Who wins? 2011 Mavs to 2019 Raptors

[Showtime 80]

Funniest comment was that the 1983 Sixers were a "one hit wonder" when they made the Finals from the tougher conference in 3 out of 4 years!

Any Finals between champions would probably be close, but I'd have the Raptors in 6 or 7

Maybe that was the wrong label to use for the 83 Sixers since they were knocking on the door since 77’ with multiple great seasons but they were a one hit wonder in terms of winning titles specially when their title defense was such a joke in 84’.

But that was my point, the 19 Raptors aren’t even in the same convo with teams that dominated the season from start to finish like the 83 Sixers, 71 Bucks or 72 Lakers.

[FarBeyondDriven]

Kawhi slows Dirk down considerably and it's not close. Raptors in 5 with a very real possibility of a sweep. That Raptors team was a super team. One of the more well-rounded championship squads ever assembled. It would have beaten the Warriors whether they were healthy or not.

Lowry-FVV
OG-Green
Kawhi-Powell
Siakam
Ibaka-Gasol

[Myth]

Raptors are better on paper, but those Mavs were on a mission beating teams that were better on paper. Raptors felt like they barely squeaked by teams that were not as good as teams Mavs crushed. I vote Mavs.

[TroubleS0me]

Raptors will have home court advantage. but under which format? 2-3-2 or 2-2-1-1-1(current)
Are they playing with 2011 rules or 2019 rules? is Caron Butler active this series for the Mavs?

[Duffman100]

Mavs comfortably. Their 2011 run was legit. The Raptors were a great team but wouldn’t have won the championship without all the Warriors’ injuries.

We wouldn't have won without the Durant injury. But almost no team in the history of the NBA beats that Warriors team healthy.

We would have overcome the Klay injury.

[ShootersShoot]

Raptors went through the Butler/Embiid/Simmons/Harris 76ers and the 60 win bucks with the MVP winner Giannis. None of the teams the Mavericks beat were as good as these two.

Mavs beat the young talented 48 win Blazers team (before injuries destroyed them), the 55 win Thunder, 57 win Lakers (2 time defending Champs) and the 57 win Miami Heat superteam that went on to win 2 titles.

2019 was a strong playoff run for the Raptors but the Mavs 2011 run was one of the most impressive of all time. Its not even a debate.

Lakers were on the backend of their time and were starting to get up there in age.

Thunder were the best team of the group and were in fact very good, but they were up against a veteran squad who took them to school.

This Miami team that Dallas beat was nothing special. They were an above average team that featured three superstar players but were horrible outside of them. Dallas already had their number prior to beating them in the finals.

Don't get me wrong, it was a good story driven run but it's gotten horribly overrated with time.

In other words, it's absolutely a debate. We need to stop pretending the Mavs were massive underdogs beating all time great teams. They didn't.

So the embiid butler sixers were more impressive than the heatles, defending champ lakers, and the og okc big three? Cmon man you cant seriously believe that.

[Bank Shot]

Mavs beat the young talented 48 win Blazers team (before injuries destroyed them), the 55 win Thunder, 57 win Lakers (2 time defending Champs) and the 57 win Miami Heat superteam that went on to win 2 titles.

2019 was a strong playoff run for the Raptors but the Mavs 2011 run was one of the most impressive of all time. Its not even a debate.

Lakers were on the backend of their time and were starting to get up there in age.

Thunder were the best team of the group and were in fact very good, but they were up against a veteran squad who took them to school.

This Miami team that Dallas beat was nothing special. They were an above average team that featured three superstar players but were horrible outside of them. Dallas already had their number prior to beating them in the finals.

Don't get me wrong, it was a good story driven run but it's gotten horribly overrated with time.

In other words, it's absolutely a debate. We need to stop pretending the Mavs were massive underdogs beating all time great teams. They didn't.

So the embiid butler sixers were more impressive than the heatles, defending champ lakers, and the og okc big three? Cmon man you cant seriously believe that.

