It’s clear he’s next in line for the throne of best SG in the league.
Dating back to the 90s Jordan had it first, then Iverson is arguable then Kob, then D Wade had an argument but I don’t think he was ever better than Bean. Then of course Harden ran with the title for years and now it’s Book’s time
Win an MVP and a ring at the very least.
Booker is great player. But he will never be even the shadow of Iverson.
Needs to drop 51 in the finals and step over T-Lue
What about dropping 40 on a bad hamstring
Become a universally beloved icon after stepping over Anthony Davis in an NBA Finals win.
Win an MVP or multiple titles
One title as the best player, or multiple titles with the current lineup.
Yeah basically and it would have to be with substantial performances he can’t just kinda pull a Klay Thompson 4 rings type run
What if he is the best player in the current lineup?
I guess it’d depend a lot on how good he was on the championship run and how good KD was. Like if KD is hurt and doesn’t play, then yeah Booker surpasses AI in terms of reputation among fans. But if KD is doing his normal thing at a HOF level and Book is 2% better, then I doubt people would automatically put him above AI on the strength of one ring on a super team.
For instance, I don’t think people put Paul Pierce above AI, even with his ring and finals MVP, because he only did it once with a loaded team.
Nothing bc Booker will never surpass Iverson
He isn’t even better than Luka or SGA today either
Why would Booker need to do anything when he’s already better than Iverson
lmao
At the very least, win a couple scoring titles and an MVP.
Well time to grab the popcorn
Become important culturally outside of Arizona—ie: it will never fucking happen
Interesting that you rank all time players based on their cultural impact. Seems pretty arbitrary to how good he is at basketball.
Not a lot of average players out there making cultural impacts. Not arbitrary at all when you actually stop and think about it. AI is an all-time great. He normalized a lot of shit that you see in the NBA today, on and off the court. Oh, he was pretty good at basketball too.
I definitely see what you mean, and I agree that cultural impact can’t happen to some bench players in most cases. But surely you wouldn’t argue that hakeems cultural impact is as much as iverson, but iverson doesn’t come close to Hakeem in terms of all time rankings. Just an example. Booker could be the most bland personality ever, but if he won a couple rings or MVPS and plays another 8 years, surely he would be able to surpass Iverson easily in purely on court basketball skill
No offense but were you watching basketball when Hakeem and AI were playing? Hakeem was pretty well known
Yes. To people that watched basketball.
I know Hakeem was well known, but I wouldn’t say it was on the level of AI. I guess maybe not the greatest example, because yes he still had an impact. But certainly there are a lot of players much better than AI with less cultural relevance.
Sure—I more wanted to point out that AI was a special player and even if he just met him on stats and accolades alone (which seems unlikely) Booker would have to do a LOT of other stuff to truly compare
I don’t, but AI is such a unique figure and Booker is so milquetoast the question feels absurd
Even though AI famously ranted about practice, can’t even imagine AI complaining about getting double-teamed in practice lol
Top 10 NBA vibes of all time
Dennis Rodman Michael Jordan Mo Bamba Len Bias Freedom Kanter Bol Bol Tingus Pingus Paul Pierce after shitting himself Kevin Johnson Larry Bird
He was just on the cover of 2k
So was Anthony Davis and he is not culturally important even a little bit
AD was in Barbershop 3 though.
Are we counting combo guards? If so, Booker isn’t the current #1.
he already has.
Lol I’d take booker over iverson every day of the week and twice on Friday.
In today’s game, I’d have to agree. Player’s are just better now. Softer, but better.
Play more? AI had a 14 year career. Books 26 with 8 years logged already. Itll come with time. Holy fuck some of yall are impatient, and really obsessed with relatively meaningless rankings.
He needs to have an iconic interview that is quoted constantly like the practice interview.
We talkin bout my father man. Not my mom. Not my mom. We talkin bout my father.
Yup. Embrace the shooting guard archetype Book! Let the diva seeeethe.
Double team? We talking bout double team?
Mascots. We talkin bout mascots.
A few memorable promos couldn’t hurt.