2024-25 NBA Season Discussion

[Texas Chuck]

Yeah Steph basically played for one coach in one system with 2 main teammates while lebron played in tons of situations and dominated them all. It’s like Steph’s theoretical portability somehow is better than lebrons actual real world portability, where he might be the most versatile player ever.

You see this with Dirk and KG too. KG gets all this theoretical credit for winning on any team, except he only won with peak Sam Cassell and with those loaded Boston teams. Dirk won with offense only teams, defense focused teams, and finally a somewhat balanced team. Dirk played on 4 very different teams in his prime and yet won every single year.

But Dirk never changed teams and is "only a scorer" so nobody talks about his actual proven portability, but KG who also played with a variety of teams only far less successfully is frequently hyped as most portable ever.

Make it make sense.

[Doctor MJ]

Duncan 6th and garnett 5th while mainly talking about all of garnett advantages

This was his and drza's podcast on the two. Would make passing comments about how close they were but then in every area he just kept giving every edge to KG. I had high hopes for that(knowing going in both guys would side with KG) but it was just a KG lovefest while nitpicking Timmy. None of us can avoid just loving who we love.

Something I will say is that there's hope that they'll be able to focus on positives by counting 25 to 1 rather than 1 to 25, but the conservation will go where it goes.

[CKRT]

Main thing not in his DNA would be slacking when he doesn't have the ball in his hands.

Was manu nearly the highest minute, highest usage player in the nba for like a decade straight? Seems like with his boundless energy he could have at least put up the minutes, if not the usage.

I do agree that Harden's durability and workload gets badly underrated/undervalued here. As a regular season innings eater who ran high level offenses year after year, he's a machine. His repeated inability to come through when defenses fully game-planned against him in the playoffs though probably doesn't get talked about enough.

Shame those boys couldn't make it work in Brooklyn. Harden carries the RS for KD/Kyrie and then let them shine come playoff time.

But not sure we have another player with a bigger gap between RS and playoffs as Harden. One can put him in any discussion for GOAT RS offensive player. But when defenses are geared up for that, there was no counter from him.

Agreed, once defenses really game planned for him he crashed down to just above the peak Kobe tier. Can't win with a guy like that.

[70sFan]

Duncan 6th and garnett 5th while mainly talking about all of garnett advantages

This was his and drza's podcast on the two. Would make passing comments about how close they were but then in every area he just kept giving every edge to KG. I had high hopes for that(knowing going in both guys would side with KG) but it was just a KG lovefest while nitpicking Timmy. None of us can avoid just loving who we love.

I truly want Duncan podcast to be separate from KG podcast, but I am afraid there are very low chances it won't happen. To be honest, I'd prefer to hear Duncan vs Shaq comparison personally, it's both more natural and less exploited.

[f4p]

Main thing not in his DNA would be slacking when he doesn't have the ball in his hands.

Was manu nearly the highest minute, highest usage player in the nba for like a decade straight? Seems like with his boundless energy he could have at least put up the minutes, if not the usage.

I do agree that Harden's durability and workload gets badly underrated/undervalued here. As a regular season innings eater who ran high level offenses year after year, he's a machine. His repeated inability to come through when defenses fully game-planned against him in the playoffs though probably doesn't get talked about enough.

I mean it's literally the only thing people talk about. That would be like saying shaqs physical strength doesn't get mentioned enough.

Shame those boys couldn't make it work in Brooklyn. Harden carries the RS for KD/Kyrie and then let them shine come playoff time.

.yes, epic playoff performer kyrie. What exactly has he done without being a distant second option?

But not sure we have another player with a bigger gap between RS and playoffs as Harden.

Lol, sure we have. I mean Karl malone is far and away the worst full career dropper. And if you take embiids numbers at face value (ignore injuries etc), he's as far from malone as malone is from everyone else.

Then there's Giannis with the same statistical drop-off and worse disappointments. Drob basically as bad, especially before Duncan. Nash is just as bad and no title.

Steph has essentially identical peak/prime regular season and playoff stats so obviously the drop is basically the same (his team just survives it). And as mentioned, kind of hard to explain 2018 and 2019 if steph isn't falling and harden is.

