Shai Gilgeous-Alexander holding the Bill Russell Finals MVP Trophy after defeating the Pacers
Congratulations to the Oklahoma City Thunder on winning the title and specifically to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander who completed one of the truly great seasons of any guard, of any superstar ever. He became the 11th player to have won MVP and Finals MVP in the same season. His team had a 84-21 record with him averaging 32.7 points, 6.4 assists, and 4.6 rebounds over the 99 games he played. During these playoffs, including Game 4 and Game 7 of the Finals, when everything was on the line, SGA was THE bucket-getter, THE closer, THE guy that you trust to get it done.
The basketball world at large was focused on the Finals. But this season—including up to the final games of this series—two subjects have been abuzz in the NBA world: superstardom and NBA ring culture.
I, unfortunately, am preoccupied obsessed with these ideas. Many of my days are spent, in part, thinking of ranking past greats against current greats, the overwhelming importance of a superstar, who counts as one in the current landscape, and why often polarization exists when talking about them.
There’s like a 1 in 25 chance if you ask me what I am thinking about on any given day, I am thinking about one of these two guys.
The 4 Core Tenets of NBA Superstardom
The individualized nature of success. Can you put up great numbers consistently, despite the pressurized situations? Not only that, when the toughest moments arise can you dig deep to produce? The only athletes that get really scrutinized on an individual nature in terms of their play are quarterbacks and tennis stars. An NBA Superstar needs to put up great stats and be able to do so in the clutch.
Denver Nugget Nikola Jokic’s individual brilliance has mystified stat nerds for this entire decade
Leadership. What type of leader are you? For NFL quarterbacks they do not ask this question, there’s a certain way people expect for quarterbacks to lead. Whereas in the NBA, you have the Jordan-Kobe way. The Russell-Duncan-Curry way. The LeBron-Magic-Dr. J way. Even considering these different pathways of leadership, your superstar needs to be able to do a version of each in order to be successful. As a superstar, the organization needs relies on you for culture and stability.
Bill Russell, of the Boston Celtics, is probably the greatest leader in the history of sports.
Cultural Appeal. Do you draw opposing fans to support you to root for you? Are other celebrities drawn to you? Are your marketing deals and commercials representative enough of your personality to fuel your on-court exploits? The personality of a superstar on the court is very different from what they produce off the court, but both have to feed into each other. Both have a way of making a player more famous, drawing in more eyes and more fans.
Magic was “The Man” in the 80s!
Winning. At the end of the day, the job of a NBA Superstar is to be the primary reason your team wins and ultimately get to a title Others can get their shine for a game or two, but at the end of the day the goal of winning a title rests on the shoulders of that individual. This is how the story of basketball gets told.
Steph Curry letting the Boston fans know where that championship ring is going!
Superstardom, Ring Culture, and Why it Matters
LeBron James rattled the cages as he often does with opaque language around basketball culture. Often the opinion center around his greatness not being appreciated enough by the basketball and sports culture at large, but he uses other validators to try to distract from his ultimate goal.
LeBron is in an Icarus-style pursuit for undisputed GOAT. For some he is, but the general public still thinks its Michael Jordan (for the record, I am aligned with the general public).
Here’s his quote from his “Mind the Game” podcast about “ring culture”.
"Trying to nitpick an individual because he was not able to win a team game or a team match -- or whatever the case may be -- I don't know where it started, but it's a long conversation, especially when it comes to me individually, It's so weird. It's never enough.
I don't know why it's discussed so much in our sport and why it's the end-all, be-all of everything," James said. "Like OK, 'You weren't a great player [because] you never won a championship.' Or if you won one, you can't be in the same conversation with this person. ... You sit here and tell me Allen Iverson and Charles Barkley and Steve Nash f---ing weren't unbelievable?
Lebron James and Steve Nash
"Like, 'Oh, they can't be talked about or discussed with these guys because this guy won one ring, or won two rings.' It's just weird to me."
"I don't understand where it came from. I don't know where it started," he said. "I just hope we have to appreciate more of what guys have been able to accomplish, what guys have been able to do.
"A ring is a team accomplishment, and if you happen to have a moment where you're able to share that with your team, that should be discussed. 'This team was the greatest team,' or 'that team' -- you can have those conversations."
LeBron and his fans are willfully obtuse about a couple of things. It is absolutely held against NFL quarterbacks if they do not win a title. Dan Marino it hurts his legacy in the pantheon of quarterbacks, that he did not win a title because that’s the standard for quarterbacks. His greatness is still very much appreciated and acknowledged. If Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson do not win titles, it is absolutely going to be held against them that never won a Super Bowl, and rightfully so, but more on that in a moment.
More importantly, for a lot of American Sports fans, basketball is the most accessible to play and to understand. We also know as much as it is a team game and that you need quality players to produce, one great player can be the elevator between winning and losing. It is incredibly easy to identify not only a great player, but when that player is elevating above the normal level of play.
