Rasho_libre wrote:Lebron is back to his 11,12,13 for, defensively these last 6 weeks or so. Before that the team in general was coasting and Lebron was a little below his norm. Kd is not and has not been any where near him defensively.
KD can't compete with Lebron at his best defensively, but I'm going by the entire season. It's like Shaq in his prime, aside from 2000, he didn't bring it night in and night out defensively, but would for the stretch run and playoffs, but the coasting during the regular season defensively still knocks him down a bit. Durant on the other hand has improved just about every year defensively, and I'd say has gone beyond just above average to a legitimately good defender.
orangeparka wrote:Hate to sound like a homer but not even close. LeBron was right there with KD all throughout the Miami game.
In this one, KD did nothing for majority of the game. LeBron had like what, 12 before KD even scored a basket or something? Then KD was gifted FTs and had like two transition dunks as soon as LeBron left the game.
KD's still the MVP for me but let's be clear, LeBron owned KD's soul in this game.
It was as much of a "Slow down there KD, I'm still the best" type of statement game as you'll ever see. Just would've been nice if he'd finished the game.
KD outplayed Lebron decisively in the Miami game. Lebron made the stats look closer when he started going hard late and padded his point total nicely with the game already in hand. In fact, iirc, Durant had pretty much backed off with his own offense since early in the 4th since he had already put OKC in a comfortable position.
Lebron's performance in that game was really underwhelming while Durant played great. Not sure how anyone could have watched that game and come away with any other impression.
I do agree with your assessment of tonight's game, though. Miami had a huge lead in the 3rd, and OKC would never seriously threaten them from that point and Durant was something like 4 for 14 at that point, but had the easy follow in transition off the Sefolosha miss, the bailouts on jumpers including the 3, the type of foul we see in today's game that I hate when he pretty much ran into Birdman who was running back and just threw up a running shot from around 15 feet and 2-3 other wide open transition dunks. All after Miami had long since established a double digit lead that typically stayed between 16-20 points.
In this case, Durant's stats make it looked like a pretty respectable performance and better than he really was, but that's similar to Lebron's numbers making his Miami game look better than it was in January.