And of course that's box score measures. If you don't like those, then I'm afraid harden is a straight up playoff riser. On off goes up. RAPM goes up. Team net rtg goes up. Guys like dirk and Nash drop in on off. Hardens never lost as a significant favorite like steph, dirk, Giannis, Duncan, etc.

One can put him in any discussion for GOAT RS offensive player. But when defenses are geared up for that, there was no counter from him.

It's funny how basically peak lebron just gets ass blasted by the KD steph warriors but harden plays them to a draw with one hand tied behind his back and he's easy to solve and gets no credit.

[falcolombardi]

Duncan 6th and garnett 5th while mainly talking about all of garnett advantages

This was his and drza's podcast on the two. Would make passing comments about how close they were but then in every area he just kept giving every edge to KG. I had high hopes for that(knowing going in both guys would side with KG) but it was just a KG lovefest while nitpicking Timmy. None of us can avoid just loving who we love.

Is more of a funny thingh now than a serious criticism but back in 2018 when ben made his players profiles rankings the way he wrote about duncan and garnett was full of small digs at duncan in either player page lol (or wilt and russel)

Like he would be talking about duncan in thw duncan player profile article and show a play where he cannot stop a layup "sometimes he was not quite fast enough to block the faster attacks*" (*here is a video of garnett actually blocking such a shot)

Or he woukd do these boxscore diamond shaped graphics for players and show both reg and post season ones to compare them, but then with garnett article there is only the regular season one and he instead mentions briefly he had a drop off in post season production

[70sFan]

Duncan 6th and garnett 5th while mainly talking about all of garnett advantages

This was his and drza's podcast on the two. Would make passing comments about how close they were but then in every area he just kept giving every edge to KG. I had high hopes for that(knowing going in both guys would side with KG) but it was just a KG lovefest while nitpicking Timmy. None of us can avoid just loving who we love.

Is more of a funny thingh now than a serious criticism but back in 2018 when ben made his players profiles rankings the way he wrote about duncan and garnett was full of small digs at duncan in either player page lol (or wilt and russel)

Like he would be talking about duncan in thw duncan player profile article and show a play where he cannot stop a layup "sometimes he was not quite fast enough to block the faster attacks*" (*here is a video of garnett actually blocking such a shot)

Or he woukd do these boxscore diamond shaped graphics for players and show both reg and post season ones to compare them, but then with garnett article there is only the regular season one and he instead mentions briefly he had a drop off in post season production

To be fair to Ben, his top 40 podcast and the greatest peaks series were both excellent on Duncan (and Wilt). It's so much better to just hear about the player than to listen how he is worse than his rival.

[f4p]

KD deserves blame for that 2018 series being as close as it was, IMO. Warriors ended up iso-balling and playing into the Rockets' hand and of course Rockets' defense mucking things up helped as well.

My teammate was scoring 31 ppg on 60 TS% doesn’t seem like a good excuse for Steph through the first 5 games when Steph was at 24 ppg on 56 TS%, a decline of 11.5% from the regular season. The fact Chris Paul so consistently shut down Steph in the playoffs and Steph got better right when Paul got hurt makes the “peaked way above “ harden argument tough.

Also, 2019 is arguably crazier. Chris Paul looking completely washed, the rockets with no bench and Kd averaging 35 ppg and it was somehow 6 super close games with harden massively outplaying Steph for the series. Either hardens peak is really really high or Steph needs to be ranked lower because he was getting massively outplayed by the 19th peak when Steph was basically at his own peak.

History has not been kind to KD-led offenses, no matter how efficiently it looks like he scored.

But with what we're talking about, most of it is literally just that steph sucked.

Not going to lay the blame of all of Curry's struggles in the first few games at KD's feet as Curry is very much a flow and "whole is better than the sum of its parts" player which has its plusses and minuses.

Well that's part of the problem. People want to say steph fits everywhere but his ideal offense is an all encompassing steph curry experience. You're either setting picks for him or looking for ways to pass him the ball. Kd one of the best iso players ever wants to iso? Sorry, set some screens Kevin. How dare you score 31 super efficient points. Steph the portable can't play with that kind of distraction.

