Peak manu vs peak draymond
Posted: Thu Jan 11, 2024 5:20 am

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The Master wrote:One-year peak? 2016 Dray, although 2005 Manu can be legitimately chosen as well.
Any longer time span? Manu.
Perhaps it's close, but Draymond could be utilized the way he was thanks to perfectly fitting cast with all-time great offball shooters. Obviously, Dray has also an outlier-type of skillset to fit in such environment, but in comparing players you have to run more than one scenario to evaluate them.
And Manu was a perfect fit to basically every team as a ballhandler/shooter/defender creator. He would've been fantastic second option to basically any 1st-tier superstar historically.
OhayoKD wrote:What Draymond offers defensively is more portable than what Manu offers offensively.
The Master wrote:OhayoKD wrote:What Draymond offers defensively is more portable than what Manu offers offensively.
Perhaps it is, but that's not a point, we're talking about overall impact, not about Dray's defense vs Manu's offense, and overall portability, not offensive vs defensive portability by, respectively, Manu and Dray. I wrote about Manu offense because it's kind of obvious All-NBA D guard would fit any lineup, same with Dray's DPOTY-level D.
So if by 'peak' the OP meant 'better best season', I can go with Dray (DPOTY defender - respectable shooter - great playmaker), although it's very close (2005s Manu is legendary in terms of pure impact for a 2nd option). Manu's best years are better than any non-decent shooting season of Dray, and that's like everything besides 2016 + 2017 playoffs (not a full season tho), I believe.
Manu went +10 net on a championship team without his best player on a court, so I don't think win-improvement is any indication of him being 'more favored situationally'. He obviously was, in this sense that he played on an all-time great franchise, but not in terms of his 'skillset optimization'.
cupcakesnake wrote:I also disagree with Draymond being more portable.
Draymond will bring that monster defense and provide value wherever he goes, but any other offensive situation is a more awkward fit for him than Golden State. He'll always grease the wheels some with his playmaking, screening, and smart movement... but it will also always be awkward that not only can he not shoot, but he's never a scoring threat anywhere on the floor in any kind of action. I don't like to give him too much credit for a single season of solid 3-point shooting (2016) and a single post season run (2017). The media was slow to react to the reality that Draymond couldn't actually shoot, but we don't have to be! His own confidence in his shot (and his drives) shriveled up fast. I'm not saying Draymond needed to be in Golden State to provide value, just that the offensive side of the equation only gets more awkward in any other situation.
I don't see a situation where Manu is an awkward fit on either side of the ball. If it's a team that already has primary playmakers, Manu can add value as a spot-up shooter, close out attacker, and genius level extra playmaker. Oh and if you ever need him to scale up to become your main ball handling decision maker... he can do that at a superstar level (in limited minutes).
OhayoKD wrote:The bulk of Draymond's total impact is defensive. Thus "kind of obvious" to you that draymond not playing "with a bunch of great off-ball players" would not be nearly as damanging to his total impact as say, Manu Ginobli playing next to a player who can only effectively anchor the offensive side of the court, ala, Steph Curry, Kobe Bryant, Micheal Jordan, Magic Johnson, Kyrie Irving.
Again the "kind of obvious" thing here basically only works if you ignore that Duncan got star-level impact defensively while Manu does not. If Manu wasn't getting maximized next to Duncan, then his "overall impact" is clearly more context-dependent than Draymond's is.
OhayoKD wrote:cupcakesnake wrote:I also disagree with Draymond being more portable.
Draymond will bring that monster defense and provide value wherever he goes, but any other offensive situation is a more awkward fit for him than Golden State. He'll always grease the wheels some with his playmaking, screening, and smart movement... but it will also always be awkward that not only can he not shoot, but he's never a scoring threat anywhere on the floor in any kind of action. I don't like to give him too much credit for a single season of solid 3-point shooting (2016) and a single post season run (2017). The media was slow to react to the reality that Draymond couldn't actually shoot, but we don't have to be! His own confidence in his shot (and his drives) shriveled up fast. I'm not saying Draymond needed to be in Golden State to provide value, just that the offensive side of the equation only gets more awkward in any other situation.
