two rings in a weak year if they’re going to be at an MVP level for 10 years - like Dirk, Hakeem, Jokic or Giannis have.
Bird made everyone better on the team He got them all involved and controlled the flow He was an elite player and to say different would be someone who didn't see him play He was to them what Magic was to the Lakers
