The LeBron Thread 2021 Off-Season Edition

[homecourtloss]

So jealous of these teams who can reliably hit open 3s.

Basically every team other than the Lakers.

[donnieme]

Doubt Kuzma ever had any real relevant trade value.

Must be annoying how he can't even raise his value somewhere between a marginal bench contributor and a trade asset with upside, already very low bar of expectation. Pretty much every roleplayer embarrassed their market value this postseason. Those shooting numbers were ghastly. All of them talking about running it back need to keep their heads down for now

[Greyhound]

Post LeBron I’m for sure converting to a Luka fan. This dude is just something else.

Good for you. I am sure there’s a Luka thread somewhere.

[Dupp]

Post LeBron I’m for sure converting to a Luka fan. This dude is just something else.

Good for you. I am sure there’s a Luka thread somewhere.

Lukas the future goat, we need to just accept it

[falcolombardi]

Post LeBron I’m for sure converting to a Luka fan. This dude is just something else.

Good for you. I am sure there’s a Luka thread somewhere.

Lukas the future goat, we need to just accept it

is not impossible, but the lack of overwhelming physical tools means he will need to develop a really high skillset. a good deal higher than bron ever did. to hit lebron level, let alone overcoming it

is not impossible but it will be very hard (but exciting to imagine)

as of now he is probably a slightly worse or comparable player at the same age (vs 2007 lebron) with the possibility that by being more skilled at this state of his career he may be closer to his ceiling (lebron hit another whole level in 2009 then arguably raised it in miami/cavs 2.0 years) that lebron was in 2007

any way i am almost sure he will be the 2020's goat unless zion really puts it all together beyond all expectations or some other super talent comes soon

[Dupp]

Good for you. I am sure there’s a Luka thread somewhere.

Lukas the future goat, we need to just accept it

is not impossible, but the lack of overwhelming physical tools means he will need to develop a really high skillset. a good deal higher than bron ever did. to hit lebron level, let alone overcoming it

is not impossible but it will be very hard (but exciting to imagine)

as of now he is probably a slightly worse or comparable player at the same age (vs 2007 lebron) with the possibility that by being more skilled at this state of his career he may be closer to his ceiling (lebron hit another whole level in 2009 then arguably raised it in miami/cavs 2.0 years) that lebron was in 2007

any way i am almost sure he will be the 2020's goat unless zion really puts it all together beyond all expectations or some other super talent comes soon

Luka is clearly better than any lebron pre 2009. His skill set and iq is clearly ahead. Ignoring physical tools he might already be more skilled than any lebron ever .

[falcolombardi]

Lukas the future goat, we need to just accept it

is not impossible, but the lack of overwhelming physical tools means he will need to develop a really high skillset. a good deal higher than bron ever did. to hit lebron level, let alone overcoming it

is not impossible but it will be very hard (but exciting to imagine)

as of now he is probably a slightly worse or comparable player at the same age (vs 2007 lebron) with the possibility that by being more skilled at this state of his career he may be closer to his ceiling (lebron hit another whole level in 2009 then arguably raised it in miami/cavs 2.0 years) that lebron was in 2007

any way i am almost sure he will be the 2020's goat unless zion really puts it all together beyond all expectations or some other super talent comes soon

Luka is clearly better than any lebron pre 2009. His skill set and iq is clearly ahead. Ignoring physical tools he might already be more skilled than any lebron ever .

Box score wise sure, but he is less efficient adjusted to era and less productive per impact stats too

he may be more skilled/smart than lebron at any age (maybe on the skilled part, disagree on the smartness) but not as good

2006 or 2007 lebron was better adjusted for era, people forget even 2006 bron got a 30 points season in deadball era, and 2007 beat a elite pistons teams to make finals, 2008 cavs outscored 65 win celtics (hawks and kobe lakers didnt come close) in a 7 game series

the worry is that growth is not linear, Luka wont necesarrily improve his skill/iq at the same pace as bron did at that age since he is already further ahead there

luka is such a early bloomer with so much experience compared to your average nba rookie that maybe he was much more advanced into his development (having played in pro level at europe highes tier of competition) compared to guys who cruised through high school basketball like lebron

any way, as i said luka is such a talent he may just overcame those odds and be better than lebron or anyone else, is far from guaranteed but possible

[homecourtloss]

Lukas the future goat, we need to just accept it

is not impossible, but the lack of overwhelming physical tools means he will need to develop a really high skillset. a good deal higher than bron ever did. to hit lebron level, let alone overcoming it

is not impossible but it will be very hard (but exciting to imagine)

as of now he is probably a slightly worse or comparable player at the same age (vs 2007 lebron) with the possibility that by being more skilled at this state of his career he may be closer to his ceiling (lebron hit another whole level in 2009 then arguably raised it in miami/cavs 2.0 years) that lebron was in 2007

any way i am almost sure he will be the 2020's goat unless zion really puts it all together beyond all expectations or some other super talent comes soon

Luka is clearly better than any lebron pre 2009. His skill set and iq is clearly ahead. Ignoring physical tools he might already be more skilled than any lebron ever .

