What is the argument against Chris Paul in the top 20?

[No-more-rings]

B) Injury timing is the main thing holding him back from pushing top 10.

Or you know he's just simply worse than Bird or Magic was(guys in lower end of top 10 or borderline), or KG whoever it is you have in there.

[No-more-rings]

I don't think there's any reasonable argument that he's top 20 unless you just ignore that he hampered his teams playoff chances with injuries several times throughout his career.

09
12
14
15
17
18

These are all years where he either missed playoff games, or had some major lingering injury where it effected his play. That's like over half his prime.

I feel like if this was any other player people would be docking him big time. And that doesn't even include the plethora of regular season games missed.

I guess if we completely throw durability out the window, yeah i suppose he has a case.

[Amares]

He has no really case not to be in top 20, the only that are constantly repeated are "because he never made finals", "because longevity"... but both are not so relevant or true, especially first which is just example of lazy way to compare players

[Colbinii]

I really hope this isn't talking about Oscar because if it is this post is bordering on being a flat out lie.

How is it a lie?

Oscar Robertson made the playoffs 10 times not 6 and he won 8 series not 2, plus he played in an era where there were only 3 series to be played max (not 4).

He said at the same age before an MVP player joined the team.

If you wanna talk same age CP3 is 34, and Oscar already got a ring by 34.

CP3 faced the Warriors in 2018 or would very likely have a ring of his own.

It's not Oscar's fault that when he played with a league MVP (who wasn't an MVP prior to Oscar, so that's already a misframing of events) like Paul did he was actually able to win and be a good enough teammate to not be shipped away for an undeniably worse player.

1) Kareem was clearly MVP level in just his rookie season and was MVP level in 1971. Saying Kareem was an MVP rather than MVP level isn't correct but not something we should be penalizing LA Bird for. He mispoke but his point stands [Unless you don't think Kareem was an MVP level player].

2) Harden didn't win MVP until Paul joined either.

3) Again, Oscar never faced a team remotely close to the Warriors in talent level or level of play.

Milwaukee faced an injury riddled Lakers Team and then an all-time bad finals team [42-40, .91 SRS] while they cruised to the Finals.

As more time passes I get lower and lower on CP3. He's the biggest example of how off the court chemistry can effect the team because the Clippers and Rockets should've been much better.

How should the Clippers have been much better?

They had a 3-year run where they were above 6-SRS and 2 more seasons of above 4 SRS. The 4 SRS years included a season where both Griffin and Paul each missed 21 games and another season where Griffin missed 48 games.

The talent on that roster was NOT great, it was good. It was significantly worse than say the 08-10 Lakers, lacked the top end 2/3 punch of the Heatles, lacked the depth of the 2010s Spurs and didn't have the near flawless roster balance of the 2010s Warriors [even pre-Durant].

Those Clippers teams were great because of Paul.

The Rockets literally went something like 44-4 with both Paul and Harden. How much better do you want out of these guys?

[Colbinii]

B) Injury timing is the main thing holding him back from pushing top 10.

Or you know he's just simply worse than Bird or Magic was(guys in lower end of top 10 or borderline), or KG whoever it is you have in there.

What makes him worse?

[No-more-rings]

B) Injury timing is the main thing holding him back from pushing top 10.

Or you know he's just simply worse than Bird or Magic was(guys in lower end of top 10 or borderline), or KG whoever it is you have in there.

What makes him worse?

What makes him as good as them besides box scores?

Both of these guys led dynasties with multiple dominant championship performances along the way. If Paul was ever capable of that he surely didn't prove it.

It shouldn't be an insult to say Cp3 isn't as good as those guys, almost no one is accept for legendary 2-way wings like James & Jordan or dominant bigs(Kareem, Wilt, Shaq etc), i mean can you with a straight face really say that Cp3 was on the level of those guys?

[Colbinii]

Or you know he's just simply worse than Bird or Magic was(guys in lower end of top 10 or borderline), or KG whoever it is you have in there.

What makes him worse?

What makes him as good as them besides box scores?

Both of these guys led dynasties with multiple dominant championship performances along the way. If Paul was ever capable of that he surely didn't prove it.

It shouldn't be an insult to say Cp3 isn't as good as those guys, almost no one is accept for legendary 2-way wings like James & Jordan or dominant bigs(Kareem, Wilt, Shaq etc), i mean can you with a straight face really say that Cp3 was on the level of those guys?