I mean in 2019 the series didn't turn because KD got injured (the games were close before and after) but because KD averaged (prorated) 35 ppg on 59 TS% while steph had a catastrophic 20.0 ppg on 48 TS% at the point when KD got injured.

In other words KD was dragging a steph anchor for 5 games and keeping steph afloat and somehow keeping the warriors tied and then steph has one good half in game 6 and it's KDs fault the series was close when steph was like the 4th best player in the series.

But KD was and is not a cerebral player and couldn't see how his ball-stopping tendencies were playing into the Rockets' hands and taking away from what made the Warriors great. This was really the core of the friction between KD and the Warriors (which Draymond was really a figurehead of).

Maybe stephs game shouldn't collapse because a teammate is scoring efficiently. I mean guys like lebron and harden and Luka would kill to have a teammate doing what KD did.

Anyway, not really debating about where Harden should stand on a list like this just providing some context on why the Warriors struggled so much against the Rockets despite the talent difference on paper.

But at the end of the day, it can't take a litany of context to explain why a supposed talent mismatch of epic proportions somehow wasn't. Occams razor says we are simply off on the talent part.

[Peregrine01]

KD is at his best when he's finishing off the creation of others not when he's doing the creating himself. I'm sure Bron and Luka would love to play with KD and would kill it doing so - but only when they're controlling the action.

It wasn't just Steph that was struggling when the ball was being funneled to KD by the Rockets but also Klay and Draymond. The Warriors were built to play a certain way and KD was inclined to play in a very different way. He was actually very well-equipped to play the Warriors way (as we saw in 2017) but that lasted only a season before his ego got in the way again.

[parsnips33]

Is it really that surprising that a team that led the league in 3PA by a significant margin was able to overperform (briefly) due to variance before coming down to Earth? Wasn't that the whole idea behind Morey's team building to combat the huge talent gap by jacking up variance on their end?

Don't really think it's a given that Harden has to be close to Steph just because he almost beat him a couple times. Not saying Harden isn't or can't be close to Steph, just I think there are better arguments for it

[f4p]

Is it really that surprising that a team that led the league in 3PA by a significant margin was able to overperform (briefly) due to variance before coming down to Earth?

No, it wouldnt be. But since the rockets shot 36.2% on 3s in the regular season and 33.5% in the first 5 games, then it is pretty surprising. The variance went against them and it was still close.

[parsnips33]

Is it really that surprising that a team that led the league in 3PA by a significant margin was able to overperform (briefly) due to variance before coming down to Earth?

No, it wouldnt be. But since the rockets shot 36.2% on 3s in the regular season and 33.5% in the first 5 games, then it is pretty surprising. The variance went against them and it was still close.

Was hoping you wouldn't look that up

Fair enough. Just a case of God loving the Warriors I think

[lessthanjake]

The argument here seems to simultaneously be that we should look down on Steph compared to Harden when he outplays Harden individually but the series is very close (2018), but should also look down on Steph compared to Harden when Harden outplays Steph individually but the Warriors win the series relatively cleanly (2019). It seems like the angle is basically that we should look around and draw any possible negative inference we can about Steph Curry—whether that’s looking at individual stats (either in a whole series or just a specific portion of a series if the whole series data doesn’t support the point) or looking at an amorphous comparison of team results in a series compared to perceived talent on the team. Ultimately, Steph Curry absolutely dominated the Harden Rockets, unlike almost anything we’ve ever seen (Russell dominating West’s Lakers more, as did Jordan against Ewing’s Knicks, and perhaps a few other examples). I don’t think there’s much of a valid/reasonable way to look at those results and come to the conclusion that those series suggest Harden was as good or better than Steph. One could try to make some sort of nuanced argument using other information, but going for “Steph’s record against the Rockets in the playoffs shows he is overrated compared to Harden” is definitely a very hot take.

[therealbig3]

Meh, I never really got the KD Warriors criticism...forget 2017, the Warriors playoff offense in 2018 and 2019 was also crystal clearly better than their playoff offense in 2015 and 2016. So claiming in some way that KD held back the offense from achieving what they could doesn't make a lot of sense.

