“This dude the GOAT” – Damian Lillard gets candid about moment he realized Michael Jordan is ABOVE everyone in NBA history

Damian Lillard admits that Michael Jordan is the G.O.A.T.

“This dude the GOAT” – Damian Lillard gets candid about moment he realized Michael Jordan is ABOVE everyone in NBA history

Damian Lillard and Michael Jordan (via X.com)


In the NBA, players often have their basketball idols, those they consider the greatest to ever grace the court. Amidst the ongoing debates over basketball GOATs, Miami Heat’s star Damian Lillard has a clear choice: Michael Jordan. The seven-time NBA All-Star expresses nothing but admiration and profound respect for the legendary Michael Jordan.

Lillard recently said:

My NBA GOAT is Michael Jordan. It's just different when you talk about MJ. On the floor, it's just never been nobody like him. Nobody electrified the crowd like him. The Air Jordan shoe, rocking the cradle, walking in air, you know, it's Jordan. Two-three on his back. I don't think it's too much of a debate as far as who's the GOAT, and I would say it's Jordan. Bron, that's definitely a conversation to be had, but I think most people will look at Jordan as the GOAT.

While there is an all-out debate on who is the greatest of all time between the NBA legend Michael Jordan and Lakers superstar LeBron James, without a question majority of the fans and NBA players were in favour of Lillard’s choice of Jordan being above everyone in the league. It goes without saying that while LeBron James may be the best basketball player in the history of the NBA to date, Michael Jordan was the one who single-handedly redefined the dynamics of the game of basketball in the ’90s with the Chicago Bulls.

However, this is one of those never-ending arguments in the basketball community that has fans and critics still not able to reach the point of a definitive answer. With extreme favoritism for both athletes who have been foremost in the league in their respective times, most of them out there are entrenched in their opinions with this debate.

Had Michael Jordan not retired, might he have won 8-10 titles?

The NBA legend Michael Jordan played for the Chicago Bulls for 13 NBA seasons and retired in the year 1993. Jordan was burnt out as he had gone through playing three consecutive NBA seasons and by the end of it winning them all. In the year 1998, the Bulls were on the lookout to get young talent on board, and along with that Bulls General Manager Jerry Krause wanted to replace the coaching staff, in specific Phil Jackson.

Michael Jordan (Image via NBA.com)
(Image via NBA.com)

With new amends being brought to the table, Michael Jordan made it explicitly clear that if he would continue playing for the franchise, it would be definitely under Phil Jackson being the head coach for the team and nobody else. But former head coach of the Chicago Bulls Phil Jackson and Jerry Krause had a toxic relationship that there was in no way in which Jordan would have made a return to the team.

But there are a lot of factors in play to consider the fact that Jordan would have been facing the league’s best athletes during the time of his retirement including Hakeem Olajuwon in the Houston Rockets and the iconic duo of Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant from the Los Angeles Lakers. This may have had some effect on the chances of Jordan winning a championship if he had opted out of his retirement from the league but at the end of it, there is no definitive answer to it and is only subject to speculation and favoritism.

In Case You Missed: