Re: Better peak: Kevin Garnett vs Nikola Jokic
Posted: Fri Sep 8, 2023 3:15 pm
ShotCreator wrote:JimmyFromNz wrote:ShotCreator wrote:Garnett is better. The talent is too high.
Jokic' playmaking(not pure passing, but playmaking angles created), isn't the tier needed to just brute force past Garnett's level overall.
Garnett scales as high as Gobert defensively, and as a high as a Donovan Mitchell offensively. Just pure talent-wise. How he was used(No lob passers played with, no 3pointers taken), is not confusing me as to the actual ceiling of play. And the raw ceiling was enough to be considered better. But when maximized, and next to real talent? There's no team I'd ever feel Jokic could improve more than Garnett.
Yeah little unsure what you mean. Particularly the tiered approach to skill levels. Where Jokic is pretty comfortably the best big man playmaker of all time already, this seems like a pretty good 'tier' to me, acknowledging that is not just what he is.
He's as good of a rebounder (TRB% is higher), and on a different level as a scorer to KG. The defensive gap is clear, there's no argument there.
So I guess my question would be the invert of yours. What is it about Garnett's defensive tier that just 'brute forces' past Jokic overall peak? Personally I dont think a debate around having the more balanced skillset (which he does) ' to Jokic is that determinative or convincing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems the main point is based around Garnett's scalability onto other teams. I wouldn't disagree, but I'm not sure that answers the original question.Spoiler:
And Jokic is close to me, but this is where the playmaking comes in. He isn't Curry or Magic good on offense. The types of passes his scoring game opens up just isn't sieveish or explosive enough. Honestly, this is gonna sound crazy to some, but the actual style of his scoring game doesn't seem to put more pressure on a defense than just a regular prime Chris Paul season. Purely speaking in terms of the angles he attacks from and what a defense can do to try and slow that down, scheme-wise. Like purely scoring pressure wise, Damian Lillard strains a defense more when he has a live dribble, 30 feet away and there's a screen coming for him. But Jokic's passing is just better than Paul's so it overcomes that gap.
And, he is probably the most portable offensive double-double threat ever ever ever because he has game that has no ball domination to it unlike Chris Paul's. It's a lot of touching the ball, poking it, skipping it quickly, not even always to score.
I really feel Jokic's pure playmaking pressure on defense is in the LeBron or Luka range, not quite Nash or Magic where it's seemingly infinite passing angles being created all the time. And you know what, that's really who I should've mentioned instead of Paul. Nash's hesitations, and direction changes rapid fire all over the court scare a defense into opening passing lanes more, than Jokic's passive touching and dominant post-up actions. But Jokic is more physically dominant than almost all the names I mentioned ITT so his resilience is very good offensively and really scoring wise.Spoiler:
4:00 of this recent video is exactly why I said most of this and especially the bold:
;t=240s&ab_channel=ThinkingBasketball
Jokic's real offensive ability when it comes down to it, down to it being against playoff defenses, is closer to Paul or Luka than Nash or Magic to me. And I'm not taking any of those guys over KG.
He's a floor spacer out past the 3P line but he's not usually a dynamic threat everywhere at all times like Curry or Nash. But again, come playoff time, he has much more counters to his scoring game than them due to his body and physicality. So it's not completely one way or another. But the difference in ceiling is there.