The NBA Playoffs are pro wrestling

[Eduardo]

Seriously, Kawhi Leonard has been amazing as of late. He's been so much fun to watch, both on defense and offense.

[elliott]

Had some fun with the comparing NBA players to wrestlers game.

 

LeBron James is Hulk Hogan. Biggest star in the world, delusional, steroids, hair. Always uses his immense drawing power to obtain creative control.

 

Steph Curry is early 90s Jushin Liger with great technical skill and breathtaking highspots. He will age really well because he’s so smart and bitch slap people with deep 3s forever.

 

Blake Griffin is John Cena the worker. Some undeniably great performances/years but some people will always hate them just because.

 

Dwayne Wade is Nobuhiko Takada. Overrated in some circles underrated in others. Some really great seasons and performances and certainly amongst the most popular of their generation. Not afraid to completely dog it even though they aren’t working a full schedule.

 

Kawhi Leonard is Jun Akiyama. Incredibly talented, hard working next generation stud that looks poised t keep a dynasty alive. Hopefully this turns out better for the Spurs than it did for All Japan. If Kawhi chooses to defect when his elders move on, Portland would be a lovely spot to start Noah.

 

Baron Davis is Dick Togo. Short, fat, awesome, shockingly athletic.

 

Charles Oakley is Meng/Haku. Because they are both cool as fuck and will break you.

 

Magic Johnson is Jumbo Tsuruta. Undeniable all time great. Couldn’t help but love him even if he was on the rival team or beating up your favorite young boy. Careers tragically cut short. Made depressing comebacks as comedy workers for late night tv shows.

 

Scottie Pippen is Bill Dundee. Amazing all time great player who was best as a sidekick or clear #2. Couldn’t get you to the promised land by himself but pair him with someone ever better and he will help make magic.

 

Jerry West is Buddy Rogers. Undeniable all time great worker/player/draw who could never break through because some other guy was dominating the scene and winning all the titles (Russell/Thesz). The symbol for greatness for their respective sports (West because of the Logo, and Rogers because look at how many greats ripped him off directly).

 

Kobe Bryant is Terry Funk. 2^nd generation star who became bigger than his father. Unquestionable all time great that is overrated by some and underrated by others. Basketball/Wrestling lifer who will never stop working. Career’s/lives that could not be replicated.

 

Kareem is Tenryu. Great forever, showed no emotion, will casually walk up and punch you in the face as hard as he can.

 

Bill Russell is 80s Ric Flair. Most decorated champion, arguably the best ever, made everyone around him better, known for defense, though had underrated offensive games (at least until Flair quit doing everything). I bet Bill Russell was smart enough to invent flopping against Wilt paving the way for Flair and future nba players to use this tactic to the delight of some and the dismay of others. Was consistently great working brutal cross country schedules and could still up their game when it matter most. .

 

Vince McMahon is Phil Jackson. Helped build a tremendous dynasty with Michael Jordan/Hulk Hogan that changed the sport and ushered in a new era. Lucked into later success because Kobe/Shaq/Stone Cold/The Rock took their games to the next level and further strengthened the Phil/Vince “genius” narrative. Phil was more aggressive than ever with his verbal jabs and mind games; definitely embracing his role as Mr McMahon in this new attitude era. Lucked into further success because John Cena became John Cena and the NBA gift wrapped Pau Gasol to LA. The Post WrestleMania 30 is definitely New York Knicks Phil Jackson. Instead of rebuilding through the draft, he is focused more on free agency and trades to bring in the big names to eat up cap space and minutes for guys who will realistically be past their prime. Meanwhile winners at WrestleMania 31 include: Big Show, Randy Orton, HHH, John Cena, Undertaker.

 

Vince Russo is Donald Sterling. Obviously.

 

Jay Williams is Magnum TA because they were both bad drivers.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

Kelly Olynyk just went Playboy Buddy Rose on Kevin Love's shoulder.

[elliott]

Kelly Olynyk just went Playboy Buddy Rose on Kevin Love's shoulder.

 

So long Eastern Conference. Try again next year.

[jdw]

Kareem is Tenryu. Great forever, showed no emotion, will casually walk up and punch you in the face as hard as he can.

