Dime Q&A: Alonzo Mourning Speaks on Comparing Players And Eras

Earlier this spring, I caught up with former NBA All-Star Alonzo Mourning. And while our meeting wasn’t necessarily to talk NBA Playoffs/LeBron/Scottie Pippen/MJ, we sort of got around to comparing eras.

With this recent talk revolving around the comments Scottie Pippen made about LeBron becoming a better overall player than the GOAT, Steve Kerr, another former Bull, chimed in with his opinion yesterday, telling ESPN:

“The irony to me is that LeBron is not Michael. LeBron is actually Scottie,” former Bull and current television analyst Steve Kerr said Monday on “The Waddle & Silvy Show” on ESPN 1000. “He’s so similar to Scottie in that defensively he was just a monster, could guard anybody, really more of a point forward than scoring guard. Scottie always loved to distribute the ball. That’s really where LeBron’s preference is.

Phil Jackson used to call Scottie a ‘sometimes shooter.’ Sometimes they would go in, sometimes they wouldn’t. That’s how it is with LeBron. He’s a great talent and a great player but you can see his flaws as a basketball player. He doesn’t have an offensive game that he can rely on: no low-post game, no mid-range jump shot so when the game really gets tough he has a hard time finding easy baskets and getting himself going. That’s what Michael did in his sleep so that’s why the comparison is wrong.”

So I went D.I.T.C. earlier this morning for my talk with Alonzo. Although he doesn’t do much comparing here, some of the stuff he has to say is pretty interesting (he is a BIG fan of Kevin Durant/Russell Westbrook).

Here’s part of the conversation where I asked ‘Zo about comparing the two eras.

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Dime: Do you miss playing at all?
Alonzo Mourning: Ah…I do miss playing the game. I miss the playoffs more than anything. Yeah, I miss playing. Yeah, yeah. But I don’t miss regular-season games at all. But I miss the playoffs.

Dime: What do you think about the league now? Who are some guys that play now that could’ve thrived in your era as well?
AM: Some of the guys playing in the game right now that could’ve been competitive in my era? D-Wade, LeBron, Kobe…um, wow. Those three stand out more than anything. I think Tim Duncan obviously back in my era, the early years of my era in the ’90s. They would’ve been really good. Who else? There ain’t too many more because the rules were different back then. The four of those guys? I think they would’ve been very impactful players back then. The four of those guys.

Dwight Howard? Ah, yeah. He would’ve been more like a David Robinson with less offense. But David Robinson, he had offense man. Dwight Howard doesn’t have the offense that David Robinson had. Yeah, there are a handful of guys that could’ve made it. Kevin Garnett. Ray Allen. I think that Rajon Rondo would’ve been an excellent point guard back in our day, back in the ’90s. He would’ve been an excellent point guard because of his speed and court savvy.

Dime: Back then, it seemed like every night you had to matchup with Hakeem, David, Shaq
AM: When you think about the NBA back then, it was more centered towards post play. Now you have a more perimeter-oriented game. You had Hakeem, David Robinson, Patrick (Ewing), (Rik) Smits, myself, Shaq, Vlade Divac. I mean you name it man. We had a bunch of ’em (laughs). Brad Daugherty. We had a lot of guys man (laughs). Every time you turned around you were going up against another center so it was tough back then. It was very, very tough.

Now, you only have one center! Well, maybe two. You have Dwight Howard and then you have Bynum. That’s it. You have two centers in the league now. Yao Ming is gone. Shaq is on his way out the door. And that’s all you have. You have two guys now. Supply and demand. I keep telling my son: they pay you from the inside-out (laughs). So if you’re a dominant center and can just dunk, make a couple free throws, make a couple hook shots, and block some shots and rebound? You get paid a lot of money to do that.

***

Dime: Do you think we will ever see rivalries like you guys used to have with the Knicks?
AM: I think it’s a possibility. The Knicks have two dominant players. They have a pretty decent supporting cast. They don’t have that defensive mentality that the Knicks had back in the day, but I think that rivalry can evolve again. We could actually visit that again.

Dime: What do you remember about those series you used to have with them? All of the intense games…
AM: I remember the intensity, the competition…just every minute was extremely intense. I mean every minute of the game was very intense. It was kind of like the Hatfields and the McCoys going at each other. That’s kinda how it was. And it seemed like every time we competed, the world just stopped. Every game against the Knicks, the world just stopped and everybody was watching us. I kind of felt that way.

Dime: Were those the most intense games you’ve ever played in?
AM: Yeah. Very much so.

What players from this era would’ve been stars back in the ’80s and ’90s?

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