cupcakesnake wrote:Mavrelous wrote:I have Luka as a tier above, slightly worse as a scorer, tiers above as playmaker, SGA defense is insanely overrated, but it's what have you done for me lately league, and he had the supporting cast to win, but chose to come back out of shape and give Nico the excuse to trade him, until this happens, the reigning MVP and champion is ahead and should be considered better, while Luka needs to build a contender from scratch again.
When you say overrated, how good do you think Shai's defense is.
I agree it's overrated when people give him all-defense mentions. He's the 5th best defender in OKC's starting lineup. At absolute best, he's the 7th best defender on that team. Playing with such ridiculous defensive talent hides any flaws, and make him look good.
That being said, Shai is an excellent defensive playmaker. A long-armed guard with a knack for deflections and some legitimate rim protection. The numbers all back this up. It's hard to call it purely a product of his environment, since he's had the same defensive statistical signals for years, and OKC only emerged as a defensive juggernaut the past 2 years.
He's skinny, so he's not matchup proof. He has no chance against strong scoring forward. He holds up super well against all kinds of guards and smaller forward though. Opponents tried to post him in both of the last 2 playoffs, and had some success if they could the right matchup. There's nothing really to attack in OKC's defense though, so it's not some huge blemish on his reputation.
When measuring the value of elite players, he's just not someone you should consider his defense, for positive or for negative, by overrated I mean the fact that people actually consider him all defense player or even significant defender for OKC.
He has long arms, and good reflexes, but he is physically weak and get pushed around, disgree on not being posted up, he was posted up against the Mavs by PJ very successfully, in general, take Jokic and Doncic, they are easily exploitable on an island, but are pretty strong.
For the specific comparison with Luka Doncic, defense shouldn't be a factor, there are no bad defensive playmakers in this tier IMO.
To put it bluntly, SGA is basically neutral on defense on/off both in RS and PO, do you think if you replaced SGA with Luka, OKC defense will be affected significantly? I don't think it'll move an inch, but it's speculative so I get if you have a different opinion.
cupcakesnake wrote:On offense, Luka is a vastly superior passer. Where Shai has an advantage is in shot selection. Shai is ruthless about getting to his best shots, while Luka will take any shot at any time. If we go by TS Add (my go to for measure scoring efficiency + volume), there's a massive gap here. Luka has been only a slight positive as a scoring force over his career, while Shai is in absolutely elite territory. Functionally, I can see why you'd call Luka "slightly worse as a scorer", because Luka really can score at an elite level on any given night, both in the paint and with his step back. However, in terms of the actual results, Shai has been on a way higher level the past couple seasons.
Career TS+ it's 106 Vs 103, I wouldn't consider it massive by any stretch...
If we filter out earlier years for SGA and this year for Luka
23 108 Vs 105
24 110 Vs 106
You consider 110/108 Vs 106/105 a massive gap?
In the PO, they both neutral TS+ BTW, PO should weigh more IMO.
Regardless, I compare them in the actual offenses they drive, with the tools they have.
For the Mavs to be able to have a proper defense around Luka, they played Lively a non-shooting center, with PJ and DJJ who are average to below average shooters, Luka is constantly doubled and blitzed, more than SGA, significantly, and he still managed 115 offensive rating in the PO in 23/24, SGA had 115 ORTG with the roster this year, I consider OKC roster much more potent offensively than 23/24 Mavs.
To put things into simpler questions:
Do you think Chet Holmgren will have average effeciency in the PO playing with Luka Doncic?
Both players had 2 deepish PO runs, with Luka, Mavs 3P% stayed roughly the same in PO and in the RS, with SGA, Thunder 3P% dropped 3-4 % points, do you attribute that to shooting luck/inexperience or to Luka's resilience as playmaker and generating open shots in heavily defended half court possessions in a manner SGA is just incapable of?
This goes back to the on/off debate, it's hard to disconnect the player from the environment, SGA doesn't have a sample with bad rosters, Luka spent most of his career on bad rosters.
I don't have definitive answer here, nor do I claim to have the ultimate truth, I have a strong but biased personal opinion, watching the 2 players play, and my personal opinion is that Luka's playmaking significantly outweighs SGA's more efficient scoring.
*INGRAM*ALLSTARSEASON*