 

 

Kareem is Flair. Worked forever. High peak, longer than just about everyone's peak. Still excellent late in career, though not quite as good as "rated". Then washed up and embarrassing at the end, but still fawned over. Loved by some, hated by others. Dominant Champ through a declining era of his promotion, then still around when the business went back up through the roof with other talent carrying the promotion. Around for so long that some just wanted him to go away.

 

Bill Russell is 80s Ric Flair. Most decorated champion, arguably the best ever, made everyone around him better, known for defense, though had underrated offensive games (at least until Flair quit doing everything). I bet Bill Russell was smart enough to invent flopping against Wilt paving the way for Flair and future nba players to use this tactic to the delight of some and the dismay of others. Was consistently great working brutal cross country schedules and could still up their game when it matter most. .

 

 

 

Bill Russell = Jim Londos. That fucker refused to job unless he got his big payday to put over another star (Pettit & Wilt), Then promoters realized Pettit & Wilt weren't really Championship Material, so they quickly put the Belt back on Russell for another run. Russell then walked off into the sunset without jobbing the title, and will take it to his grave.

 

 

Vince McMahon is Phil Jackson.

 

 

Nah.

 

Pat Riley is closer to Vince as a master manipulator, working angles and deals, doing both booking (Head Coach) and promoting (General Manager). Up and down run career. Glory days that are fondly remember by people who cut their teeth on it (Showtime Lakers vs Rock 'n' Wrestling). Some ugly times (Knicks vs Diesel Era). Some interesting times with some quality, but not quite peak stuff (early Mourning Miami era vs good early 90s stuff and parts of the 00s - 10s). A second peak era (Lebron Heat vs Stone Cold - Rock peaks). Wears on people, even his allies and especially his wrestlers/players. Holds a hell of a grudge.

 

Hard to say who Phil is. He made a career out of getting the best out of some high end exceptional talent, while being supported by organizations the complimented that high end talent with quality stablemates. That he was able to pull out three distinct quality runs (Jordan Bulls, Shaqkobe Lakers, Kobe's I-Me-Mine Lakers), none of them short one hit wonders, is also impressive and hard to find a match. There really isn't a big failure in there either: his 2005/06 - 2006/07 Lakers teams were weak on talent behind Kobe, Kobe was in total egofuck mode at the time, so 45-37 & 42-40 out of those teams wasn't bad coaching. 22 year run, two years sitting on the sidelines so 13 Finals in 20 seasons of coaching. Pretty nuts.

 

I can't think of an office/management equiv that's like that in wrestling. I'm sure there are bullshit self promoters who would claim that level of run, but no one in wrestling is close.

[elliott]

Here is the problem with Kareem as Flair...Flair is one of the most charismatic and exciting people who ever lived. Kareem is boring as fuck. Although if you were going to make the Kareem-Flair connection how could you pass up the opportunity to say Kareem only took one shot his whole career and Flair wrestled the same match over and over again. It was right there!

[jdw]

Here is the problem with Kareem as Flair...Flair is one of the most charismatic and exciting people who ever lived. Kareem is boring as fuck. Although if you were going to make the Kareem-Flair connection how could you pass up the opportunity to say Kareem only took one shot his whole career and Flair wrestled the same match over and over again. It was right there!

 

 

Kareem was great and exciting as hell to the fans of those NWA UCLA & NWA Lakers territories, the two greatest style and profiling territories of all-time... WOOOOOOOOOO! He was even exciting as hell to the fans of that otherwise craphole NWA Milwaukee office before he left their sorry asses to walk that long, immortal aisle back to Los Angeles.

 

And let's be honest and admit that Flair was boring as fuck to the Rock'n'WrestlingCeltics WWF fans of the 80s... and really even in the 90s. And we all knew what the Nature Boy thought of those asshole Celtics Fans:

 

[jdw]

LeBron James is Hulk Hogan. Biggest star in the world, delusional, steroids, hair. Always uses his immense drawing power to obtain creative control.

 

[elliott]

We've all seen Tenryu do exactly this.

 

 

Flair would have taken a huge bump off the elbow, had his punch no-sold, flopped, climbed the hoop and been thrown off the top landing just past the free throw line.

