Your Unpopular Basketball Opinions? [PC Board Edition]

[bondom34]

May not be too unpopular on this sub but I get a lot of flak for saying Kawhi Leonard is currently better than Carmelo Anthony, Paul George, and John Wall.


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I think most here would agree on all 3, at least I certainly would right now. I think the best argument may be for PG but right now I'd need to see him back at a really high level for a full year or 2 and even then really unlikely.

[mysticOscar]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

Definately. I critisised Lebron in 2014 finals (among friends), even tho his stats looked good on paper, for not taking it to the Spurs and seemed to be protecting his efficiency more than anything.

Last finals, if he didn't do what he did, it wouldnt even have gone to a game 6. This is where certain stats (if people want to focus and analyse it) needs to be done with context.

[mtron929]

With exception of few elite players (e.g. Lebron, Kobe) as well as random players with good attitudes (e.g. Battier), players do not really care about winning a championship as much as we think the do. It's nice for them, but I doubt that they even think about it too much in their daily lives. It's only the ultra competitive superstars like Kobe and Lebron that constantly think about winning and their legacies. For rest of the guys, it's more like a job.

[Gus Fring]

May not be too unpopular on this sub but I get a lot of flak for saying Kawhi Leonard is currently better than Carmelo Anthony, Paul George, and John Wall.


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I think most here would agree on all 3, at least I certainly would right now. I think the best argument may be for PG but right now I'd need to see him back at a really high level for a full year or 2 and even then really unlikely.

Completely agree. Honestly the only reason I said this was because the people on the reddit nba forum vehemently disagree with that statement, no matter what evidence or stats I put out. I just wanted to see what other people had to say.


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[Clyde Frazier]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

I was in that corner, too:

2) LeBron - To put it simply, I don't think any other player in the league could've taken that cavs team as it deteriorated to game 6 of the finals. The amt of energy exerted was off the charts. Firmly believe what became the "i have to do everything" game plan was the only way to keep the finals competitive, and he succeeded beyond what most people expected. He still had a very good reg season, just not by his standards. I do think he deserves some leeway as developing chemistry with a brand new team isn't easy. I also don't really fault him for the issues with love, as kyrie seemed to adapt to playing with him just fine.

viewtopic.php?p=44082341#p44082341

[Joao Saraiva]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

Really? People blamed LeBron after a loss? I'm surprised.

Not for the loss, for not playing "team ball". Which to Chuck (and I was and am with him as well as PaulieWal) was BS because his team was so decimated he didn't have much choice. It was the argument against Westbrook all year as well as well as others, which was why I was familiar with it.

I honestly thought he played team ball. I felt Varejao was involved as always, I thought West and Mo got their shots (Mo just couldn't get it to go for most times), big Z had his pick&pop shots... And honestly I didn't feel like Cleveland was having a ton of trouble on offense. I thought Lewis was a big mismatch, and Howard too. No one was able to contain Howard because of the lack of athleticism on Cleveland's centers. LeBron actually got Howard in foul trouble sometimes, and that's the best they could do. Whenever Cleveland went with Big Z, Varejao and Ben Wallace (2 of them) in the frontcourt, Lewis absolutely torched them because they didn't go out in the perimeter to contest his shots properly.

Lewis shot nearly 50% from 3 in those series (15-31) and was almost at 65 ts%. And while I think Mike Brown had no real options to contain Howard (yeah try to foul him and not letting him score) he could have done a much better gameplan to contain Lewis.

[bondom34]

Really? People blamed LeBron after a loss? I'm surprised.

Not for the loss, for not playing "team ball". Which to Chuck (and I was and am with him as well as PaulieWal) was BS because his team was so decimated he didn't have much choice. It was the argument against Westbrook all year as well as well as others, which was why I was familiar with it.

I honestly thought he played team ball. I felt Varejao was involved as always, I thought West and Mo got their shots (Mo just couldn't get it to go for most times), big Z had his pick&pop shots... And honestly I didn't feel like Cleveland was having a ton of trouble on offense. I thought Lewis was a big mismatch, and Howard too. No one was able to contain Howard because of the lack of athleticism on Cleveland's centers. LeBron actually got Howard in foul trouble sometimes, and that's the best they could do. Whenever Cleveland went with Big Z, Varejao and Ben Wallace (2 of them) in the frontcourt, Lewis absolutely torched them because they didn't go out in the perimeter to contest his shots properly.

Lewis shot nearly 50% from 3 in those series (15-31) and was almost at 65 ts%. And while I think Mike Brown had no real options to contain Howard (yeah try to foul him and not letting him score) he could have done a much better gameplan to contain Lewis.

Oops, was talking about last year's finals. When Kyrie went down and Lebron went nuts a bit, many didn't like it, there was a smaller group who felt it necessary myself included.

