Skip Bayless
speaker
259 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard May 2025
last heard May 2025
Skip Bayless’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
I give you every point you made about points and about rebounds and about blocks and about sky hooks and all that is sensational. But there's a missing ingredient called leadership, charisma, whatever that greatest intangible is that Magic had greater than anybody this side of Jordan. Yeah, no, I give you that.
Without Kareem, you mean? Without Kareem?
Before he got injured in game six. He could have gone to Utah or wherever he would have gone. I just think he would have been rookie of the year. But he was the perfect fit at the perfect moment for this team. And it became a super team. It was Showtime and they had Big Game James, obviously, and they had Byron and they had Michael Cooper guarding the way nobody could guard on the perimeter.
I give you all that. But it gelled around the new son, S-U-N, who was Magic, right? And he lifted them into what was nine finals. And he is the driving force. Kareem was really more of a Robin, but you can make a case he was the greatest Robin of all time. Okay? I give you all your numbers because clearly it took LeBron playing now 22 years, but it took 21 years to break Kareem's record.
Okay, but you grew up in the Mamba mentality era, am I right?
Okay, all right, you do, and I give you that. But Magic Johnson was the greatest NBA leader ever, beyond Bill Russell, beyond Michael Jordan, beyond, we got Brady over on the other side in the National Football League, so that's another argument. But on just NBA leadership, Magic on charisma, on winning time, as he called it, winning time.
In my generation, winning time was more important than, because we didn't know mama mentality yet. I want winning time. I want magic time.
I think Kobe was a Jordan-esque leader and he modeled every bit of his action, his very body language after Michael Jordan. And he led like Jordan did. And it wasn't a pretty sight because he could be a real, you know, just a tough leader. Like he gave nobody any... He pushed, he pulled, he cursed. He did it the way Jordan did it. And it was scary.
It was like an intimidation, leadership by intimidation. Magic did it with a smile, but Magic, listen, I got to know him in his rookie year. He was as tough as they came. You wouldn't want to mess with him.
I'm with you, but I'm looking at the first four years with no Shaq. And Kobe really struggled by himself because he couldn't figure out yet how to lead because he was a solo act of solo acts. So it took Jordan a while to figure out, hey, you actually need those four other guys along with eight, nine other guys to get this done.
And with Phil's help, he finally figured that out when they broke through. But even... after the Pout game in game seven, if I look at Kobe winning the championship, getting even with the Boston Celtics in that game seven, he shoots six of 24 in a game seven. Well, that's not Mamba mentality. And I didn't love that.
It's like, remember, Ron Artest, Metta World Peace, hit the shot of shots in that game with a minute left. He hits a big three that gave them the cushion. I'm a Celtics fan. I watched that. It broke my heart. There you go. Thank you, Skip. Way to go. Good job.
He did. He was still 12 years, but it should have been 20.
Okay, but we're not talking about post-career. We're talking about playing career because Jerry West, to me, is the greatest GM ever in the history of the NBA. And by the way, Michael Jordan was the worst GM in the history of the NBA, just for objectivity here.
But to your point, okay, so Jerry West and the Lakers get to nine finals, nine finals, and he loses eight times, and a lot of it had to do with that guy, Bill Russell. To the Greatest team ever. But if I swap out, if I put Magic in place of the logo on those teams, Magic was the greatest winner this side of Michael Jordan that I ever closely observed and got to know.
So if you put him in on those Jerry West teams with Wilt and with Elgin and with Gale Goodrich, he puts them over the top because of his dynamic charisma and leadership. It was unequaled. I've never seen a thing like it. Jerry's leadership...
He's the logo of the NBA. And you can't say that's better than Magic's winning time showtime.
Yeah, I understand that.
And he played long. But if you put Jerry West on the Showtime teams, do you think they're Showtime? Because they're not. Because he didn't play with any... Kurt Randis was on the Showtime team. Well, he was. He was like a sixth man or badass enforcer.
Yeah, but again, if you didn't have Magic Johnson on those teams, you don't have Showtime. There's no more Showtime. You don't have Showtime. And Jerry West was as pretty a jump shooter as I've ever seen. It was just beautiful form and it was mesmerizing, but it wasn't captivating, right? It wasn't Magic Johnson. I couldn't take my eyes off Magic because he had the big smile.
Showing 21–40 of 259 · page 2 of 13
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