[elliott]

The key point for my Lebron/Hulk comparison is the hair

 

MJ had the common sense to shave his head making bald cool.

 

MJ was a better worker than Hulk too.

[jdw]

Kobe might be Kobashi. Think about that one a bit.

 

The only real difference is that most everyone hates Kobe, including some Lakers Fans like myself who thank him for Five More Rings. In contrast, I think most people in the business liked Kobashi.

 

But the other parallels run far and deep.

 

Shaq is a tough one. All-Time Great who did it all, but still should have had more of a career if it wasn't pissed away. On some level perhaps Hashimoto, though Shaq pissed away his own career (with help of Kobe wanting the Lakers to be his own team), while Hash had his career pissed away by Inoki and New Japan, then the decline of the business, then his own sad death. But up through 1998, Hash had already laid down the foundation for an all-time great career and was just 33. Ugh... I'm depressed thinking about it.

[jdw]

The key point for my Lebron/Hulk comparison is the hair

 

MJ had the common sense to shave his head making bald cool.

 

MJ was a better worker than Hulk too.

 

Though it's quite possible that the reason MJ shaved his head was...

 

 

Hogan was a great worker in his own way.

[elliott]

Kobe might be Kobashi. Think about that one a bit.

 

The only real difference is that most everyone hates Kobe, including some Lakers Fans like myself who thank him for Five More Rings. In contrast, I think most people in the business liked Kobashi.

 

But the other parallels run far and deep.

 

I actually thought about Kobe-Kenta. But I recently read Meltzer's big Kobashi retrospective from a couple of years ago and I decided against that comp because Kobashi wasn't a star athlete in high school like Misawa and Kawada. Obviously Kenta was great from the start. I went with Terry Funk leaning on 2nd generation stars, great work, and just having totally unique and bizarre lives even within their profession which is full of people with unique and bizarre lives.

 

None of these are perfect. But all of them are fun

[elliott]

 

The key point for my Lebron/Hulk comparison is the hair

 

MJ had the common sense to shave his head making bald cool.

 

MJ was a better worker than Hulk too.

 

Though it's quite possible that the reason MJ shaved his head was...

 

Hogan was a great worker in his own way.

 

 

But only one of them was smart enough to shave their heads and make bald cool. The other two are stubborn/oblivious fools about it

 

I agree Hogan was a great worker. But he wasn't MJ. MJ could pack the arenas, draw in new fans, "work effectively" to send them home happy etc. But he was also Mitsuharu Misawa having 5 star classics blowing the minds of all the hardcores.

 

MJ was Hulk+Ric.

 

LeBron is more like John Cena if Cena was seen as the next top guy from the very start instead of almost getting fired. But they do have a lot of parallels.

[jdw]

Freaking Kent Benson... what a doufus he was.

 

Look at this draft:

 

http://www.basketball-reference.com/draft/NBA_1977.html

 

Despite the risk of getting a second hand high off the coke dust flying around that page, look at all the insane talent there.

 

That craphole of an office NWA Milwaukee had the #1 and #3 picks. They went correct with the #3 pick in Marques Johnson (one of that last great workers "trained" by the John Wooden in the UCLA Dudgeon). But they butchers the #1 in a LOADED draft.

[jdw]

 

Kobe might be Kobashi. Think about that one a bit.

 

The only real difference is that most everyone hates Kobe, including some Lakers Fans like myself who thank him for Five More Rings. In contrast, I think most people in the business liked Kobashi.

 

But the other parallels run far and deep.

 

I actually thought about Kobe-Kenta. But I recently read Meltzer's big Kobashi retrospective from a couple of years ago and I decided against that comp because Kobashi wasn't a star athlete in high school like Misawa and Kawada. Obviously Kenta was great from the start. I went with Terry Funk leaning on 2nd generation stars, great work, and just having totally unique and bizarre lives even within their profession which is full of people with unique and bizarre lives.

 

 

Kobashi had "it" right from the start, and got a push beyond his level really early: those 1989 TV matches in his second year are similar to Kobe making the All Star Game push in his second season.

 

I think Kobashi had a natural gift for pro wrestling, similar to Kobe for basketball. There isn't pro wrestling in jr high and high school, or Kobashi would have been eating up the Nike Puoresu Camps and been a McDonalds High School All-Nippon member.