You never explained how CP3 is worse.

The crux of your argument is team results. Yes, team results should weigh in on a player's evaluation but you are stating that team results is the only measure you are using.

As you mentioned, his box-score is as good, if not better than some top 10-15 players ever. His impact data we have access to also says he was wildly, all-time great in terms of impact.

B-But CP3 had Blake Griffin instead of Kareem Abdul-Jabaar so let's penalize Paul.

[70sFan]

For me, it's health (if anything - I suspect that I'd still scrape him into my top 20). His healthy prime level of play was absurd, but the health is a real issue. Of course, it also begs the question of whether we look at other players in the same vein health wise - do we punish guys like Curry for his playoff injuries in 2016 and 2018, when his team was actually capable of winning series without him? CP3's injury history is pretty bad, but arguably looks worse than it is because his injuries basically ensured the collapse of his teams, which doesn't happen to all cases of injury in NBA history.

I'm not sure if I have him in top 20 or not, but my concerns are:

- lack of durability and that's huge especially in postseason,
- great defensive player but his defense isn't good enough alone to anchor your team,
- his conservative style sometimes can limit offensive celling, although I'm not sure I'd agree here,
- his longevity is very good, but not elite ans he's already past his prime.

Just going to highlight these two points.

The offensive ceiling point is one I simply don't buy. If we look at prime CP3's team's ORTGs when he's on the court, he is elite in this manner - best in the league levels.

2008: 8th in the league behind Radmanovic, Nash, Vujacic, Stoudemire, Kirilenko, Stojakovic (on his own team), Boozer. Aside from Nash, who of those players is anywhere near Paul offensively?
2012: 6th in the league behind Bonner, Harden, Nick Collison, Splitter and Butler (on his own team). Aside from Harden (who, even in 2012, was amazing offensively), none of those guys are even remotely close to him offensively.
2013: equal 1st with LeBron, with the top 6 all being from Miami or LAC.
2014: equal 4th behind Brandan Wright, Matt Barnes (on his own team) and Ginobili.
2015: 2nd to Blake (Who missed 15 games that year, whereas CP3 somehow played 82 games )
2016: 14th (behind a bunch of GSW, LAC, OKC guys, and don't forget, Blake missed heaps of this season)
2017: 4th (behind Curry, Durant and Pachulia)
2018: 2nd to Curry

That's an incredible run of offences. In particular, his Clipper years had him as the #1 ranked high volume guy from 2012-2014, and essentially equal 1st with Blake in 2015 (don't forget, collinearity and that). His 2017 and 2018 years were only beaten by the GSW juggernaut, and in 2016, he ran the 4th best offence in the league with him on the court with his top 10 lineup guys as Jordan, Redick, *big drop*, Mbah a Moute, Crawford, Blake (only 861 minutes for Blake), Pierce, Wesley Johnson, Jeff Green, Austin Rivers and Lance Stephenson.

To add to this, even looking at 2012-2017, the league average for ORTG was 106.3, and CP3 still had an ORTG of 113.5 without Blake (who had 109.3 without CP3), and 116.8 with him. In the regular season, CP3 has led a plethora of top end lineups.

His offensive on-off during the regular season in these years was:

2008: +15.2
2009: +16.0
2010: +3.7 (he was hobbled all year)
2011: +11.2
2012: +14.0
2013: +12.2
2014: +4.9 (low, but he was also the #1 ranked high-volume offensive player by ORTG that year anyway)
2015: +19.5
2016: +14.0
2017: +11.4
2018: +8.1, even though most of his "off" minutes had Harden on the court

In the 3 year RAPM samples that we have available that cover his prime (2012-15, 2013-16, 2014-17, 2015-18), he ranks 3rd, 3rd, 4th and 5th, in a clear top 5 with Curry/LeBron (clear top 2), Harden and Westbrook.

Even in the playoffs, he had a heap of series (the playoff series in 2008, 2013-2015) that have him with elite ORTGs in the playoffs. Playoff ORTGs etc are way harder because it's not a balanced playing field, but there's a sample that does show that CP3 is capable of very high level team offence in the playoffs.

