not pacing yourself to play 4 quarters is a result of low bball iq not passing to teammates who have a better shooting % and are not as tired as you is a result of low bball iq
the constant amount of bad shots he takes is just part of the reason why he has low bball iq imo. lets take 18 3 pters for someone that is a sub 30% shooter. just terrible iq there. he fails to understand efficiency is the key to being a true contender in today's league with the pace and skilled players all across. because of his inefficiency, he limits his ceiling to the wow factor triple doubles w/ his extreme usage rate and his team being lower level playoff team. whether this will improve remains to be seen cause to be fair i do recognize this is the first time hes had a team of his own. And of course due to the circumstances he did feel he had something to prove coming into this year. But to this point WB has stayed true to who he is throughout these years so i guess well see.
I definitely think Westbrook, Harden, Lebron, and Kawaii all have very very high BBIQ's. Westbrook - I mean, it's ridiculous to say he has a low BBIQ - the guy is OCD and goes back and watches the film of every game and analyzes it for what he could have done better. He's know as the hardest worker and very by the book. Everything he does is very deliberate. I can't believe I am actually having to defend him. You guys need to just stop being homers for a moment and just be basketball fans - appreciate the brilliance of what he is and does. It's not often that a player like him comes along - freakishly athletic and freakishly driven. Comparing him to Steve Francis....anyone who does that doesn't know squat. Westbrook isn't like Francis, and definitely not like T-mac. He's at the Jordan and Kobe level. And frankly, he works a lot harder than Harden does. When's the last time a guy who was 6'3" was out rebounding most centers and power forwards in the league? You don't get those kinds of rebounds just by being freakishly athletic. You have to know where to go well before the ball hits the rim. That's high bbiq. Stop being ridiculous.
last time i checked he said publicly he doesn't watch film but ok. in this case, im not being a homer at all. Im telling it like it is. Im a fan of his staying true to self attitude but at the same time I recognize his huge flaw that will not allow him to be as good as he could really be. And that flaw again is his bball iq not being as high as it should be for a player of his caliber. I actually don't see how it's even debatable. he plays the exact same way no matter how the game presents itself to him and his team. the best players know and learn to adjust accordingly. that's something he doesn't do too well.
What adjustment can you make? If he sits on the bench, they start losing. if he "paces" himself, they will lose. He already creates 10+ assists a game for his teammates - it's not that he doesn't pass. I mean what exactly could he have done differently? They weren't going anywhere. They are probably in the lotto for a top five pick without him. So I find it strange that people think he should have played differently
He must change his attitude, "ball is my only friend on the court" , no wonder KD left the ball hogger.
Too many emotions for a stats-loving GM who plucked this kid out of Russia and watched him lock down the MVP of another stats-loving GM while being a big shot sniper on offense and at only $6m salary. I bet Morey was crying like he was watching The Notebook when he heard that quote.
None of your post makes sense. Hard work has nothing to do with bbal IQ wtf. Athleticism and drive has nothing to do with bbal IQ. You can be athletic, driven, a hard worker and still have low bball IQ like De Andre Jordan. You can also be lazy, unathletic and out of shape but have high bball IQ like Juwon Howard. Deliberate? You mean Westbrick is deliberately shooting 3s even when he is 27%? He is deliberately breaking the usage record while shooting fg at 30%? What does his rebounds have to do with anything? His rebs are due to stat padding, if you take away all the defensive rebs his centers and pfs give him his offensive rebs are just average. Brilliance to describe Westbrick is an oxymoron. Dude's bball IQ is among the worst tier for supersfars in the league. He is a lot of things, but brilliant he ain't.
there's quite a few adjustments he can make actually. one is of course trusting others around him more. that's obvious. it's actually awful imo seeing 4 guys watch wb dribble and basically the rest of his guys get out of the way and not move bc WB is throwing the shot up regardless of difficulty. I was loving it all series long bc he was doing houston a favor. sure he'll hit some shots. I mean if you jack up 30-40 shots a game, some are bound to go in but things will come back down to earth eventually. two, not jacking up so many shots that are contested. you move the ball around and trust a better shot will develop. that's the point of having teammates. Three, learn to read the game better. others are pace and decision making. there's absolutely no reason you play the exact same way in every single game. the game is predicated on flow which is different in every game, however he plays at the same tempo, same mentality, same decisions regardless. the best players break down how a game is going and attack it accordingly. Not every single game has to be about him. Other guys do have their nights but you'll never hear about that. It's all about wb's triple doubles. You say they start losing when he sits on the bench. well that's no surprise, he forces himself to do everything for them when hes in the game so no one else is truly getting into the flow of the game to give themselves a chance to hold it down while hes out. These guys need confidence also. Our game plan was to allow him to get off as many shots as he wanted on the perimeter but of course contest as much as possible while showing him different bodies. He not once adjusted to that in any of the 5 games and still played the exact same way, putting up bad shot after bad shot after bad shot. What I think gets kind of overlooked to me is coaching. Whether BD is hesitant to add versatility to OKC's offense bc of wb's alpha mentality is a possibility. As a coach, he should be more active in wb's effect on the game whether they agree with each other's ideas or not. Just bc he creates 10 assists doesn't just mean he "passes". There's a big difference in passing the ball to get a good shot and passing the ball to get your team in a rhythm and flow. You'll rarely see multiple actual basketball passes with okc, bc it's understood by the team that it will go back to WB more times than not. Again for the record, i think wb is a hell of a talent. Pretty much is unarguable when he is in those moments but his bball iq will hold him back from being as great as he could be, especially when that athleticism will eventually regress.
