Luka Doncic V Curry Right Now

mdonnelly1989 · Post #1 » by **mdonnelly1989** » Mon May 16, 2022 3:17 am

All season I've had it like this

1.) Giannis
2.) Jokic
3.) Embiid
4.) KD
5A. Luka
5B. Curry

I go back and fourth on who the better player is... Right now Luka looks individually like he can do more, but Curry looks like he has more of an impact. When I watch him the way he opens up the offense with his passing/vision it's like wow.

eminence · Post #2 » by **eminence** » Mon May 16, 2022 3:22 am

I dunno about that KD #4, but anywho, not the question at hand.

I think Curry had the pretty clearly better RS, and the better 1st round due to health (very difficult to make up for missing half a series). Luka had the better round 2, especially considering level of competition.

Despite them both being primarily perimeter based offensive players I find them pretty difficult to directly compare. Luka is a great on-ball force who doesn't do much off it, while Steph is a good on-ball guy who does more than anybody off-ball.

Defensively overall I prefer Steph, though he may have more clear weaknesses to target than Luka (it's hard to be a 6'3 somewhat slender defender).

I'd go Steph for now, but wouldn't be shocked to see Luka outplay him next series or to open up a gap next season, each very much on opposite sides of the aging curve.

Peregrine01 · Post #3 » by **Peregrine01** » Mon May 16, 2022 3:43 am

I think it's Luka. Steph has fallen off quite a bit as an on-ball player on offense. He just isn't collapsing defenses anywhere near what he did even last year and teams are getting away with switching a big on him. His turnovers when teams put two on him have been atrocious. With Luka, his ability to collapse defenses again and again with robotic-like consistency to open up a look for his team may be unrivalled by any player we've ever seen. Curry's the better off-ball player clearly but I struggled to reconcile that with the pretty sizeable advantage that Luka has on ball at this stage in their careers.

On defense, I think Steph has a small advantage though I think it will be tested in this upcoming series far more than it has all playoffs long.

LukaTheGOAT · Post #4 » by **LukaTheGOAT** » Mon May 16, 2022 3:48 am

Luka

Size, strength, finiahing and counters on top of counters matters comes PS time. I think Steph is a better defender.

Cavsfansince84 · Post #5 » by **Cavsfansince84** » Mon May 16, 2022 4:14 am

Its somewhat easily Luka since Jan imo. If Steph were better right now he would have shown it.

BIGJ1ER · Post #6 » by **BIGJ1ER** » Mon May 16, 2022 4:58 am

I'm going to agree with Eminence that it was pretty easily steph throughout the regular season, Steph in round 1, and luka in round 2. We may see Luka completely outplay Steph here in this series, but in POY voting at this point I'd have steph as the more impactful player.

I'd assume next season Luka will comfortably surpass Steph, and may even do it this year.

GSP · Post #7 » by **GSP** » Thu May 19, 2022 11:44 pm

Steph. The offball gap is massive and Steph has a notable defensive advantage. This is the best defensive season of his career

No-more-rings · Post #8 » by **No-more-rings** » Fri May 20, 2022 1:21 am

Luka comfortably for me. He’s been pretty impressive this postseason. I don’t even care what Steph’s numbers are, he’s not what he used to be and you can tell by watching him.

No-more-rings · Post #9 » by **No-more-rings** » Fri May 20, 2022 1:24 am

GSP wrote:Steph. The offball gap is massive and Steph has a notable defensive advantage. This is the best defensive season of his career

Why is offball neccesarily an advantage if the other guy is way better onball and is having great results with it? I was sure the board debunked offball being automatically better than onball.

Who’s better at defense seems more like a tiebreaker than anything at this point, Steph definitely lost a decent amount from his peak offense.

Colbinii · Post #10 » by **Colbinii** » Fri May 20, 2022 1:50 am

eminence wrote:I think Curry had the pretty clearly better RS, and the better 1st round due to health (very difficult to make up for missing half a series). Luka had the better round 2, especially considering level of competition.

Its close.

Luka in 2022 (January 1-End of RS): 29.7/9.8/8.7, 58.4 TS%, 114 Individual Ortg, +/- +230

Curry in 2022 (January 1-End of RS): 23.2/5.2/6.8, 59.3 TS%, 114 Individual Ortg, +132

I think Curry gets the nod in the regular season but Luka was better when looking at January 1st-End of RS, which is over half the RS. Curry's start to the season [And really the Warriors as a whole] was absurd where Curry looked like he would end up with another season over +800 on-court.