This only matters if Draymond's defense alone is not suffecient to provide great impact. Given that pretty much any data has the bulk of Draymond's value coming from the defensive end...I don't really see much relevance with your skill-criticism. Draymond's primary value add is that he is an a to b+ paint-protector among bigs(bball index), an extremely versatile as a man defender, and orginaizes defenses(and offenses) as a floor general on the court or on the bench. None of that is really teammate dependent. For comparison...I don't see a situation where Manu is an awkward fit on either side of the ball. If it's a team that already has primary playmakers, Manu can add value as a spot-up shooter, close out attacker, and genius level extra playmaker. Oh and if you ever need him to scale up to become your main ball handling decision maker... he can do that at a superstar level (in limited minutes).
"extra playmakers" are inherently less valuable than primary playmakers. Just like becoming a spot-up shooter is a big value drop from being someone the defenses primarily focus on. The problem isn't that manu can't adapt. The problem is the adaption instantly drains him of his impact in a way surrounding draymond with defensive players does not.
His "weakness" is he's a role player on the end of the floor that translates the easiest and a star on the end where stars are a dime a dozen.
It's the same reason Kareem and Lebron exert impact rivalling anyone in situations they're not optimized(as in literally playing with a smaller version of the same sort of player), and Duncan and Russell were winning regardless of system or coach.
The conception of "portablity" popularized here and elsewhere only works if you ignore defense. Curry was never the most portable player ever. Nor was Bird. Nor was Jordan. Nor was Durant. You don't belong in that conversation if you can't carry defenses.
The Master wrote:OhayoKD wrote:The bulk of Draymond's total impact is defensive. Thus "kind of obvious" to you that draymond not playing "with a bunch of great off-ball players" would not be nearly as damanging to his total impact as say, Manu Ginobli playing next to a player who can only effectively anchor the offensive side of the court, ala, Steph Curry, Kobe Bryant, Micheal Jordan, Magic Johnson, Kyrie Irving.
Manu (highly efficient two-way player with great handles and decent shooting-playmaking combo) would be highly efficient alongside any of these guys. Whether it would be enough to win a championship is dependent on other factors (re: roster composition etc), but the same applies to Green. It's not like he would've been 12-3-3 type of a guy with Jordan on a team.
The thing is Manu could've played 2nd-fiddle offensive role alongside any of these guys (the beauty of Manu is he didn't need a ball that much) - Dray could've played 'his' role offensively on championship-level team basically only on Warriors historically. Whether it makes a big difference (Dray as a non-scoring big whose share in playmaking decreases from ~7 APG to ~4.3 APG, let's say) is another story, it's very much dependent on an era we talk about, with contemporary offenses - it does, in 2004 - probably not that much, there were many offensive scrubs out there and he would still have things that he's good at. That's why the difference between shooting and non-shooting Dray is that significant in my eyes - and I believe it would be generally much more visible if he didn't find himself in hyper-optimal situation in terms of a fit with Curry and Kerr's system.
Again the "kind of obvious" thing here basically only works if you ignore that Duncan got star-level impact defensively while Manu does not. If Manu wasn't getting maximized next to Duncan, then his "overall impact" is clearly more context-dependent than Draymond's is.
If Manu wasn't maximized next to Duncan and yet he is ~top50 player of alltime based on him playing his whole prime alongside Duncan, then he's underrated.
My point was much simpler though, Manu doesn't have to play alongside Duncan for his skillset to be 'optimized' (to do things he's great at) - he can do basically the same, more or less, alongside Jokic (Murray) or LeBron (Williams, Wade, Irving), as even with all-time great offensive anchors you need offensive talent alongside. Playing with all-time great player such as TD is certainly helpful to win some rings, but this is another story.