I do think Curry isn't as unblemished as an offensive anchor as people try to make it seem. His style of play didn't really lead to offensive success in 2015 and 2016. It wasn't until they added KD's iso tendencies that they actually looked great as a playoff offense.

[Peregrine01]

Meh, I never really got the KD Warriors criticism...forget 2017, the Warriors playoff offense in 2018 and 2019 was also crystal clearly better than their playoff offense in 2015 and 2016. So claiming in some way that KD held back the offense from achieving what they could doesn't make a lot of sense.

I do think Curry isn't as unblemished as an offensive anchor as people try to make it seem. His style of play didn't really lead to offensive success in 2015 and 2016. It wasn't until they added KD's iso tendencies that they actually looked great as a playoff offense.

The 15-16 Warriors playoff offense was about 4-5 pts better relative to their opponents' regular season DRTG. This compared to 2018-2019 at 6-7 pts better. In 2017, when everything was firing on all cylinders they were +11 and this despite KD missing the entire 1st round and a half. In playoff games when both Steph and KD played, Warriors were running an obscene +15 or something in 2017 which fell to +5-6 in 2018 and 2019. So they clearly weren't gelling like they did in 2017.

[therealbig3]

Meh, I never really got the KD Warriors criticism...forget 2017, the Warriors playoff offense in 2018 and 2019 was also crystal clearly better than their playoff offense in 2015 and 2016. So claiming in some way that KD held back the offense from achieving what they could doesn't make a lot of sense.

I do think Curry isn't as unblemished as an offensive anchor as people try to make it seem. His style of play didn't really lead to offensive success in 2015 and 2016. It wasn't until they added KD's iso tendencies that they actually looked great as a playoff offense.

The 15-16 Warriors playoff offense was about 4-5 pts better relative to their opponents' regular season DRTG. This compared to 2018-2019 at 6-7 pts better. In 2017, when everything was firing on all cylinders they were +11 and this despite KD missing the entire 1st round and a half. In playoff games when both Steph and KD played, Warriors were running an obscene +15 or something in 2017 which fell to +5-6 in 2018 and 2019. So they clearly weren't gelling like they did in 2017.

I mean yeah, Curry also missed games and also just played a lot worse individually in the 2018 and 2019 playoffs, can't really ignore that.

And my point was that they were still clearly better offensively in 2018 and 2019 with more KD iso ball than they were in 2015 and 2016, which is true. There's a narrative that's been constructed that Curry helped KD, KD didn't help Curry, or that more KD meant less Curry and not as good results, but when it was just Curry, he wasn't exactly doing amazing things offensively. I think KD helped him a lot.

2017 was when everything finally clicked together, but you also can't ignore that 2017 Curry in the playoffs was an aberration compared to the other 4 playoff runs he had during that 2015-2019 stretch.

Now to be fair, Curry's play in the 22 playoffs redeemed him a lot imo, and proved he didn't necessarily need KD. But I do think KD still helped him quite a bit when they did play together.

I would still take him quite clearly over Harden though, because Harden has underperformed in pretty much every playoff run he's ever had, but the point about Curry having his blemishes and getting them swept under the rug is kind of a fair one, it's winning bias.

[Peregrine01]

I suspect Thinking Basketball is going to have LeBron on multiple times in the top 25 peaks project. Otherwise, it's hard to make a case that there's been 19 other players with better peaks than Harden.

[eminence]

I suspect Thinking Basketball is going to have LeBron on multiple times in the top 25 peaks project. Otherwise, it's hard to make a case that there's been 19 other players with better peaks than Harden.

It's absolutely 1 per player.

25. Kidd
24. Tatum
23. Green
22. Howard
21. Manu
20. Harden

Shaq, Duncan, KG, McGrady, Nash, Dirk, Kobe, LeBron, Wade, Chris Paul, Durant, Curry, Kawhi, Davis, Giannis, Jokic, Embiid, Luka, SGA the remaining 19 (not mentioned in the HMs and guys who absolutely would've been).

I do think Harden was very low, though not quite past what I'd call his 'I'll stop taking you seriously if you have a guy outside of this range' #.

McGrady/Davis/Embiid over Harden notably weak arguments imo.

