Timeline of Anthony Edwards Taking a Dig at Michael Jordan’s Era: Exploring Who Said What

Anthony Edwards had a memorable 2023-2024 season. Following the campaign, the youngster even got an opportunity to share the floor with some of the greatest NBA players–LeBron James, Stephen Curry, and Kevin Durant–while representing his country at the 2024 Olympics. Despite a successful summer, the Timberwolves guard has been criticized as of late for certain controversial comments regarding the players from Michael Jordan’s era.

Edwards didn’t mince his words when stating that the players from the 1990s, except Jordan, were less skilled than the current lot of players in the league.

“I don’t think anybody had skill back then… But now everybody has skill,” Ant declared in an interview with the Wall Street Journal.

Such a bold statement inevitably went viral and caused a massive stir in the basketball community. As expected, several esteemed individuals — Isiah Thomas, Magic Johnson, and Kevin Garnett, among others — reacted to the disputable comment.

Thomas called out Edwards on X

The leader of the Bad Boys Pistons was amongst the first notable figures to give his two cents on Ant’s take. After highlighting the “propaganda”, IT would proceed to defend his era. He refuted this by claiming that the increase in the number of three-pointers gives an illusion that the current generation is more skilled.

The Hall of Famer also clapped back at the 23-year-old by criticizing the big men of the current NBA, calling them “less” skilled than the taller players of the previous era.

After Thomas, another Point Guard in Magic Johnson expressed his disagreement with Edwards.

Magic ignored Ant

Magic Johnson had the most savage response amongst all those who reacted to the comment. During a live interview with Stephen A. Smith, the Lakers legend revealed that he wouldn’t acknowledge such comments from a player who has no championship–high school, college, or the NBA.

“I don’t never respond to a guy that’s never won a championship. Nothing to really say. He didn’t won a college championship. I don’t even know if he won in high school,” Johnson told Stephen A. Smith.

Johnson’s silence couldn’t make it any more clear that he didn’t agree with the youngster.

After Johnson, some of Ant’s biggest fans had to come out and correct him.

Garnett and Paul Pierce refuted the combo guard

Edwards’ comments also ticked off two of his biggest supporters from the NBA fraternity–Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. During an episode of the KG: Certified podcast, the former Celtics teammates went on passionate rants in which they disagreed with the former Georgia Bulldog.

Pierce began by comparing a few guards from the two generations after calling pointing out that Garnett, drafted in 1995, was one of the most skilled players ever.

“This (Kevin Garnett) is one of the most skilled players that ever played the game,” The Truth said.

KG chimed in and shut down the 6ft 4 highflyer’s claims by comparing the physicality of the two eras. He claimed that half of the players in today’s NBA wouldn’t make it into any of the teams in the 1990s.

“If I’m being honest, bro. I don’t think anybody in this generation could have played like 20 years ago… Let’s not talk about the physicality of the game back then real sh*t because I only think half these kids in the league could have been on an NBA team 20 years ago,” KG said on his podcast.

However, it wasn’t all doom and gloom for the Wolves guard. After a slew of well-known names disagreeing with him, he had a staunch supporter in a former Wizards All-Star.

Gilbert Arenas supported the youngster

While a majority of the basketball community was criticizing Edwards, Arenas was one of the few people supporting these comments. The Gils Arena host doubled down on the take by claiming that the players from the current generation would’ve given Jordan better competition than the players in the 1980s and 1990s.

“All we can off is just the metrics of their agility, speed, and then their jumping ability, height, and attributes. That’s all we can go off of. So, as a shooting guard… You’re talking about somebody like DeMar DeRozan, James Harden… PG [Paul George], Zach LaVine, f***ing [Malik] Monk can go up in there. It’s a normal thing. 40-inch vertical. That wasn’t a thing back then,” Arenas said.

Goes without saying that even Agent Zero joined Ant in receiving hate on social media and from fellow personalities from the NBA.

Pundits called Anthony Edwards a “fool”

Apart from Stephen A. Smith, numerous other veteran analysts also spoke about this topic at length. Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser, who have been associated with the league for several decades, simply laughed at Edwards’ “stupid” comments.

“The comments are somewhere between naive and stupid,” Wilbon said.

Kornheiser was even more stern with his choice of words, calling the NBA All-Star a “fool” for tarnishing his reputation.

“He sounds like a fool… He should have stopped, Mike, with this quote: ‘I didn’t watch it, I can’t speak on it.’ That’s where he should have stopped,” Kornheiser condemned the Wolves leader.

There are still a lot of people who have yet to give their opinions on Edwards’ comments. But from what the outburst displays, players from the 1980s and 1990s are offended. However, it is important to note that no prominent figures from the 2000s, 2010s, and 2020s have chimed in on the same.

It’ll be interesting what players such as LeBron, Steph, and others from the current generation say if asked to comment on the same topic during the media interaction before the beginning of the 2024-2025 season.