Gilbert Arenas blasts Michael Jordan fans for relying on rings in GOAT debate – “None of this s**t matters”

Michael Jordan is regarded as one of the best Basketball players of all time and won five NBA titles in his glorious career. The former Chicago Bulls player was always hungry for success at the top level and was known to give his 120% on the court. Jordan was lethal in his preparation and left no stone unturned in the training sessions.

However, former NBA player Gilbert Arenas reckons the number of titles should not be used as the parameter to judge Jordan’s legacy as many experts had put him ahead of Kareem Abdul Jabbar even before he won a single NBA ring.

“This is what I hate about the narrative now. When they say, ‘He’s the GOAT, and you’ve got to have this, this, this and this.’ When he got the title, he didn’t have that,” Arenas said on Above the Rim DH12 podcast. “When he got crowned the greatest of all time, he didn’t have a championship. When they said, ‘You’re better than Kareem Abdul-Jabbar,’ he did not have a championship yet.”

“You broke the code and said, ‘None of this s**t matters,'” Arenas said. “So, stop using it then because you didn’t use it when you removed Kareem, you didn’t use it when Bill Russell got moved, you didn’t use that s**t against Magic Johnson and [Larry] Bird.”

Arenas said Jordan was praised for his scoring ability before he won a championship with Chicago Bulls.

“Jordan was 26 when he was considered the best player in the world … You can’t do that anymore,” Arenas said.

“Like Luka, there’s no player that can come into the league, average 37, 35, 32 and 33 [points per game], and no one says, ‘When are you gonna win championships?’ Name somebody who can go and win a scoring title five times before they start questioning his legacy.”

Meanwhile, Luka Doncic is considered as one of the best young players in the NBA and took Dallas Mavericks to the final in the previous season.