Kenny Smith:Humble Superstars Elevate 2015-16 Warriors and 1993-94 Rockets

Keep moving the goal posts bruh.

 

Dream is clearly the all time leader in humbles total but Tim Duncan is leading in humbles per game (HPG) with a career average of 12.6. Dream stats are colored by his early years when he hadn't mastered humbleness and was more Shaq like with only 2.3 HPG while in his later years he averaged a monster 19.7 HPG.

For value to team success though what we should be looking at is humbles per game over replacement (HPGOR). Two Rockets stand out in that category and is when it comes to running a truly effective humble game are far more critical. Yao HPGOR is 5.8 over his replacements while Shane Battier was 5.2 HPGOR. The Rockets were much different teams when those two weren't on the court.

During the later Yao years while the team was overall humble Mutumbo frequently hurt team humbleness with his finger wagging and "Who Wants to Sex Mutumbo!".

 

They are a great team. I would say Curry is humble/comes from a different path of life that is more attractive for people to want to be fans of.

 

Unintentional shots at James Harden

 

This is a great article. We've been stuck with me and my type of players for too long now. First Francis, then Tmac and now Harden.

 

I don't think Harden ever annoyed Curry as much as Curry annoys Harden, even right now.

Curry has no feelings about Harden - he's just an NBA player like anyone else.

Harden hates Curry and maybe this is part of the problem with his current mental state and on court play.

 

yup. tim duncan was the first that came to mind when i was reading the article.

as to harden,,, "i shouldve won the mvp", "i'm the best player in the league",,, to me that's just disgusting and laughable at the same time. and i think his sink in performance this yr. could have sth. to do with that kinda mentality.

like many have said here, this isnt all about humility, though. it's the overall mindset of a player and the chemistry of a team.

if any nba superstar wants all the glory and stagelight, maybe he should change his sport to sth. like tennis or golf. but even roger federer in fact has a team supporting him.

 

Get this humble BS out of here. MJ was not humble and he is the greatest player who ever played. The better the player most likely they will be an ahole, but at least they win.

 

You're wrong man. If MJ wasn't an ******* he'd have like 40 rings.

 

all true. but i think there's a post in this thread that argues a healthy dose of humility could've helped those players even more.

i think it's a legit argument.

 

But isn't that more of an argument for society in general than just sports?

And basketball is a sport where the individual player is magnified moreso than any other team sport. We want the best player taking the last shot, we want him to be clutch, etc. You want him to want it as bad as you do.

LeBron got roasted when he made a pass on a potential game winner during the Finals against the Spurs IIRC. Then we roasted him for showing humility by sacrificing his stats to go play with his buddies in Miami. And then we said "see I told you so" when he decided that he needed to be THE guy and carry the team.

Again there's a distinct difference between humility and teamwork. Humility is always welcomed and admired but isn't a prerequisite for a championship team. Jordan passing to Kerr or Paxson for the last shot isn't about humility as much as it was about smart basketball and team work.

 

yes, of course. was gonna say sth. about it. but was feeling lazy to do so.

and the rest of your post,,, i agree, too.

btw, this board needs a bit more humility as well. the way i feel at times.

 

Hey Kenny, nice article about Dream.

But don't understand the connection to GSW other than the 15-0 record.

 

At the end of the day..if you can walk the walk then you can talk the talk..simple as that..harden just needs to stfu about mvp and being the best player in the league..

 

I don't know if Harden hates Curry. That's way too strong for my taste.


However, it should be noted, Curry is not playing to beat another player. Curry is playing to be the best he can possibly be. He's playing against himself trying to beat himself. That is the way the true greats play. They play to master the game, not another player.

Now, you have to consider that mental mastery is a part of mastering the game. Guys like Jordan, Bird, Kobe, KG, etc. have run their mouth over the years and mentally intimidated opponents that they knew were weak. But the other side of that is it simply doesn't work against other strong players. Classic example of this is KG vs. Duncan. KG is one of the most mouthy players of all-time. He gets under anybody's skin he can get under to help his team win. That stuff NEVER has worked with Duncan. Duncan just ignores him and plays his game. And has beaten KG down throughout his career because Duncan's team was always better than KG's team. Duncan has always been about what is best for the team. Not that KG hasn't. But Duncan was selfless. KG wasn't throughout his career. Only in his advanced NBA age did KG finally settle down and play to better the team, which meant his individual game took a backseat.

There's no way you can deny that Kobe's pride/arrogance has cost him. It cost him his relationship with Shaq and also with PJax to a certain extent. Hall-of-fame player but he only wanted to win rings his way. He didn't want to feed a big man and that big man pile up 35-40 points and get equal front line credit for the team winning. Kobe was/has always been about doing it like Mike. And it has cost Kobe rings. There's no question about that.

MJ was/is probably the most prideful/arrogant player the NBA has ever seen. But by the same token he had to make it work with Pippen, Grant, Rodman and Phil Jackson. MJ never won anything until the Bulls hired the greatest coaching psychologist of all-time in Jackson. And MJ only won with Jackson. After submitting himself to the triangle and learning to trust his teammates instead of being a one-man band.

Kobe was the same. He never won anything with any other coach but PJax. And he did force a split between Shaq and himself which led to a semi-rebuild after Shaq was traded when Kobe didn't win jack...until he got another big man to play with. And Kobe regressed as soon as Phil left both times into a totally selfish self-absorbed player whom other superstar players did not want to play with. Moving the goal posts my hiney.


You don't hear any of this kind of stuff about Steph. And when you watch the Warriors they are a machine of modern-day team basketball. The ball moves. Everybody touches it. Everybody scores. They're the most prolific offense in the league. And Steph gets all his. But everybody wants to play with him. You simply can't say that about Harden and this Rockets team. The ball sticks. James gets his but other guys (Lawson) suffer for it.

Harden has some maturing to do and some humility to incorporate.

 

To be fair, the teams that have the best efficiency in the clutch are the ones that run their usual offense, like San Antonio (and Golden State, but their usual offense is Curry chucking 3's at a ridiculous clip), so maybe there's a bit of truth here, unless you are lucky enough to have a GOAT on your team

 

Perfect description.

 

I preferred Kenny Smith's shout out to the 93-94 Rockets on TNT during halftime of the Warriors/Lakers telecast.

They had a picture of the whole roster and even called out Scotty Brooks lol.

You're my boy Kenny!