But it's getting a bit offtopic vs what OP asked about - and I think my answer is quite inclusive, in this sense that I can imagine having one-year peak of Dray ahead of Manu. If you interpret 'peak' as longer period of time, then my answer is Manu. And not because Green wasn't a great player for a longer sample size than a season or so, but in his prime-not very peak years he wouldn't be AS GOOD as he was with Steph/Warriors' system,
as even for defensive specialist - the other side of the floor matters. Even 2016 Green wouldn't be as good in basically every other scenario, but he was shooting really well that year, so he still would've been a dream fit for any all-time great guard or forward. Other than that? As above. It's obviously two-way argument (someone may argue about his superiority based on the same thing: him being able to fit in a Warriors' system), but we are in the (discussing) world of interpretation.
OhayoKD wrote:cupcakesnake wrote:I also disagree with Draymond being more portable.
Draymond will bring that monster defense and provide value wherever he goes, but any other offensive situation is a more awkward fit for him than Golden State. He'll always grease the wheels some with his playmaking, screening, and smart movement... but it will also always be awkward that not only can he not shoot, but he's never a scoring threat anywhere on the floor in any kind of action. I don't like to give him too much credit for a single season of solid 3-point shooting (2016) and a single post season run (2017). The media was slow to react to the reality that Draymond couldn't actually shoot, but we don't have to be! His own confidence in his shot (and his drives) shriveled up fast. I'm not saying Draymond needed to be in Golden State to provide value, just that the offensive side of the equation only gets more awkward in any other situation.
This only matters if Draymond's defense alone is not suffecient to provide great impact. Given that pretty much any data has the bulk of Draymond's value coming from the defensive end...I don't really see much relevance with your skill-criticism. Draymond's primary value add is that he is an a to b+ paint-protector among bigs(bball index), an extremely versatile as a man defender, and orginaizes defenses(and offenses) as a floor general on the court or on the bench. None of that is really teammate dependent. For comparison...I don't see a situation where Manu is an awkward fit on either side of the ball. If it's a team that already has primary playmakers, Manu can add value as a spot-up shooter, close out attacker, and genius level extra playmaker. Oh and if you ever need him to scale up to become your main ball handling decision maker... he can do that at a superstar level (in limited minutes).
"extra playmakers" are inherently less valuable than primary playmakers. Just like becoming a spot-up shooter is a big value drop from being someone the defenses primarily focus on. The problem isn't that manu can't adapt. The problem is the adaption instantly drains him of his impact in a way surrounding draymond with defensive players does not.
His "weakness" is he's a role player on the end of the floor that translates the easiest and a star on the end where stars are a dime a dozen.
It's the same reason Kareem and Lebron exert impact rivalling anyone in situations they're not optimized(as in literally playing with a smaller version of the same sort of player), and Duncan and Russell were winning regardless of system or coach.
The conception of "portablity" popularized here and elsewhere only works if you ignore defense. Curry was never the most portable player ever. Nor was Bird. Nor was Jordan. Nor was Durant. You don't belong in that conversation if you can't carry defenses.
AdagioPace wrote:OhayoKD wrote:cupcakesnake wrote:I also disagree with Draymond being more portable.
Draymond will bring that monster defense and provide value wherever he goes, but any other offensive situation is a more awkward fit for him than Golden State. He'll always grease the wheels some with his playmaking, screening, and smart movement... but it will also always be awkward that not only can he not shoot, but he's never a scoring threat anywhere on the floor in any kind of action. I don't like to give him too much credit for a single season of solid 3-point shooting (2016) and a single post season run (2017). The media was slow to react to the reality that Draymond couldn't actually shoot, but we don't have to be! His own confidence in his shot (and his drives) shriveled up fast. I'm not saying Draymond needed to be in Golden State to provide value, just that the offensive side of the equation only gets more awkward in any other situation.
This only matters if Draymond's defense alone is not suffecient to provide great impact. Given that pretty much any data has the bulk of Draymond's value coming from the defensive end...I don't really see much relevance with your skill-criticism. Draymond's primary value add is that he is an a to b+ paint-protector among bigs(bball index), an extremely versatile as a man defender, and orginaizes defenses(and offenses) as a floor general on the court or on the bench. None of that is really teammate dependent. For comparison...I don't see a situation where Manu is an awkward fit on either side of the ball. If it's a team that already has primary playmakers, Manu can add value as a spot-up shooter, close out attacker, and genius level extra playmaker. Oh and if you ever need him to scale up to become your main ball handling decision maker... he can do that at a superstar level (in limited minutes).
