Gobert Vs Conley: Who makes a bigger impact?

[TimberKat]

Let me frame it this way, Mike Conley might be the best value non-rookie non-max contract in the NBA the next 2 seasons at about 10 million per year while Rudy will be making about 4.5 times as much.

Rudy was by far the best defender in the league when he was guarding all but 2 players last year:
Jokic and Embiid (maybe throw Zion in there too). He struggles against big heavyweight centers with girth.
Luckily there are only a couple of those guys left.
And there wasn't another big man faring much better against those 2 guys either, so it's really hard to make an argument against Jokic's performance in game 5 being disqualifying for Rudy.
Rudy himself bulldozed Wemby right off the court a few times and dunked right in his face.
Wemby has a long way to go to get to Rudy's level.
Davis and Bam's teams were only Play-In caliber.

As for playoff MVP, it always should go to a player on the winning team. Always.
The last scrub on the bench of the winning team would get my vote before the best player on the losing team.

Because TROPHIES ARE NOT FOR LOSERS.
Or they would create a special award for the best player on the losing team too.

A lot of people think like you. All that matters to me is which player in the series played the best. I gave you a +1 for recognizing Rudy.

The award is Most Valuable - not Best Player. There is nothing more valuable than winning in sports. For me it's always the player contribute most to winning, therefore, no win no award. I view the DPOY as defensive MVP, so for the same reason won't give it to any team that doesn't have winning record.

[TimberKat]

In NBA. good individual offense always trumps good individual defense. I think you can argue a defense only player should not get a supermax contract but you can't expect him to be able to go 1-1 and shutdown Jokic (I do expect him to play better than game 4,5). However, his value to winning is likely in between the 20th to 40th players in the NBA. The Ringer had him ranked at 34th (Towns is 27th), which seems about right.

[FrenchMinnyFan]

In terms on value/Salary : Mike by far
In terms of Defense : Rudy by far.
In terms of BBIQ: Mike by far.

As say Finchy, Mike is damm good important. He make all players better by making the right play as say ANT.
So overall, i would say Mike. But Rudy is an important piece in the team right now.

[KGdaBom]

Let me frame it this way, Mike Conley might be the best value non-rookie non-max contract in the NBA the next 2 seasons at about 10 million per year while Rudy will be making about 4.5 times as much.

Rudy was by far the best defender in the league when he was guarding all but 2 players last year:
Jokic and Embiid (maybe throw Zion in there too). He struggles against big heavyweight centers with girth.
Luckily there are only a couple of those guys left.
And there wasn't another big man faring much better against those 2 guys either, so it's really hard to make an argument against Jokic's performance in game 5 being disqualifying for Rudy.
Rudy himself bulldozed Wemby right off the court a few times and dunked right in his face.
Wemby has a long way to go to get to Rudy's level.
Davis and Bam's teams were only Play-In caliber.

As for playoff MVP, it always should go to a player on the winning team. Always.
The last scrub on the bench of the winning team would get my vote before the best player on the losing team.

Because TROPHIES ARE NOT FOR LOSERS.
Or they would create a special award for the best player on the losing team too.

A lot of people think like you. All that matters to me is which player in the series played the best. I gave you a +1 for recognizing Rudy.

The award is Most Valuable - not Best Player. There is nothing more valuable than winning in sports. For me it's always the player contribute most to winning, therefore, no win no award. I view the DPOY as defensive MVP, so for the same reason won't give it to any team that doesn't have winning record.

I get the idea that if your team didn't win than what you did was worthless. I just don't agree with it. No player has ever won a game. Only teams do that.

[A1FromDay1]

I agree that maybe we should recognize the actual best player of the finals, when they are head and shoulders above everyone else, and only lost to a great team, a well-oiled machine a la Detroit Pistons in the 2000s. After all, the winning team already gets the trophy, the rings, the legacy, while the runner-ups are forgotten (I need to google 90% of the runner-ups). You can average 100 points and 50 rebounds in the finals and not have anything to show for it. But then again, the NBA already recognizes individuality way too much, with all the other individual awards and focus on ISO, so maybe it's good as it is, forcing players to leave aside their stats and work as a team in order to win - setting the picks, the hockey assists, boxing out even if all these dont show up in the boxscore.

And back to the initial question, it's very hard for me to pick 1 of the 2 players. On one hand I feel like Conley is more important because he also elevates Gobert a lot, but still Rudy is more unique and there are only a few in the league that can impact the game defensively as he does, requiring special game plans from the opponents. They don't do that for Mike. But Mike is also cheap and such a good teacher with the right personality. It's a tie for me.