If you want a brief playoff summary of say, CP3's LAC career in the playoffs (sans 2012, where he sucked), he drops from a 116.5 to 112.3 ORTG with CP3 on the court. That's a drop of 4.2 points. Of course... he also faced an average defence of -3.2, which would mean that his relative on court ORTG drops by a... gargantuan 1 point. The guy that arguably led the best offences in the league during this period (and in the regular season, his on-court ORTG ranks #1 in this time period) has a gargantuan 1 point drop on team ORTG.

There's very little to suggest that his play caps his team's performance at an unusually low ORTG. I mean, it's right in the ballpark of what the other top end guys are doing. Not calculating all the numbers for everybody because it's a lot of work, but the fact that CP3 ends up being a +9 guy (according to BBR) or +9.9 guy (according to NBA.com) in the postseason on offence is pretty excellent in my books.

As for the longevity argument...

Without going into too much depth/arguing how he ranks in different years, he actually ranks fairly highly on the all time leaderboard (I'm talking top 10ish all time) for "most seasons in the top 5/10 in WS/BPM"). 8th all time in seasons with at least 10 win shares, etc. There's nothing too scientific here, but there are a bunch of markers that do place him as a top 15ish guy in terms of "highly valuable seasons produced". Ranks 17th all time in total WS (and that number will likely increase a few spots as the season goes on, and will likely get higher in years future). Ranked 2nd in xRAPM in 2009 (without the 2007 prior weighing him down anymore) and still ranked 1st in RPM in 2018.

Lots of things point to CP3's longevity actually being excellent and actually kind of underrated on this front.

Very good post, I just want to add that I agree that my 3rd point isn't strong (just that some argue this way against him) and I don't think that his longevity is bad at all, but that combined with his durability it's not on ATG level.

I also forgot to mention off-court things which sometimes gets underrated in these debates. I don't think that Paul is bad teammate (he plays really well this year) but he's not among my favorites as a leader.

[No-more-rings]

You never explained how CP3 is worse.

I've explained it several times on this board and i know you've seen it, and you were directly involved in a lot of them. You aren't going to agree, so me reiterating isn't gonna get anywhere.

The crux of your argument is team results. Yes, team results should weigh in on a player's evaluation but you are stating that team results is the only measure you are using.

No it's called were comparing careers, and I'm not going to just grant championships to Cp3. Maybe he could've with better casts, but I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt when others guys have done it.

As you mentioned, his box-score is as good, if not better than some top 10-15 players ever. His impact data we have access to also says he was wildly, all-time great in terms of impact.

We don't have it for Bird and Magic, that's why it's hard to compare them.

B-But CP3 had Blake Griffin instead of Kareem Abdul-Jabaar so let's penalize Paul.

Magic won 2-3 championships when Kareem was a worse player than Griffin. So you may not want to resort to sarcasm on that retort.

[eminence]

B) Injury timing is the main thing holding him back from pushing top 10.

Or you know he's just simply worse than Bird or Magic was(guys in lower end of top 10 or borderline), or KG whoever it is you have in there.

Sure, you could think that, I do not. My guys in that 10-14 group are Oscar/Magic/Bird/Dirk/Kobe and I don't think he's really a large step down from any of them as prime players and I'd probably put him over 1-2 of them.

I have KG much higher than that (#4).

[GhosDini]

This anaytics culture aroubd here is very strange. Its like you guys arent even talking about an actual game with actual results. Instead its all about numbers, theories, and formulas like the gane is a computer program or something. For all of the analytic metrics one can tout regarding Chris Paul none them have ever even come close to translating to on court success and achievement. And guess what...none of you even care lol.

There really are two different sets of nba fans and culture. You got those that focus on tangible results while takimg into account a players stats and you have those that focus on numbers, theories, and formulas while completely disregarding the results. I dont get it.

[limbo]

There really are two different sets of nba fans and culture. You got those that focus on tangible results while takimg into account a players stats and you have those that focus on numbers, theories, and formulas while completely disregarding the results. I dont get it.

The only different set of nba fans are those who are incapable of parsing individual impact in a team context and thus look to simplify a complex game into simple and binary as possible answers for the sake of their own comprehension.

What is there to get?

