"Washed up" Chris Paul is the best clutch player in the NBA and will be in All-Star Game this year

Donovan is going for COTY if they keep this up.

 

I guess we all have our opinions but CP3 did little to improve our team. He is a point guard. We already had an outstanding pint guard in James Harden. Like with Westbrook when you have 2 point guards on the court at the same time, one of them is usually standing around. I cannot think of a time in the history of basketball when a team already had an outstanding point guard that they went out and mortgaged the team to get another better than average starting point guard. Especially when they had much bigger needs in other areas. In our case we had and still have a huge need for a better than average power forward.

 

Going from 34 to 31 is downgrading? Are you sure? You realize what paying a 38 yr old Cp3 42M usd means right? I also defended the signing but if there was an opportunity to shed that deal you do it no questions asked. Yes you do give up 2 low first rounders but thats the price you pay to get rid of a 4 year max deal. You have to extend that window as much as you can and the window gets shutdown asap with a 35 yr old Cp3.

Also Harden wanted Cp3 gone and WB on the team. How is that not justifiable? You mean refusing the demands of your superstar the few times he flexes is not justifiable? Lol!

 

It was a gamble that didnt pan out, simple as that. It was an opportunity to add talent to the team thats why that deal got made.

You are speaking from hindsight at the time Harrell was just a 2nd round pick, Beverly was always injured and Cp3 was healthy as an ox. We even had Ryan Anderson starting at the time and Anderson had a market value of 18M a year so he was def seen as a better than average power forward. Of course knowing what we know now it would have been better to trade all those assets for somebody like Davis Bertans but thats with the power of hindsight.

 

You did not watch the Rockets in 2017-2018 if you honestly didn’t see any improvement from the addition of Chris Paul. That is simply asinine.

 

The Rockets gave up a 4 year max deal to get a different 4 year max deal, only they now have less assets and are statistically better with the new max deal on the bench.

Great trade if that’s what you’re looking for, I guess...

 

CP3 gets hurt in the playoffs almost every other year, sometimes back to back years, this guy has the worst timing of getting hurt possibly ever.

We need to remember that the Rockets are playing well right now, tied for 2nd place, a few games out of first, and virtually rolling. Haven't been embarrassed yet by another contender, dropped some silly games sure but they are in a better spot now than they were last year.

All of this and we must remember that when we needed CP3 most, he was either hurt OR just flat didn't show up. That's what has happened.

We didn't break up a championship team, we broke up a pretender. We can go on and on about how the Warriors were one of the best-assembled teams of all time but that is still no excuse to stay pat and run it back when you have the chance to get a younger star.

Team results matter. Individual efficiency stats don't.

 

LOL...I wonder if he's trolling this thread

 

Correction Paul’s deal is 1 year shorter. OKC made out like bandits. A slew of assets, less money and got to look like the good guys doing Russ a favor when you know deep down they were doing cartwheels knowing they were gifted an out.

 

I can’t even....

What?

The ultra god individual efficiency of James Harden DOESN’T matter?!?!?!?

It is precisely THE reason he is arguably the best offensive player ever and a perennial MVP candidate! His unmatched ability to be ultra efficient with the largest volume of shots in the league!

There is nothing that matters more in the NBA. Scoring efficiency is king. Offensive and defensive.

How exactly do you think they calculate a teams results in efficiency?

By adding up all the individual stats.

Westbrooks bad, well below league average efficiency while shooting it 20+ times a game is all added in to our overall team output and drags it down. There is no reasonable excuse for someone so poor at scoring to shoot so much. Our offense and team overall would only get better if he cut his shots in half.

 

Harden may be the most efficient player ever and no one...

Let me repeat.

No one will have him in their top 5 all time...can you guess why?

Hakeem will be higher on that all time list for a reason, it is what it is. Team results are all that matters in the end. Sorry.

 

lol yes. Because while he was a good offensive efficiency player Hakeem was one of the best ever defensive efficiency players. When you combine the 2 it’s all time level. Which is what my post clearly stated.

Nice try on your attempt to dodge your crazy point that individual stats don’t matter. Westbrook uses a lot of possessions and uses them inefficiently and it hurts the team.

