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I’m generally low on playoff Lillard, but not this low. He had the best offensive series of the era against Denver.

Halliburton has never touched that level. And really hasn’t been the same since that mid season injury a couple years back.

Peak Lillard was a pretty elite scorer.

Really Hali had historic playoff run but when comparing him to other stars he's not close to being as complete of a player as those he's being compared to, at least not yet
Dame by a mile

This mostly sounds like "scoring versus playmaking" to me. Lillard was an atrocious defender who was an excellent RS scorer who was notably worse in the playoffs outside of 2021. And of course Hali is newer to the scene and not really the same level of scorer, but a much better playmaker who isn't an ATG waste on D.

An interesting discussion.

Im partial to the more classic PG archetypes. Especially ones that flirt with 50/40/90 efficiency and who take care of the ball unbelievably well. I’d rather be tasked with finding pieces around Haliburton, than relying on Lillard being my best player/scoring option.

Lillard’s great, but perhaps much like Kyrie — he’s actually better deployed as an offensive weapon rather than the pg/lead guard whose discretion you live or die by.

Amare_1_Knicks wrote:Lillard’s great, but perhaps much like Kyrie — he’s actually better deployed as an offensive weapon rather than the pg/lead guard whose discretion you live or die by.

Well put, that.

Pretty confident in preferring Lillard as an offensive weapon. He has a proven track record of producing strong offensive results even with lackluster supporting casts; Lillard's offensive rating on-court, with on-off in parentheses; excl. 2022 with only 29 gp

2019: +7.6 (+10.3)
2020: +5.1 (+9.2)
2021: +6.2 (+9.4)
2022: ---
2023: +7.6 (+13.4)
2024: +6.9 (+6.3)

2024 Pacers were +5.0 on offense with Haliburton off the floor which I can't imagine from any of the Blazers Dame teams (he never had a season where his team was a positive on offense without him until the Bucks stint). Along with the coaching difference.

I think he actually grew into being quite a strong play maker by the time of his peak. Not Haliburton level, no, but absolutely better than Kyrie. Not sure how else people imagine him generating good offensive results while getting blitzed as often as he does in the pick-and-roll and not playing with any capable play makers.

Hali is definitely not as bad on defense, so I could see that being an argument to take him despite the inferior offensive impact.

jalengreen wrote:Pretty confident in preferring Lillard as an offensive weapon. He has a proven track record of producing strong offensive results even with lackluster supporting casts; Lillard's offensive rating on-court, with on-off in parentheses; excl. 2022 with only 29 gp

2019: +7.6 (+10.3)
2020: +5.1 (+9.2)
2021: +6.2 (+9.4)
2022: ---
2023: +7.6 (+13.4)
2024: +6.9 (+6.3)

2024 Pacers were +5.0 on offense with Haliburton off the floor which I can't imagine from any of the Blazers Dame teams (he never had a season where his team was a positive on offense without him until the Bucks stint). Along with the coaching difference.

I think he actually grew into being quite a strong play maker by the time of his peak. Not Haliburton level, no, but absolutely better than Kyrie. Not sure how else people imagine him generating good offensive results while getting blitzed as often as he does in the pick-and-roll and not playing with any capable play makers.

Hali is definitely not as bad on defense, so I could see that being an argument to take him despite the inferior offensive impact.

Good post. Hali should be better on defense but the metrics don't really support it. His career DRAPM is atrocious (worse than Dame's) and his peak DRAPM is not as good as peak Dame's.