They Raptors also beat an 8+ SRS Bucks team that had looked like the best team in league all year up until game 3 of the ECF.

[Wingy]

Mavs comfortably. Their 2011 run was legit. The Raptors were a great team but wouldn’t have won the championship without all the Warriors’ injuries.

The Mavs wouldn’t have either.

Big fan of both of those teams though. I wish Kawhi stayed in Toronto.

[Yallbecrazy]

If you consider the same franchise winning multiple championships in a span of a decade as one team then that Raptors team is easily a top 10 team of all time, probably even top 5 after 1980 at least.
They get underrated because they were going against the top 1 team of all time with injuries so people think they only won because of injuries.

More than 2/3rds of the league gave up on competing in that era because of the Warriors so all the top players ended up consolidated in a few very high end squads. That was the best 76ers team of their era by far (prime Butler, Simmons best year before he fell apart, Embiid near peak,
Reddick just after peak, Tobias Harris just before peak)Probably close to the best Bucks team too including their championship season.

[Iwasawitness]

Mavs beat the young talented 48 win Blazers team (before injuries destroyed them), the 55 win Thunder, 57 win Lakers (2 time defending Champs) and the 57 win Miami Heat superteam that went on to win 2 titles.

2019 was a strong playoff run for the Raptors but the Mavs 2011 run was one of the most impressive of all time. Its not even a debate.

Lakers were on the backend of their time and were starting to get up there in age.

Thunder were the best team of the group and were in fact very good, but they were up against a veteran squad who took them to school.

This Miami team that Dallas beat was nothing special. They were an above average team that featured three superstar players but were horrible outside of them. Dallas already had their number prior to beating them in the finals.

Don't get me wrong, it was a good story driven run but it's gotten horribly overrated with time.

In other words, it's absolutely a debate. We need to stop pretending the Mavs were massive underdogs beating all time great teams. They didn't.

So the embiid butler sixers were more impressive than the heatles, defending champ lakers, and the og okc big three? Cmon man you cant seriously believe that.

Why is that so hard to believe?

All of those teams performed worse against a team that isn't even as good as the 2019 Raptors, a team the Butler Sixers took to 7 games. On that aspect alone I have no reason to believe any of those teams to be superior.

[ConSarnit]

The 2011 Heat were starting Joel Anthony at center.

Lebron averaged 17ppg. Does anyone think Kawhi is getting shut down by JJ Barea?

Now consider who the Raptors can throw at Dirk: Kawhi, Ibaka and Siakam.

The Raptors shot 15 more 3pa per game than the Mavs. The Mavs shot 15 more midrange attempts per game. If nothing else the Mavs get mathed to death.

The Raptors would by far be the best offensive AND defensive team the Mavs faced during their run.

[Iwasawitness]

The 2011 Heat were starting Joel Anthony at center.

Lebron averaged 17ppg. Does anyone think Kawhi is getting shut down by JJ Barea?

Now consider who the Raptors can throw at Dirk: Kawhi, Ibaka and Siakam.

The Raptors shot 15 more 3pa per game than the Mavs. The Mavs shot 15 more midrange attempts per game. If nothing else the Mavs get mathed to death.

The Raptors would by far be the best offensive AND defensive team the Mavs faced during their run.

To be fair, LeBron wasn't shut down by Barea.

[MrGoat]

Recency bias at it's finest. Raptors needed a game winner by Kawhi in game 7 to potentially avoid Joel Embiid advancing to the third round and then Golden State fell apart with injuries in the Finals.

Dallas took out fully healthy Portland, swept the two time defending champs healthy again, sent a stacked healthy OKC team home in 5, and downed the Big 3 healthy Heat who went on to win the next two Finals. And never even needed a game 7 to do it

Those Mavs would have been a 60+ win team too if it wasn't for a midseason stretch where Dirk uncharacteristically missed 9 games with injury and they went 2-7 without him. The only reason they were considered underdogs was because of how insanely disrespected they were at the time largely thanks to the reffing Mark Cuban had brought upon the team in previous seasons.

