Doctor MJ wrote:Regarding Garnett, he is rising in my list again, but his candidacy was killed by how well the team did without him.
This was in part 4 of the thread, but since I was off the board yesterday I'm just getting to respond today. If how the team did without him is going to kill KG's candidacy, you have to at least look at WHO they beat. The Celts went 7 - 2 without KG...five of those wins were against the Heat, the Knicks, the Timberwolves, the Clippers, and the Pacers (Combined record 106-268).
The Celtics actually played relatively tight games against those teams without KG, winning by an average of 7 points outside of the Heat, (who they beat by 30). The Celts were undefeated against those same 5 teams with KG, but they won by almost 20 ppg. In other words, it's not that KG's absence didn't make a difference...he just got hurt during the weakest portion of the Celtics schedule when the teams they played were on the whole so bad it didn't matter much.
The Celts did a good job of scrapping and doing what they were supposed to when KG was out. But if the Lakers had played those 5 teams with everyone healthy but Kobe, they probably win. If the Hornets played those 5 teams with everyone healthy but Paul, they probably win. I just don't think the Celts winning closer games against a bunch of teams that they usually blow out is good reason to eliminate KG as a candidate.