erudite23 wrote: But there's other "stats" that favor Deron. For example, there is a stat called drawn charges and Deron annually bests Paul there. But you don't see it bandied about much for some reason. I can't even find it online without digging. But there are others. Like 6'3" versus 6'0". Deron is able to contest shots and bother people in a way that Paul can't. 220 pounds versus 190. You never see an opposing PG post Deron up twice. Some are dumb enough to try once, but then that's that. Paul, though, is at the mercy of bigger guys in the post (often forcing either a switch, or a big guy to help, thus resulting in another player's stats reflecting the mismatch...which is not reflected in Opp PER). I've seen it with my own eyes. I've also seen Paul get caught up going through screens on a regular basis and I've seen him leave his man wide open in an effort to pick someone from behind or to jump a pass he sees coming. I've seen it. I guess there's no way to prove things from an anecdotal perspective, but I've seen it. And, ultimately, defense is a team proposition. Paul's defense has been just a tad bit better than Deron's...with better big men. If Paul was so much better than Deron, along with his defensive bigs being that much better, too....wouldn't that show up in the team stats? No one has answered that.
So now we're penalizing Chris Paul's defense because he plays with better defensive big men. Are you also willing to penalize Williams' offense for playing with better offensive big men? I didn't think so.
But that's a good point about the drawn charges. A drawn charge is probably almost as good as a steal (gives the opponent a foul, but doesn't lead to easy buckets). Does he draw more than two additional charges per game than Paul? Because then it'd be approaching the impact of Paul's steals.
Deron does have a few advantages. No one can deny he is bigger. He can guard some SGs and he is better in the post. Quite frankly though post play has become rare enough these days among big men, let alone point guards. It's not exactly a huge deal for a PG. And Paul does have some quickness advantage over Deron though he has lost about a 1/4 step since the knee injury. His hands are probably the quickest in the league though.
The thing with CP3 is that generally, he can't guard the Tyreke Evans-sized PGs of the world but they can't stay in front of him either, so they generally put smaller defenders on CP3. Deron is one of the very few body types that will match up really well. He has the maximum size and bulk a defender can have while having juust enough quickness and mobility to stay with CP3 off the dribble. It's like how Yao matches up really well with Dwight Howard because of that big size advantage, but most people agree who generally impacts games more in this league.