The only reason to think the Raptors would win would be because they were in the 3 point era and would still take way more 3s than the Mavs despite the Mavs being one of the greatest 3 point shooting teams ever assembled at the time. Dirk could render even the greatest defenders helpless, though. The idea that Kawhi could even slow that 7 footer with his flamingo fadeaway down is laughable. Kawhi would have to deal with Shawn Marion dogging him with Tyson Chandler protecting the rim on the other hand

[Tripod]

Mavs comfortably. Their 2011 run was legit. The Raptors were a great team but wouldn’t have won the championship without all the Warriors’ injuries.

We wouldn't have won without the Durant injury. But almost no team in the history of the NBA beats that Warriors team healthy.

We would have overcome the Klay injury.

No way to know that for sure.

Raps beat them both times in the regular season...and 1 time did it by 20 without Kawhi and all of Durant, Klay, Curry and Green played.

And we played without OG who was great defensively even at that age so that's another body to help slow them.

In the end, you can only play the team in front of you with who you have available. The Raps had the 2nd best record in the NBA all while resting Kawhi and took down the #1 and #3 teams along with the stacked 76ers.

Then had the best parade ever...lol.

[Black Jack]

I voted Raps because they had the size to if not slow down, at least bother Dirk a little and also Kawhi was in terminator mode.

[76thBearCub]

Pretty sure this years Raptors beat them... In a realgm poll

[The Servant]

Kawhi slows Dirk down considerably and it's not close. Raptors in 5 with a very real possibility of a sweep. That Raptors team was a super team. One of the more well-rounded championship squads ever assembled. It would have beaten the Warriors whether they were healthy or not.

Lowry-FVV
OG-Green
Kawhi-Powell
Siakam
Ibaka-Gasol

OG wasn't who he is today back then but they were stacked. They still were a bounce away from a 2nd round loss though to a team whos big three had Ben Charmin Soft Simmons as a member so lets not get too crazy.

[FarBeyondDriven]

Recency bias at it's finest. Raptors needed a game winner by Kawhi in game 7 to potentially avoid Joel Embiid advancing to the third round and then Golden State fell apart with injuries in the Finals.

Dallas took out fully healthy Portland, swept the two time defending champs healthy again, sent a stacked healthy OKC team home in 5, and downed the Big 3 healthy Heat who went on to win the next two Finals. And never even needed a game 7 to do it

Those Mavs would have been a 60+ win team too if it wasn't for a midseason stretch where Dirk uncharacteristically missed 9 games with injury and they went 2-7 without him. The only reason they were considered underdogs was because of how insanely disrespected they were at the time largely thanks to the reffing Mark Cuban had brought upon the team in previous seasons.

The only reason to think the Raptors would win would be because they were in the 3 point era and would still take way more 3s than the Mavs despite the Mavs being one of the greatest 3 point shooting teams ever assembled at the time. Dirk could render even the greatest defenders helpless, though. The idea that Kawhi could even slow that 7 footer with his flamingo fadeaway down is laughable. Kawhi would have to deal with Shawn Marion dogging him with Tyson Chandler protecting the rim on the other hand

that Sixers team was stacked. They didn't have the depth of the Raptors but they had the better starting 5 imho.

Simmons
Covington-Redick
Butler
Harris
Embiid-Saric

[Raps in 4]

Recency bias at it's finest. Raptors needed a game winner by Kawhi in game 7 to potentially avoid Joel Embiid advancing to the third round and then Golden State fell apart with injuries in the Finals.

That was Jimmy's team. Jimmy went to the Finals twice after leaving that Philly team.

[Raps in 4]

Mavs comfortably. Their 2011 run was legit. The Raptors were a great team but wouldn’t have won the championship without all the Warriors’ injuries.

We wouldn't have won without the Durant injury. But almost no team in the history of the NBA beats that Warriors team healthy.

We would have overcome the Klay injury.

Literally. No version of the Jordan Bulls would beat that team. Nor any version of the Heatles.