[Jim Naismith]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

I was in that corner, too:

2) LeBron - To put it simply, I don't think any other player in the league could've taken that cavs team as it deteriorated to game 6 of the finals. The amt of energy exerted was off the charts. Firmly believe what became the "i have to do everything" game plan was the only way to keep the finals competitive, and he succeeded beyond what most people expected. He still had a very good reg season, just not by his standards. I do think he deserves some leeway as developing chemistry with a brand new team isn't easy. I also don't really fault him for the issues with love, as kyrie seemed to adapt to playing with him just fine.

viewtopic.php?p=44082341#p44082341

Not for the loss, for not playing "team ball". Which to Chuck (and I was and am with him as well as PaulieWal) was BS because his team was so decimated he didn't have much choice. It was the argument against Westbrook all year as well as well as others, which was why I was familiar with it.

I honestly thought he played team ball. I felt Varejao was involved as always, I thought West and Mo got their shots (Mo just couldn't get it to go for most times), big Z had his pick&pop shots... And honestly I didn't feel like Cleveland was having a ton of trouble on offense. I thought Lewis was a big mismatch, and Howard too. No one was able to contain Howard because of the lack of athleticism on Cleveland's centers. LeBron actually got Howard in foul trouble sometimes, and that's the best they could do. Whenever Cleveland went with Big Z, Varejao and Ben Wallace (2 of them) in the frontcourt, Lewis absolutely torched them because they didn't go out in the perimeter to contest his shots properly.

Lewis shot nearly 50% from 3 in those series (15-31) and was almost at 65 ts%. And while I think Mike Brown had no real options to contain Howard (yeah try to foul him and not letting him score) he could have done a much better gameplan to contain Lewis.

Oops, was talking about last year's finals. When Kyrie went down and Lebron went nuts a bit, many didn't like it, there was a smaller group who felt it necessary myself included.

Confusing 2009 LeBron with 2015 LeBron is a very revealing mistake.

I agree that 2015 LeBron's inefficiency was very necessary. In fact, I think 2015 LeBron > 2015 Curry.

But I also think 2009 LeBron was not a top-3 peak of all time.

In fact, the gap between 2009 LeBron and 2015 LeBron is smaller than what most of his critics (and fans) would admit.

[bondom34]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

I was in that corner, too:

2) LeBron - To put it simply, I don't think any other player in the league could've taken that cavs team as it deteriorated to game 6 of the finals. The amt of energy exerted was off the charts. Firmly believe what became the "i have to do everything" game plan was the only way to keep the finals competitive, and he succeeded beyond what most people expected. He still had a very good reg season, just not by his standards. I do think he deserves some leeway as developing chemistry with a brand new team isn't easy. I also don't really fault him for the issues with love, as kyrie seemed to adapt to playing with him just fine.

viewtopic.php?p=44082341#p44082341

I honestly thought he played team ball. I felt Varejao was involved as always, I thought West and Mo got their shots (Mo just couldn't get it to go for most times), big Z had his pick&pop shots... And honestly I didn't feel like Cleveland was having a ton of trouble on offense. I thought Lewis was a big mismatch, and Howard too. No one was able to contain Howard because of the lack of athleticism on Cleveland's centers. LeBron actually got Howard in foul trouble sometimes, and that's the best they could do. Whenever Cleveland went with Big Z, Varejao and Ben Wallace (2 of them) in the frontcourt, Lewis absolutely torched them because they didn't go out in the perimeter to contest his shots properly.

Lewis shot nearly 50% from 3 in those series (15-31) and was almost at 65 ts%. And while I think Mike Brown had no real options to contain Howard (yeah try to foul him and not letting him score) he could have done a much better gameplan to contain Lewis.

Oops, was talking about last year's finals. When Kyrie went down and Lebron went nuts a bit, many didn't like it, there was a smaller group who felt it necessary myself included.

Confusing 2009 LeBron with 2015 LeBron is a very revealing mistake.

I agree that 2015 LeBron's inefficiency was very necessary. In fact, I think 2015 LeBron > 2015 Curry.

But I also think 2009 LeBron was not a top-3 peak of all time.

In fact, the gap between 2009 LeBron and 2015 LeBron is smaller than what most of his critics (and fans) would admit.

Wasn't really confused in that way, I thought Chuck's coment was on 2015, don't know if that's what you meant.

[Dr Positivity]

Athleticism is overrated. There is superstars who are average athletes and elite athletes who suck. It makes a difference but there are so many parts of talent

Athleticism
Length
Strength
Lateral footwork
Ball handling
Shooting
Passing
Post play
IQ
Motor

That it's one of many attributes. Lebron is an absurd athlete but his size, skill and IQ combined means a lot more IMO. Even Westbrook who is athleticism driven owes a lot of his penetration dominance to his ball handling excellence and size and his maniac motor helps a lot

That is why I'm interested in Wiggins as a test case because outside of athleticism he is otherwise unremarkable

[tone wone]

- People dont take team environment/scheme/responsibility into account as much as they should when comparing/evaluating players.