"extra playmakers" are inherently less valuable than primary playmakers. Just like becoming a spot-up shooter is a big value drop from being someone the defenses primarily focus on. The problem isn't that manu can't adapt. The problem is the adaption instantly drains him of his impact in a way surrounding draymond with defensive players does not.
His "weakness" is he's a role player on the end of the floor that translates the easiest and a star on the end where stars are a dime a dozen.
It's the same reason Kareem and Lebron exert impact rivalling anyone in situations they're not optimized(as in literally playing with a smaller version of the same sort of player), and Duncan and Russell were winning regardless of system or coach.
The conception of "portablity" popularized here and elsewhere only works if you ignore defense. Curry was never the most portable player ever. Nor was Bird. Nor was Jordan. Nor was Durant. You don't belong in that conversation if you can't carry defenses.
In other words, Draymond is best-in-the-league-level at one full side of the game.
I feel like Manu could be considered above Draymond at their peaks only if we think of Draymond as a contextual collective allucination, vulnerable to mood changes based on team success. On the other hand Manu was a wrath of God, regardless of contexts, between summer 04 and summer 05. Manu has more experience as a valuable leading piece in a variety of situations, from Bologna to Argentina.
I can see Manu's talent advantage,incredible intelligence and adaptation spirit being less prone to fluctuations, despite Draymond's defense being inherently more portable as you say.
Peak Draymond for a bunch of already established teams is perfect but I don't trust him scaling back as a "person", rather than a top defender.
cupcakesnake wrote:OhayoKD wrote:cupcakesnake wrote:I also disagree with Draymond being more portable.
Draymond will bring that monster defense and provide value wherever he goes, but any other offensive situation is a more awkward fit for him than Golden State. He'll always grease the wheels some with his playmaking, screening, and smart movement... but it will also always be awkward that not only can he not shoot, but he's never a scoring threat anywhere on the floor in any kind of action. I don't like to give him too much credit for a single season of solid 3-point shooting (2016) and a single post season run (2017). The media was slow to react to the reality that Draymond couldn't actually shoot, but we don't have to be! His own confidence in his shot (and his drives) shriveled up fast. I'm not saying Draymond needed to be in Golden State to provide value, just that the offensive side of the equation only gets more awkward in any other situation.
This only matters if Draymond's defense alone is not suffecient to provide great impact. Given that pretty much any data has the bulk of Draymond's value coming from the defensive end...I don't really see much relevance with your skill-criticism. Draymond's primary value add is that he is an a to b+ paint-protector among bigs(bball index), an extremely versatile as a man defender, and orginaizes defenses(and offenses) as a floor general on the court or on the bench. None of that is really teammate dependent. For comparison...I don't see a situation where Manu is an awkward fit on either side of the ball. If it's a team that already has primary playmakers, Manu can add value as a spot-up shooter, close out attacker, and genius level extra playmaker. Oh and if you ever need him to scale up to become your main ball handling decision maker... he can do that at a superstar level (in limited minutes).
"extra playmakers" are inherently less valuable than primary playmakers. Just like becoming a spot-up shooter is a big value drop from being someone the defenses primarily focus on. The problem isn't that manu can't adapt. The problem is the adaption instantly drains him of his impact in a way surrounding draymond with defensive players does not.
His "weakness" is he's a role player on the end of the floor that translates the easiest and a star on the end where stars are a dime a dozen.
It's the same reason Kareem and Lebron exert impact rivalling anyone in situations they're not optimized(as in literally playing with a smaller version of the same sort of player), and Duncan and Russell were winning regardless of system or coach.
The conception of "portablity" popularized here and elsewhere only works if you ignore defense. Curry was never the most portable player ever. Nor was Bird. Nor was Jordan. Nor was Durant. You don't belong in that conversation if you can't carry defenses.