 

There are some dissimilar things, such as Kobe being an utter dick. But the similarities, right down to them both "playing through injuries" that hardly anyone else would and then breaking down body part by body part. They also both were more insanely driven than any player of their generation... kind of pathological in each case.

[elliott]

I agree with everything you said about Kobe/Kenta. That is all precisely why I thought about it. Since I tried to include some sillyness in all of my comparisons, I also would have said "Later Chop-Fu Kobashi is the equivalent of Later All Offense No Defense Kobe."

 

You could even draw a comparison between Kenta's long losing streak to start his career and Pre-Phil Kobe jacking airballs in the playoffs against Utah.

 

I would also like to revise my Kawhi Leonard as Jun Akiayama comment and say that I hope it is more like Kawhi Leonard is 1991 Mitsuharu Misawa. That would be phenomenal. Jumbo would be Timmy in this scenario which would also be a good comp.

[Johnny Sorrow]

Shouldn't Flair be Wilt since they both fucked 20,000 women?

[elliott]

I'm struggling to come up with a good comp for Wilt.

 

I didn't think of Flair, but you could absolutely say that Wilt slept with 20,000 women like Flair wrestled 100,000 matches.

[Johnny Sorrow]

Who's Laimbeer?

[Jesse Ewiak]

Who's Laimbeer?

 

Um, RVD? Unsafe to work with, but loved by his fans?

[elliott]

I would say Laimbeer is like a poor man's Greg Valentine.

[Cross Face Chicken Wing]

Flair is much closer to Wilt than he is to Kareem.

 

Laimbeer was too chickenshit to be Valentine. Laimbeer is kind of a blue collar version of Buddy Rose.

[jdw]

Flair won lots of titles. Kareem won lots of titles: 3 in college & 6 in the NBA. Both of them were winning titles after their prime.

 

Wilt won 2 titles, only one when he was truly the top guy (West was in 1972).

 

Wilt is Andre the Giant. Titles largely meant nothing to him. He won the 1967 Title to prove that he could, then the belt went back to Russell. Wilt was all about being larger than life. Of course there's also the famed quote about no one loving Goliath.

 

* * * * *

 

Laimbeer was a dirty thug heel. I don't think Rose was enough of a thugish tough guy to be Laimbeer. Laimbeer was limited, but had a few strong characteristics: team defense, rebounding, outside shooting (pulling the opposing center away from the hoop long before it became vogue), and dirty intimidating hacking. So you're looking for a tough heel who does a few things good/well, is a thug, but overall limited. Laimbeer certainly wasn't a big bumping heel... though Parrish did beat the living shit out of him once.

 

* * * * *

 

Too early to tell of Leonard is Misawa. On some level, the "Misawa" should be someone whose career we've already seen come to an end (or largely to an end). You can't tab that on someone earlier in their career.

 

Misawa might be Bird.

 

The clear Ace in the World at his peak, respected by everyone even his rivals (Mutoh totally respected Misawa as the real Man in Japan back when both were Champs in 1995). Major titles and honors in his prime. Deadly icy cooler finisher who could take you out with all sorts of spots (Bird could kill you deep, could kill you driving to the hoop, could kill you drawing the foul and going to the line, and could kill you with a super smart "counter steal" like the famous one against the Pistons). Both broke down at the tail end of their primes: Bird after yet another insane year in 1987/88, and Misawa right as he was heading into his first headlining Tokyo Dome. Both stuck around after that, got other honors and flashed some brilliance here and there, but never were really the same after the big injuries.

 

* * * * *

 

Don't really know who Kawhi is. So early in his career. We don't even know if he's going to turn into a serious MVP candidate, or if he's Pippen 2.0 which itself is an exceptional level but never really rose to serious MVP candidate level. I really think we need to let someone who is four years into their career, just 23, and "only" averaged 17-7-3 have some time to develop and show us where the high end of is play on a night-in, night-out basis ends up. I certainly look forward to watching it.

[DR Ackermann]

Laimbeer is Bradshaw. Fake tough guy bully who gets his ass handed to him when push comes to shove. Never one of of the elite guys but had a run at the top that is underrated.