For example, I honestly believe Paul George v Kwahi offensively is real argument but im not sure that would get any real traction here. The argument is based on George's skillset and how much better i think he'd look in San Antonio. But I have no actual proof. So Kwahi's glowing 45-50gm TS% and godly +/- will win out easily. Im not that impressed with his offense.

[Dipper 13]

- Wilt Chamberlain is a top 10 player all time

- Hal Greer is a top 10 SG (very underrated)

- Pistons Rodman was better than Bulls Rodman

- Barkley is the GOAT interior scorer

- '67 Sixers are the best single season team

- '94 Rockets were clearly better than the '95 team, especially defensively

- In drafting big men who will be franchise cornerstones for 10+ years, Duncan is 2nd only to Russell. There are no distractions, no locker room problems, nor do they need a great amount of offensive touches to remain engaged defensively.

- Statistical data can be very misleading without proper context

- Aside from rebounds, it is silly to linearly compare individual players statistics across eras just using pace, especially while not taking into account usage or even minutes played.

[Narigo]

Young Wilt offensive impact is underrated. He anchored an above average offensive team in 1962. But it gets ignored here on RealGM.

With that being said 1962 Chamberlain can be argued as his peak. He carried that team on both ends of the court singlehandedly with little help.

[Joao Saraiva]

What's interesting to me about the Lebron conversation happening above is that in real-time I was about the only guy on the PC board defending Lebron. Most everyone else was killing him over his efficiency. I'm glad to see much of that has changed. And just deciding he shot poorly without looking at the context of that series where the offense was Lebron seems lacking to me. There wasn't a plan B. And the other team knew that. It's not as simple as Lebron shot bad. It's more like---Lebron had to score or the Cavs couldn't win and so the opposing coach, you know, game-planned for that.

I was in that corner, too:

2) LeBron - To put it simply, I don't think any other player in the league could've taken that cavs team as it deteriorated to game 6 of the finals. The amt of energy exerted was off the charts. Firmly believe what became the "i have to do everything" game plan was the only way to keep the finals competitive, and he succeeded beyond what most people expected. He still had a very good reg season, just not by his standards. I do think he deserves some leeway as developing chemistry with a brand new team isn't easy. I also don't really fault him for the issues with love, as kyrie seemed to adapt to playing with him just fine.

viewtopic.php?p=44082341#p44082341

I honestly thought he played team ball. I felt Varejao was involved as always, I thought West and Mo got their shots (Mo just couldn't get it to go for most times), big Z had his pick&pop shots... And honestly I didn't feel like Cleveland was having a ton of trouble on offense. I thought Lewis was a big mismatch, and Howard too. No one was able to contain Howard because of the lack of athleticism on Cleveland's centers. LeBron actually got Howard in foul trouble sometimes, and that's the best they could do. Whenever Cleveland went with Big Z, Varejao and Ben Wallace (2 of them) in the frontcourt, Lewis absolutely torched them because they didn't go out in the perimeter to contest his shots properly.

Lewis shot nearly 50% from 3 in those series (15-31) and was almost at 65 ts%. And while I think Mike Brown had no real options to contain Howard (yeah try to foul him and not letting him score) he could have done a much better gameplan to contain Lewis.

Oops, was talking about last year's finals. When Kyrie went down and Lebron went nuts a bit, many didn't like it, there was a smaller group who felt it necessary myself included.

Confusing 2009 LeBron with 2015 LeBron is a very revealing mistake.

I agree that 2015 LeBron's inefficiency was very necessary. In fact, I think 2015 LeBron > 2015 Curry.

But I also think 2009 LeBron was not a top-3 peak of all time.

In fact, the gap between 2009 LeBron and 2015 LeBron is smaller than what most of his critics (and fans) would admit.

There has been so much talk about the 09 LeBron that I thought it was about that.

Is it revealing? No. It just means that I'm used to read absurd stuff about LeBron from some posters. People saying he isn't a team player? Why not? It's not like it is even top 10 insanity when talking about LeBron.

[Quotatious]

- Wilt Chamberlain is a top 10 player all time

I know you were trying to be humorous with that, but on a serious note, I think it's far more unpopular to rank Wilt outside of the top 10.

- Hal Greer is a top 10 SG (very underrated)

I can see that. Personally I have him as a fringe top 10 SG (along with Sam Jones). He would probably make it, for me.

