Post#29 » by tsherkin » Wed May 22, 2024 3:58 pm
So, I think that Curry DID have the greater impact on the league for a couple seasons until teams started to sort out how to at least mitigate his offense some. Not to say shut him down or anything, but for a couple of seasons, he was a monster. His apex RS is on par with what we have been seeing from Jokic statistically, right? That 2016 MVP season where he was a 30 ppg guy, won the scoring title, .318 WS/48, league-highs in BPM, VORP, OWS, la la la la la. Any metric you'd care to name.
But he couldn't sustain that. He had a really nice 5-year peak, but only touched that level the one season and certainly wasn't consistently near that in the playoffs.
Aesthetically, I think he was at the head of the whole change in 3pt shooting, and he certainly helped popularize and normalize pull-up 3s in transition to a greater degree than was ever acceptable before, as well as deeper shot attempts. We were moving in that direction slowly, but I think he gave us the push.
Jokic hasn't caused any sort of league-wide revolutions in game play, though we have seen some protoforms of him in other playmaking post bigs. But he's been far more consistent about his RS play, far harder to undermine his value with defense, and has retained more of his RS form in the playoffs than Curry did, especially these past two seasons.
Both have their issues. Both have had their quieter performances alongside their dominance. Curry's obviously been the centerpiece of more titles, but that stretch with Durant was something Jokic has never enjoyed and overall, the Klay/Draymond dynamic was more consistent and effective than what Joker has been working with. 2022 was a nice little run, but again, he was able to lean into a team D when the O wasn't there which was much better than Denver's. Not to say that undercuts Curry, just to note that extended dominance requires a prerequisite level of roster talent which doesn't exist in Denver (and, indeed, is very challenging to acquire).
Blah blah blah RAMBLE.
I don't know. I think the two of them have both exerted large impact on the court. I think Curry's impact on the 3pt trends in the league is a LITTLE overrated, because we have been watching 3pt usage trend up for literal decades. And then Lillard hit the league in 2013 taking 6 3PA/g, right? And Ray had done 7, 8 3PA/g before as well. So there was precedent, and there were guys who very much didn't grow up while Steph was in the league doing it. So it was coming. Steph didn't even start taking 5+ 3PA/g until Lillard's rookie season (though he was very close to that number the whole time, he broke out to >7 in 2013).
So that side of things doesn't mean as much as is often discussed. Obviously, we've had conversations all over the boards about his off-ball gravity, and we saw what that was like in the mid/late-2010s when he got into Kerr's system and the Warriors started to do their thing, even before Durant.
I think people underrate the impact of Golden State's defense on their dominance, and that definitely had nothing to do with Steph, but it impacts things like their postseason success and certainly things like the 73-win season. But for a time, Steph was essentially the most underguardable player in the league. That 2016 RS was insane, but Steph was quite mortal in the Finals and went out like a lamb in Game 7. Draymond Green led the team with 32 points while Steph was 6/19 from the floor and 4/14 from 3. Live by the 3, die by the 3 type of thing. Bench was pretty useless that game, too.
So I don't know. When he is hitting from 3, you can't guard him. Like, literally. He snakes all over with excellent off-ball movement, he has strong handles, good fakes, he has a middle game, he has close floaters, he can drive hard. He uses screens well. He's a complete player. But even though he's the greatest volume 3pt shooter in league history, that still leaves him with considerable variance, so he has his ups and downs over an extended stretch. Someone like Jokic has considerably more consistent impact, even if he's a classical model with upgraded skills, in essence.
So honestly, I'd say around the same, overall.
@ pointing out the Warriors title they won in 1975 and 1947 as some argument that the Warriors weren't a laughing stock when Curry was drafted. Jokic is basically Giannis. Top 20 level player. That's about it. There are levels to this and Curry dwarfs Jokic./cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/8617171/kd_dunk2.0.gif)
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/8617213/kddunk3.0.gif)