Not going by impact stats measuring contributions to winning margins.

[Dupp]

We talking regular season or playoffs here?

[dcstanley]

I have a feeling Pelinka's gonna target Derozan. He's from the area and seems like the type of player the Lakers front office would covet.

[Slava]

I have a feeling Pelinka's gonna target Derozan. He's from the area and seems like the type of player the Lakers front office would covet.

This is so 2014.

[Mos_Heat]

Lakers looked like a 00's team compared to Hawks, Nets, Mavs and Clips.

[Mos_Heat]

I have a feeling Pelinka's gonna target Derozan. He's from the area and seems like the type of player the Lakers front office would covet.

Fortunately, they don't have money for that

[letskissbro]

If only the Lakers had the shooters the other teams with superstars do. Contextualizing numbers in this current spacing boom is going to be such a chore. Luka just finished the first round averaging 36/8/10, Harden and Kawhi both have over 70% TS, Jokic 30/10 on 50/40/90, Lillard 34/4/10 on 66% TS, KD 32 on 67% TS. How do you even begin to adjust any of this? "Playoff defense" isn't even a thing anymore because of 5-out spacing and soft officiating starting to trickle into the postseason.

[Dupp]

I have a feeling Pelinka's gonna target Derozan. He's from the area and seems like the type of player the Lakers front office would covet.

This is so 2014.

Not really. Your from office still sucks and hates shooting.

[Slava]

I have a feeling Pelinka's gonna target Derozan. He's from the area and seems like the type of player the Lakers front office would covet.

This is so 2014.

Not really. Your from office still sucks and hates shooting.

Its not the front office's fault that shooters stop making shots after they arrive at the Lakers. It has more to do with the garbage can offense Vogel runs and players lacking legs with all the chasing around on defence. Vogel also won't trust a good shooter to play if he makes defensive mistakes.

Danny Green Career 40.1% LAL: 36.7%
Wes Matthews Career 37.8%. LAL: 35.3%

KCP, Gasol shot 41% each and Kuzma 36.5% from 3 for the season, which is comfortably good for their level.

[Baski]

Warning, rant incoming.

I don't know which thread it was in but today I saw someone say that LeBron's 2016 championship wasn't impressive because "It's not like he had a garbage supporting cast, Lebron has never won a championship with a teammate averaging less than 20ppg in the regular season" Requiring good teammates to beat a 73-9 team is now a criticism.

And I think I mentioned it before but because there is a MASSIVE bias towards offence as you pointed out, a player surrounded by 4 good offensive players and equally bad defensive players is seen as having a stacked supporting cast, but a player surrounded by 4 good defensive players and equally bad offensive players is seen as having a trash supporting cast, so the best offensive player on a defensive minded team will get all the credit for that teams success.

Winning with the offensive teammates = You did what you supposed to do and losing = you underachieved.

Winning with the defensive teammates = You carried an underdog team to a victory, and losing = you were a valiant underdog that deserves credit for trying.

Zeke, 01 Iverson and 2011 Rose are good examples of this. Conversely, the best defensive player, on an offensively minded team will get next to no credit, like Shawn Marion. Hell, even on a team that is dominant on both offence and defence, the best defensive player will get **** all credit because people will only focus on offence. To this day millions of basketball fans think Draymond was the 3rd most important player on those Warriors teams behind Klay and the 4th most important when KD arrived -_-

That's also the reason why despite the fact a lot LeBron's finals losses came on the end of bad defence, LeBron-Ball offence is the criticism that comes after a loss. They cannot even fathom that defence can be responsible for a victory or a loss

"His ability to carry mediocre offenses allowed them to stack the team with defensive players so be sure to funnel any praise you might have for the defense right back to him."

[falcolombardi]

We talking regular season or playoffs here?

i would say both

luka yet has to win a series, while lebro has a victory over the very strong pistons at the same age (easily comparable to the current clippers)

the raw numbers were not as impressive as luka's but the context is way too different

using the more offensive era argument in lebron favor may c9me across as doing the same thingh people did to discredit lebron amd hypocrital but that was never true

people often think that lebron played in a more offensive era that inflated stats, that is not true, at all

the offensive explosión happened in 2020, then again in 2021 (2~ points jumps in league wide scoring rates each year) aka, Luka early prime

the 2010's before that were not more scoring heavy that the the 80's in general nor the 2000's more than the 90's, that offensive explosión started as soon as lebron got in the league and handchecking banned is a bit of a myth nba fans believe to prop up 80-90's players and degrade the 2000's stars

if young lebron had2 the kind of spacing doncic has i an sure his ese boxscore would be absurd too

does that mean young lebron could for sure replicate doncic? not necesarrily but i think is pretty likely

could doncic replicate what young lebron did? for the most part i think yes but is not a sure thingh

[MisterHibachi]

Saying Luka is more skilled than LeBron at any age is so ridiculous.

[No-more-rings]

Not sure if this has been mentioned yet by anyone, but this will be the 1st year since 2010 that neither Lebron or Curry will be in the finals. Just something i thought about.