Chauncey Billups isn't a better player than CP3 because you saw the '04 Pistons win a title while CP3 hasn't even been to a Finals in his career. Only a complete idiot would think that. Thankfully, we live in an era where idiots have access to numerous data points and metrics that serve to illustrate just that. How someone can have a larger role, bigger production, more responsibility, greater impact and that STILL may not be enough to win a title, because basketball isn't an individual sport played 1v1, but actually 10 people + the coach affect the game at all times.

[Colbinii]

I've explained it several times on this board and i know you've seen it, and you were directly involved in a lot of them. You aren't going to agree, so me reiterating isn't gonna get anywhere.

I don't remember every interaction I have had on this board nor do I remember the data people have shared verbatim.

Could you link/find it?

Does it refute what Bad Gatorade has stated numerous times throughout the years?

No it's called were comparing careers, and I'm not going to just grant championships to Cp3. Maybe he could've with better casts, but I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt when others guys have done it.

I'm all for comparing careers but I weigh what a player did on then court and how he helps a team with winning far more than team achievements.

For me, CP3 was basically a top 5 player for 11 years straight. Bird can't say that and most others Point Guards sans Magic/Oscar can claim that as well.

We don't have it for Bird and Magic, that's why it's hard to compare them.

This is irrelevant.

If we conclude that Bird and Magic were the top 2 or 3 players of the 80s and then we can look at current impact data and say "Hey, looks like Paul was top 2 with LeBron for this era" then that alone should be a strong case that Chris Paul is comparable.

Again, comparing cross eras is hard. Looking at CP3 and the current data we have and how he compares to LeBron should vault Paul up a ton in the eyes of people who are savvy with impact data.

It isn't about a direct comparison between Paul and Bird/Magic, rather a "Hey Look, this CP3 guy is right on LeBrons tail and if LeBron is as good or better than Magic/Bird than CP3 should be right on their tails as well".

B-But CP3 had Blake Griffin instead of Kareem Abdul-Jabaar so let's penalize Paul.

Magic won 2-3 championships when Kareem was a worse player than Griffin. So you may not want to resort to sarcasm on that retort.

Yup and this is when the Lakers had a DPOY coming off the bench [Cooper] and a loaded roster in their primes [Worthy, Green, Scott] while they played 2 teams with Negative SRS in the Western Conference playoffs before meeting a depleted Celtics team [Went 7 games against the Bucks in R2 and Pistons in R3].

1988 they played stiffer competition, going 7 games against a decent Jazz team and then 7 games against an exciting Mavericks team Aguirre, Tarpley and Harper [Think of this team like the Paul George Pacers where they gave the Heatles problems]. The Finals victory was impressive against a strong Detroit Pistons team.

[Colbinii]

You got those that focus on tangible results while takimg into account a players stats and you have those that focus on numbers, theories, and formulas while completely disregarding the results. I dont get it.

Most of the best posters here focus on tangible results with regards to what a player actually does ON the court and how a player affects his teammates and the game.

Sometimes a player can do just as much as another player, if not more, but still lose due to the thousands of variables at play within a basketball game. Some of us are able to parse through the end results [as it often isn't because of one player...in fact winning is never the result of one player] and try to attribute success/value/worth to a player based on what the player did, regardless of how his team does.

Take the 2013 NBA Finals for example. Seven years later and we all remember LeBron winning the NBA Finals MVP and his stellar game 6 and 7. But if Ray Allen doesn't make that shot then LeBron and the Heat lose that Finals, LeBron is not seen in the same light as he is now either. Is Lebron James all of a sudden a better player because Ray Allen makes the shot?

Hypothetically Kyrie doesn't get hurt in 2015 and let's say the Cavaliers win in 2015 in 6 games but lose in 2016. The Cavaliers then beat the Warriors in 2017 as Durant doesn't join them. James now has an extra Championship. Is LeBron James all of a sudden a better player because of this?

Kobe Bryant ends up makes more of his shots in game 7 of the 2010 NBA Finals. However, Pau Gasol gets injured in the first quarter and the Lakers lose a game handedly to the Celtics. Is Kevin Garnett all of a sudden a better player with 2 rings? Is Kobe a worse player by going 1/3 without Shaq?

[E-Balla]

He said at the same age before an MVP player joined the team.

Well this ignores the elephant in the room Blake Griffin, who was 3rd place in MVP voting without CP3 limiting him. Oscar on the other hand had nothing to work with. I'm not one for comparing players with totally different levels of supporting casts and **** on one for having bad teammates.

