Michael Jordan is without a doubt one of the greatest basketball players to ever grace the hardwood. Not a lot would argue about him being the GOAT in the NBA. However, it doesn’t mean that he was the best college basketball player of all time as well.
Advertisement
ESPN, though, declared he is. In 2020, they organized a 64-person bracket of the best players (men & women) to ever play the game of basketball at the NCAA level.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (then, Lew Alcindor) was the #1 seed in it and Jordan was #2, followed by Larry Bird and Magic Johnson at number 3. However, by the end of fan voting, MJ came first, Larry Legend was second and KAJ didn’t even make it to the top-4.
And to this day, the 6x NBA MVP is sour about it.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar claims Michael Jordan wasn’t close to Oscar Robertson as a college player
The sports podcast GOAT, Dan Patrick, had the 6x NBA champ on his show. Dan revealed how angry he himself was when this first came out.
The Dan Patrick Show host then asked Kareem to have his say on the matter.
“Michael wasn’t anywhere close to the college player that Oscar was,” Kareem said, talking about how the voters might have had no idea about him or either Robertson as college players, because of which they went with MJ.
It’s a natural reaction from a man who never lost an NCAA game, winning 3 championships in his 3-years with UCLA. Alcindor led his team to an 88-2 record in three years of college basketball, going 30-0 in 1968.
Oscar Robertson, meanwhile, won three scoring titles, college basketball player of the year titles, and All-American in his 3 years with the Cincinnati Bearcats between 1957 and 1960. His 33.8 PPG is still the 3rd best in college basketball history. Surreal.
Michael Jordan’s college career
Jordan had a mind-boggling NBA career that only a handful of players in the game come close to. His college career, though, was not as eventful as Kareem’s. Not even Magic or Bird’s I’d say.
He had probably the most famous shot as a freshman in NCAA Finals in 1982 which won a James Worthy-led UNC team to a championship. But it was Worthy’s final year in the college and after that, no more championships for MJ.
Jordan totaled 1788 points in three years of college. To put that in perspective, Kareem had 2325, Bird had 2850, and Robertson had 2973 points in their careers.
