Utah Jazz Fans Are Sooooo SICK of This…
It's June, which means it's time to pull out the age old argument...
"Who was better, Karl or Chuck?"
Jazz fans have to fight this battle every summer when everybody gets bored because there's no sports on TV. It's like the LeBron or Jordan argument, but more locally relevant.
@JazzLead recently posted this to Twitter:
Here are some of the best responses:
@PixlChkn:
"Chuck had a higher offensive peak. People always forget how dominant Malone was as a post defender. He might not have been a shot blocker, but he was an NBA all-defense regular. When you combine O and D, Malone was the better player with a much longer peak than Chuck."
I agree with this take. Malone was an underrated defensive force. We always think about the pick-and-roll or automatic elbow jumper, but what about the defense?
(YUCK. That's not his prime.)
@dbmoss7
"Replace Malone with Barkley in 97 & 98 and the Jazz might have two titles."
Based on what? Barkley never winning a title? Barkley had his chances in the nineties on great teams, but he couldn't beat Jordan in his MVP year in '93 just like Karl couldn't in his MVP year in the late nineties.
You can also argue that Malone had to carry much more of the scoring burden in his Finals years than Barkley did in his Finals appearance.
Barkley could shoot threes and was awesome in transition when he was at his peak with the 76ers and Suns. But Malone's bread and butter jumper and roll to the basket are some of the most efficient and dominant offensive weapons of all-time. Barkley doesn't have that.