I think at this point I would rather have Doncic on a random team over Curry but prefer Curry on the Warriors [A proven recipe for success] over Luka on the Mavs.

GSP · Post #11 » by **GSP** » Fri May 20, 2022 2:01 am

No-more-rings wrote:
GSP wrote:Steph. The offball gap is massive and Steph has a notable defensive advantage. This is the best defensive season of his career

Why is offball neccesarily an advantage if the other guy is way better onball and is having great results with it? I was sure the board debunked offball being automatically better than onball.

Who’s better at defense seems more like a tiebreaker than anything at this point, Steph definitely lost a decent amount from his peak offense.

Steph isnt just a normal offball guy hes prolly the Goat there and Luka doesnt do much of anything offball so its big advantage IMO

I dont see defense as a tiebreaker. Normally Steph was overrated on defense by his fans in past seasons but hes made a legit impact this season. Luka is still a bad defender

70sFan · Post #12 » by **70sFan** » Fri May 20, 2022 7:28 am

I'd like to see the rest of the series, for now they are reasonably close to me this season.

GSP · Post #13 » by **GSP** » Mon May 23, 2022 3:41 am

Its def Steph by a distance. Luka is Harden with counters which makes him better in playoffs but no offball game AND being a defensive sieve is just too much to overcome

1993Playoffs · Post #14 » by **1993Playoffs** » Mon May 23, 2022 3:43 am

Luka is so bad on defense

BmanInBigD · Post #15 » by **BmanInBigD** » Mon May 23, 2022 3:45 am

GSP wrote:Its def Steph by a distance. Luka is Harden with counters which makes him better in playoffs but no offball game AND being a defensive sieve is just too much to overcome

Oh BS. He just has poeple behind him that can play defense.

GSP · Post #16 » by **GSP** » Mon May 23, 2022 3:49 am

BmanInBigD wrote:
GSP wrote:Its def Steph by a distance. Luka is Harden with counters which makes him better in playoffs but no offball game AND being a defensive sieve is just too much to overcome

Oh BS. He just has poeple behind him that can play defense.

Mavs have defenders too. Steph at least can contain penetration a bit and can allow for his defenders to cover him. Mavs are frantically trying to cover Lukas mistakes almost every possession. Hes clueless on defense.

Lukaball limits your playoff ceiling. If Mj or Bron couldnt win a title with helio ball before diversifying their games - and theyre faaaaaaaaaaaaaaar better defenders than Luka in every way - Luka has no shot at doing it

SpreeS · Post #17 » by **SpreeS** » Mon May 23, 2022 5:07 am

Curry > Doncic. So far its Curry/Harden debate again. High usg guy with really bad defence - its like take away candy from little child

Peregrine01 · Post #18 » by **Peregrine01** » Mon May 23, 2022 5:21 am

Peregrine01 wrote:On defense, I think Steph has a small advantage though I think it will be tested in this upcoming series far more than it has all playoffs long.

Well, looked like I was quite wrong here. Curry is way better on defense. And the Mavs have been unable to get Curry switched on Luka well at all this series.

Jaivl · Post #19 » by **Jaivl** » Mon May 23, 2022 7:29 am

No-more-rings wrote:Luka comfortably for me. He’s been pretty impressive this postseason. I don’t even care what Steph’s numbers are, he’s not what he used to be and you can tell by watching him.

Conversely, I don't even care what Luka's numbers are, he's not as good as them. Worse defender than Harden by a mile.

Peregrine01 · Post #20 » by **Peregrine01** » Mon May 23, 2022 1:36 pm

Jaivl wrote:
No-more-rings wrote:Luka comfortably for me. He’s been pretty impressive this postseason. I don’t even care what Steph’s numbers are, he’s not what he used to be and you can tell by watching him.

Conversely, I don't even care what Luka's numbers are, he's not as good as them. Worse defender than Harden by a mile.

I was a little confused by the Mavs defensive strategy. Seemed like they didn't really stick to anything. At times, they would trap Curry. Other times they let the soft switch happen. Other times, Luka would hedge. In any case, having Luka in so much of the action tired him out. Whereas the Rockets' defensive gameplan during those 18/19 series was simple - preswitch everything so that Harden could sit in the corner. I both player's perimeter defense is bad but the Rockets at least had strategies in place to try to cover up their player's weakness.

Better Player Right Now