I agree completely with the premise (defense being the most portable thing possible). I also agree with you that offensive stars are less rare that guys who can carry a defense. But Draymond is not Duncan or KG or even Russell (especially not relative to era in the latter's case) on offense. I'm not saying Draymond isn't portable, just that Manu fits anywhere and can provide value without ever really having to question the negatives. There are possible team configurations where Draymond's offense is damagingly negative.
We've only seen Draymond in a utopia. His strengths and weaknesses fit together like 2 sides of a zipper with his teammates strengths and weaknesses. None of us know for certain how much negative value Draymond might have on offense in another context, but his weaknesses are glaring enough that it at least deserves some doubt.
But I guess I'm curious how far you're willing to go with defensive portability being always better than the offensive version. Is Ben Wallace more portable than Curry? Is Nate Thumond more portable than Durant? Gobert>Bird? I'm not asking this condescendingly or to prove a point, I'm genuinely curious where you think the line should be drawn.
I also think you're focusing to hard on the idea of Manu scaling down and naturally losing value. It gets brought up because some offensive stars scale down and lose all their value (guys who are only effective with the ball in their hands), while Manu can be paired with anyone in my mind. But this doesn't mean he doesn't scale up just as well. Whether it's the 4th quarter in San Antonio, or the Argentinean National team playing against the USA, Manu demonstrated some ability to have an entire offense built around his unique skills. I get that you're pushing back on the idea that scaling down maybe gets over celebrated without accounting for the loss, but players like Manu can do both. Also Manu is providing big plus defense in any scenario as well. Not Draymond-level anchoring or any kind of anchoring, but he can be the second or third best defender in a championship lineup.
HeartBreakKid wrote:Hasn't Rudy Gobert been the best defender in the league as well? Do you feel that he has peaked higher and is more portable than Ginobili?
HeartBreakKid wrote:AdagioPace wrote:OhayoKD wrote:This only matters if Draymond's defense alone is not suffecient to provide great impact. Given that pretty much any data has the bulk of Draymond's value coming from the defensive end...I don't really see much relevance with your skill-criticism. Draymond's primary value add is that he is an a to b+ paint-protector among bigs(bball index), an extremely versatile as a man defender, and orginaizes defenses(and offenses) as a floor general on the court or on the bench. None of that is really teammate dependent. For comparison...
"extra playmakers" are inherently less valuable than primary playmakers. Just like becoming a spot-up shooter is a big value drop from being someone the defenses primarily focus on. The problem isn't that manu can't adapt. The problem is the adaption instantly drains him of his impact in a way surrounding draymond with defensive players does not.
His "weakness" is he's a role player on the end of the floor that translates the easiest and a star on the end where stars are a dime a dozen.
It's the same reason Kareem and Lebron exert impact rivalling anyone in situations they're not optimized(as in literally playing with a smaller version of the same sort of player), and Duncan and Russell were winning regardless of system or coach.
The conception of "portablity" popularized here and elsewhere only works if you ignore defense. Curry was never the most portable player ever. Nor was Bird. Nor was Jordan. Nor was Durant. You don't belong in that conversation if you can't carry defenses.
In other words, Draymond is best-in-the-league-level at one full side of the game.
I feel like Manu could be considered above Draymond at their peaks only if we think of Draymond as a contextual collective allucination, vulnerable to mood changes based on team success. On the other hand Manu was a wrath of God, regardless of contexts, between summer 04 and summer 05. Manu has more experience as a valuable leading piece in a variety of situations, from Bologna to Argentina.
I can see Manu's talent advantage,incredible intelligence and adaptation spirit being less prone to fluctuations, despite Draymond's defense being inherently more portable as you say.
Peak Draymond for a bunch of already established teams is perfect but I don't trust him scaling back as a "person", rather than a top defender.
Hasn't Rudy Gobert been the best defender in the league as well? Do you feel that he has peaked higher and is more portable than Ginobili?
MyUniBroDavis wrote:A 10-10 tie is very funny, I can’t wait to make a draymond or harden thread