LeBron James, for my money, has the greatest three game stretch in the history of basketball. Games 5-7 in his pursuit of a coming back from 3-1 against Golden State. Yeah Kyrie was great, the role players like Shumpert, J.R. Smith, and Channing Frye, but ultimately that comeback was about LeBron and his greatness, his pursuit of excellence. It is why in his mind he believes that was”
The hardest ring ever in the history of the league
The ring and moment that made him the GOAT
“OHHHHHHHHH BLOCKED BY JAMES”-Mike Breen, ESPN NBA Announcer. This moment here is the pinnacle of LeBron’s career.
But it is important to note that LeBron says this in large part due to the public perception that Michael Jordan is better than him. His career is perceived as having less monumental moments than MJ. Even if statistically, he was greater for far longer than MJ. The stories and images of Michael Jordan are more iconic and meaningful to millions of sports fans.
LeBron’s plight is that he operates within an unforgiving system that only rewards the ultimate goal. The burden of NBA superstardom is that the fandom surrounding it has become like pop fandom. An individual (including yours truly) has certain players they love that they will work to twist narratives to prop them up, and tear others down. Players and their families see the constant stream of love and hate all across social media. You then include a media ecosystem that allows for journalists, analysts, former and current players to opine about your game and how you perform, etc. TV, print, digital, audio all are platforms for mostly uninformed people takes about your sport. For current players, including LeBron who is about to enter his 23rd season, the stakes of winning and losing being higher than ever. My empathy for these toll on players is immense.
Some of basketball’s current superstars’ aversion to these narratives defining their career is that winning is hard. It is that the fickle nature of chance, which often determines winning and losing, allowing fans and media to make narratives they cannot control. In sports, history is written in the name of great exploits and in victory. No matter how great a player might think they have performed, it is did you win the title or not? Like all of us players have agendas. And those agendas are meant to contend with the agendas of other players in how we perceive their greatness. Understandably in the context of their careers, a desire for nuance and context in both how to frame their identity as players and think about their careers.
Yet this is the way it should be. Whether at the park or in front of millions of people watching at home on TV. Diehard fanatic or casual fan. Winning and your pursuit of it is what matters to people. Fans spend their time and their money to see displays of excellence. Our attachment to sports is our most irrational connection we can have in life. Millions bonded together over a logo and colors. As fans we want our individual team/player to win because we know in losing it is rare they get to tell the story. There are no real moral victories (sorry Pacers fans). We want guys that do not just want to win, but want more than anything else in life. And the proof is in their effort on the court or on the field. The proof is them getting back to the zenith of the sport year after year with their exploits proving how great they really are.
So yes, fans see a player like Allen Iverson as this valiant warrior who gave everything he had on the court towards winning because of his run to the 2001 Finals. Whereas Kevin Durant (not in this writer’s eyes) is viewed less-fondly than his peers (Curry and LeBron) because he went to Golden State and has not won a ring before or after. There were times you could compare Kobe v. Tracy McGrady, Tim Duncan v. Chris Webber, Steph Curry v. James Harden. Absolutely. Statistically you could see them as near identical in some ways, maybe even argue against the all-time great player. But getting a ring(s) is the ultimate elevator. It propels guys who were secondary on their teams into different conversations. Separates Dirk, KG, and Giannis from Barkley, even if they are all individually great. Isaiah Thomas is seen above all point guards not named Magic or Curry because of his two rings.
Iverson’s run to the NBA Finals in 2001 is one of the more memorable 1-man superstar performances in the history of the NBA.
The guys in the upper echelon of the greatest players did not just settle for the typical achievement, they went for the motherload of more. They can fully look at their career without any regrets.
Giannis since he won his title has been on a bumpy path. I hope he can get back here again.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is now on the path like Giannis and Jokic, where their greatness is validated with the title. Since the All-Star break of 2022, he has averaged 30+ points a game. His Game 4 of the Finals closing down the stretch, the Game 4 against the Nuggets are games in his superstar argument as well his closing all-time argument. The question becomes can he separate from his other two MVP/Finals winners with winning it all again. He certainly seems set up that way with Jalen Williams, Chet Holmgren as his sidekicks and a GM who is clearly the smartest guy in the league. We will all be witnesses, but it is up to him to determine where he lands.
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Now that the NBA season is officially over, here are my rankings for the top 25 NBA players and as a bonus because basketball never stops, a top 15 list of WNBA players. If I put a * next to their name, it means they are considered a superstar.
Top 25 NBA Players
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander*
Giannis Antetokounmpo*
Nikola Jokic*
Stephen Curry*
Luka Doncic*
Anthony Edwards
Jayson Tatum
LeBron James*
Victor Wenbenyama*
Kevin Durant*
Anthony Davis
Kawhi Leonard
Donovan Mitchell
Jalen Brunson
Paolo Banchero
Devin Booker
Cade Cunningham
Jalen Williams
Tyrese Haliburton
Jaylen Brown
Evan Mobley
Karl-Anthony Towns
Pascal Siakam
James Harden
Jimmy Butler
Top-15 WNBA Players
A’ja Wilson*
Napheesa Collier*
Caitlin Clark*
Breanna Stewart*
Nneka Ogwumike*
Kelsey Plum
Jonquel Jones
Allisha Gray
Jackie Young
Satou Sabally
Sabrina Ionescu
Kahleah Copper
Kelsey Mitchell
Kayla McBride
Paige Bueckers*
A’ja Wilson after capturing back-to-back titles for the Las Vegas Aces.