[sp6r=underrated]

- '94 Rockets were clearly better than the '95 team, especially defensively

You are a wise man

[MyUniBroDavis]

- Wilt Chamberlain is a top 10 player all time

- Hal Greer is a top 10 SG (very underrated)

- Pistons Rodman was better than Bulls Rodman

- Barkley is the GOAT interior scorer

- '67 Sixers are the best single season team

- '94 Rockets were clearly better than the '95 team, especially defensively

- In drafting big men who will be franchise cornerstones for 10+ years, Duncan is 2nd only to Russell. There are no distractions, no locker room problems, nor do they need a great amount of offensive touches to remain engaged defensively.

- Statistical data can be very misleading without proper context

- Aside from rebounds, it is silly to linearly compare individual players statistics across eras just using pace, especially while not taking into account usage or even minutes played.

I find you to be the best or 2nd best poster at giving knowledge away
cant say I agree with all of them, but the one on Tim Duncan made me give you an and one. I might even go furthur than that, because I feel that Duncan has kind of "entrusted to the next generation of spurs players"


tbh, I think I've seen you in insidehoops. no offense, but I like you here more for sure. same goes for Cavsftw. I feel that serious knowledge and discussion, posting wise, is non existent there.
also partially because I cant make an account.

[MyUniBroDavis]

realgm unpopular opinions
- davis was better than griffin in the playoffs, ignoring sample size
- Kobe is comparable to Lebron, and arguements for both sides can be made
- bpm and rapm have some flaws

well, since I guess unpopular opinion relates to area, I will post my "unpopular" opinion based on what my family and friends near me say

- shaq is better than gasol
- larry and magic arent top 4 all time
- Lebron is top 15 all time (I have him at around 9-6, it flunctuates)
- lebron is objectively better (actually, the word im looking for is comparable than kobe, since most of my family doesent have lebron in the same stratosphere) (and I like kobe much more, and in my biased opinion, I believe that Kobe is better at bringing a team past the hurdle, if that makes sense, and yes, I am baised, and I know stats disagree with me, and I know I am probably
wrong, but hey, I met one and didnt meet the other).
- peak shaq is better than kareem
- peak shaq is better than kobe
- peak duncan is better than kobe
- duncan is top 10 (imo, he his number 6-7, but most people tell me he is in top 15)
- Davis is the best young player/offensive big in the nba, ignoring injury(dont get me started with what they said.)
- Duncan has pretty much outlasted parker and ginobli, based on last year, in terms of production
- stats > eyetest, to a certain extent
- the nba is lazy at measuring statistics (play type stats should be much more advanced)
- Davis is Duncan with Swagger
- Nba players dont actually realize what they are doing half the time, and most of their game is based on instict (For example, Curry said that the best way to shoot is to have 10 toes to the rim and start the ball on teh fingertips the whole time. he does neither of this).
- player rivalries with real hatred are borderline stupid
- there should be a few controversial coaches
http://www.101greatgoals.com/blog/jose-mourinho-trolls-arsenal-wenger-told-boring-chant-video/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJS_RceEgk8
http://www.espnfcasia.com/story/1467224/i-am-a-special-one-jose-mourinhos-memorable-chelsea-quotes
- a good coach will make his team 120% of what they were before. a bad coach will make a team 25% of what they are with a mediocre coach.
- the coaching staff is just as important as the actual caoch (more excited for erman than gentry tbh)
- Lebron should pursue a career in acting when he retires (and no, im not making a flopping joke, but from the clips I saw on trainwreck, yes, he was hilarious).

[GSP]

- Pistons Rodman was better than Bulls Rodman

- Barkley is the GOAT interior scorer

- Statistical data can be very misleading without proper context

- Aside from rebounds, it is silly to linearly compare individual players statistics across eras just using pace, especially while not taking into account usage or even minutes played.

I dont think any of these are unpopular in the Pc board. Well maybe some might see Shaq or Kareem for Goat interior scorer

[GSP]

Manu was the best player on the alltime great 2014 Spurs. If u look at the numbers he was by far their offensive anchor and their offense was what was really special on that team, without Manu out there competing they were very, very beatable even with like Tony/Green/Kawhi/Splitter/Timmy or whatever lineup. It matches the eyetest too, you could see how many more open shots and how the ball was moving when he was on the court. He was clearly the best player against Dallas and Okc, and arguably against Miami as well (Fmvp)

Offense: Pts per 100 Poss.

Manu-
On: 115.8
Off: 108.6
+7.3

Kawhi
110.6
112.3
-1.7

Timmy
110.6
112.5
-2.0

Tony
110.7
112.3
-1.6

Green
109.5
112.9
-3.4

Patty, Bellineli and Diaw are the only other players who didnt see the offense get better when they werent on the court. And it was a much, much smaller margin than Manu. Belly was very bad on defense as well and Pattys role was much more refined