CP3 faced the Warriors in 2018 or would very likely have a ring of his own.

CP3 got hurt in the playoffs (again) in 2018 or would very likely have a ring of his own.

1) Kareem was clearly MVP level in just his rookie season and was MVP level in 1971. Saying Kareem was an MVP rather than MVP level isn't correct but not something we should be penalizing LA Bird for. He mispoke but his point stands [Unless you don't think Kareem was an MVP level player].

2) Harden didn't win MVP until Paul joined either.

3) Again, Oscar never faced a team remotely close to the Warriors in talent level or level of play.

Milwaukee faced an injury riddled Lakers Team and then an all-time bad finals team [42-40, .91 SRS] while they cruised to the Finals.

Wait so the:
63 Celtics
64 Celtics
66 Celtics
67 Sixers
72 Lakers
74 Celtics

Were mince meat, or we only making excuses for CP3 when he loses to NBA champions and 65+ win teams? Like come on how can we say a guy that played 2 teams seen as consensus top 10 all time never played a team remotely close to the Warriors in talent level or level of play?

How should the Clippers have been much better?

They had a 3-year run where they were above 6-SRS and 2 more seasons of above 4 SRS. The 4 SRS years included a season where both Griffin and Paul each missed 21 games and another season where Griffin missed 48 games.

The Clippers were a +5.8 team from 2012-2015 when Chris Paul didn't play over a 40 game sample. They should've been better with CP3 there but he butted heads with Blake and damn near all his teammates (Big Baby saying Rondo is the best PG he's ever played with made more sense after he wore Harden down in 1 season).

Being +6 in that context is much less impressive. There's no reason that if CP3 was actually top 20 level (of course in totality, because on the floor he is, but if he makes his teammates worse than doesn't matter as much) they wouldn't have been a +9ish team since they were +6 without him.

The talent on that roster was NOT great, it was good. It was significantly worse than say the 08-10 Lakers, lacked the top end 2/3 punch of the Heatles, lacked the depth of the 2010s Spurs and didn't have the near flawless roster balance of the 2010s Warriors [even pre-Durant].

Those Clippers teams were great because of Paul.

And they consistently still played at a +6 level without him for what reason again?

You're seriously telling me you think they had less talent than the 08-10 Lakers? Or that Blake wasn't better than Wade each year past 2012?

Blake is on another level from Pau pretty easily (Blake averaged 28/8/4 on 61 TS% with a 122 ORTG without CP3 and 21/10/3 on 56 TS% with a 111 ORTG with CP3 in 2014), Deandre is way better than Bynum just for the fact that he was healthy and able to play (Bynum played 0 mpg in the 08 playoffs, 17 in 09, and 24 in 10), and JJ/Barnes/Bledsoe/Crawford/Butler/Collison/Big Baby is better than Odom/Fisher/Girl Name/Farmar/Walton/Ariza/Artest/Vlad. Those Lakers aren't a +6 team without Kobe.

The Rockets literally went something like 44-4 with both Paul and Harden. How much better do you want out of these guys?

How about staying healthy in the playoffs?

[Ambrose]

When the going got tough CP3 got injured. That and the teams he led as an alpha dog never won anything (though these points are related).

[TurinTurambar]

I think the recent trend of trashing a player's teammates in order to boost his reputation is fundamentally boorish, and basically adds nothing of value to whatever conversation is taking place.

[Owly]

The Clippers were a +5.8 team from 2012-2015 when Chris Paul didn't play over a 40 game sample. They should've been better with CP3 there but he butted heads with Blake and damn near all his teammates (Big Baby saying Rondo is the best PG he's ever played with made more sense after he wore Harden down in 1 season).

Have you got a source for that number? Is it points dif per game, SRS, points dif per 100 possessions?

Not saying it's wrong just curious (and quite a way off what his on-off numbers paint - even acknowledging '13 and '14 were down years for him in this regard).

[An Unbiased Fan]

The argument is that there were 20 players better than him. Who is CP3 going to replace in the Top 20??? Dirk? KD? KG? DRob? Mailman? Dr. J? I can keep going

[eminence]

Except they didn't 'consistently play at a +6 level'. 23-17, +3.2 MOV, vs avg -0.4 SRS. They played at about a +3 level.