[lessthanjake]

I suspect Thinking Basketball is going to have LeBron on multiple times in the top 25 peaks project. Otherwise, it's hard to make a case that there's been 19 other players with better peaks than Harden.

It's absolutely 1 per player.

25. Kidd
24. Tatum
23. Green
22. Howard
21. Manu
20. Harden

Shaq, Duncan, KG, McGrady, Nash, Dirk, Kobe, LeBron, Wade, Chris Paul, Durant, Curry, Kawhi, Davis, Giannis, Jokic, Embiid, Luka, SGA the remaining 19 (not mentioned in the HMs and guys who absolutely would've been).

I do think Harden was very low, though not quite past what I'd call his 'I'll stop taking you seriously if you have a guy outside of this range' #.

McGrady/Davis/Embiid over Harden notably weak arguments imo.

Yeah, I think there’s probably roughly 5 or 6 guys that you list there that I’d have Harden above in terms of peaks (at least McGrady, Durant, Davis, and Luka, with a few others I’m on the fence about). So it’s a bit low on Harden IMO, but it’s not completely crazy, since I don’t really think there’s anyone there where it’s completely crazy to have them above Harden.

[f4p]

The argument here seems to simultaneously be that we should look down on Steph compared to Harden when he outplays Harden individually but the series is very close (2018), but should also look down on Steph compared to Harden when Harden outplays Steph individually but the Warriors win the series relatively cleanly (2019). It seems like the angle is basically that we should look around and draw any possible negative inference we can about Steph Curry—whether that’s looking at individual stats (either in a whole series or just a specific portion of a series if the whole series data doesn’t support the point) or looking at an amorphous comparison of team results in a series compared to perceived talent on the team. Ultimately, Steph Curry absolutely dominated the Harden Rockets, unlike almost anything we’ve ever seen (Russell dominating West’s Lakers more, as did Jordan against Ewing’s Knicks, and perhaps a few other examples). I don’t think there’s much of a valid/reasonable way to look at those results and come to the conclusion that those series suggest Harden was as good or better than Steph. One could try to make some sort of nuanced argument using other information, but going for “Steph’s record against the Rockets in the playoffs shows he is overrated compared to Harden” is definitely a very hot take.

Honestly I wouldnt expect this kind of stuff from you
Was Isiah better than Jordan from 88-90? I guess in your world, yes? Since the other 8 guys don't count?

Like how did Steph outplay harden in 2018. They have nearly identical game scores, indicating they were pretty close and Steph jumped up quite a bit once his nemesis cp3 was injured. Without that, he's almost certainly worse. Draymond was leading the warriors to the #1 defense in the playoffs, KD was scoring on volume and efficiency, the rockets weren't hitting 3s and Chris paul was at 20 ppg, 6 APG and 52 TS% so it's not like he was killing it. And clint capela was getting neutralized by Draymond. So now Steph was also outplaying harden but the series just mysteriously went 7 and maybe only because of a huge injury for Houston? You can't be the leader of the most talented team ever and be losing the series to what obviously isn't the most talented team ever but somehow it's not your fault.

And in 2019 the delta between Steph and harden is crazy, 35/7/5 on 59 TS% vs 23/5/4 on 54 TS%. They aren't even close enough to compared. Everybody keeping Steph afloat for 5.5 out of 6 games is how they "cleanly" won a series where no game was decided by more than 6 points.

I mean I've posted it before, but harden has better stats and better on/off in their head to head.

Stats from 2015/18/19 Series
Harden: 30.7 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 5.9 apg, 58.0 TS% (-3.4% from regular season), 21.9 Game Score
Steph: 26.3 ppg, 5.4 rpg, 5.4 apg, 59.5 TS% (-5.9% from regular season), 19.2 Game Score

And the bulk of what's even keeping Steph's numbers that good is from the 2015 series when his main defender was a 37 year old Jason Terry and his backup defender was 37 year old Pablo prigioni.

Harden On/Off: +16.2 per 48 (Harden with a hilarious +48.8 in 2015)
Steph On/Off: +5.3 per 48

I feel like you have to win at least one of those to say you outplayed the other person, and certainly if you want to claim any great delta like 19th peak vs 2nd.