Facts

Our offensive rating as a team is 114.1 points per 100
Our offensive rating with Harden on the floor is 115.4 per 100
Our offensive rating with Westbrook on the floor is 109.3 points per 100

His individual output isn’t helping the team results.

 

Your point is silly, because again, Harden may be the most efficient player ever...definitely one of the most. Good luck finding anyone rating him top 5...top 10...probably not even top 15. Can you tell me why that is? According to you, you get rings just for putting up great stats, you are OBSESSED with stats and ignore actual team results because someone doesn't have stats to go with it.

One of the least efficient players (Correction, star players ever) ever is Kobe Bryant. He has 5 rings. Kobe isn't even close to being the offensive player Harden is, yet Kobe basically willed himself to score points when he knew his team needed it and make plays when he knew his team needed it, and that's his legacy, and because of that I guarantee you unless Harden wins rings he will always be ahead of Harden on all-time lists.

No, I'm completely right. That's why coaches and media award winning when it comes to awards, not stats.

Otherwise, we may as well put KAT in the MVP discussion. His advanced stats say he's basically a top 5 player in the NBA. Of course, I disagree, his team should be doing better...but hey, let's ignore the team record and just reward him for his efficiency.

KAT >> Jokic, all the advanced stats say so.

 

People forget the most important stat in basketball. The scoreboard.

 

Well the problem here is that it’s been proven. You can go back and look at all the teams to EVER make the finals in NBA history.

They have a weird commonality. Well not weird at all if you know what you are talking about.

Almost ALL of them were one of the top net efficiency teams in the league. Meaning their offensive efficiency combined with their defensive efficiency were near the top of the league.

Because top efficiency results in better win loss record which results in better chances to advance in the playoffs which results in better chances at a title.

Again this is proven, accepted stuff here.

Do you think it’s just some kind of coincidence that the teams who finish with the best records over the course of a season have the best net ratings?

It again is just clear you don’t have a firm understanding of all this stuff. Efficiency is the name of the game.

Kobe was not even close to being one of the most inefficient players ever. Again another reason to believe you just don’t know what you are talking about here.

Kobe’s efficiency is worlds better than Westbrook’s and Kobe had the convenience of playing with another one of the most efficient players EVER with Shaq.

 

You sure love to strawman, didn't I say team results matter? The Rockets are still one of the most efficient teams in the NBA which has exactly been my point this entire time.

That's been my point the ENTIRE time, that the team is doing fine with Westbrook playing major minutes so obviously the stats are wrong about his effect on the team. There is no way you can play the minutes he does and apparently be such a drag on offense while your team is one of the best offensive teams in the NBA.

You are wrong here.

2019: Best net rating, Bucks.
2018: ROCKETS (Lol, so much for that huh?)
2017: Warriors *
2016: Spurs
2015: Warriors*
2014: Spurs*
2013: OKC
2012: Bulls
2011: Heat
2010: Magic

So...just going by the past 10 years, 3x, 30% of the times the team with the best Net rating won the championship...and in 2014 the Spurs had the best record. In 2015 GSW had the best record and in 2017 the Warriors had the best record.

So you are just wrong here. The best Net rating does not mean you are going to win a championship. As usual, winning playoff games comes down to who can nut up and hit big shots and get big shots, that's what it has always come down to.

Yes, Kobe was inefficient, he was the exact player you'd hate lol. He dgaf about efficiency, he'd tell you the same thing to your face. He missed more shots than any other NBA player in history by the time he retired and he heaps nothing but love on players like Westbrook for having a 'Mamba' Mentality.

The reason Kobe has 5 rings is because when it came time to win big games he was there and he was fearless.

Meanwhile, your efficiency stats still say KAT >> Jokic, so let's put him on ALL NBA first team and lets completely ignore team records because he's efficient.

 

I watched every game. We were better because Harden got better. How much credit CP3 deserves for Harden getting better is something only James Harden knows. He is incredible and an all time great as far as I am concerned. You did not address the point I made. Name me one other team that already had an outstanding point guard, in our case James Harden, that goes out and mortgages the future to obtain another point guard. Especially considering we had and still have more pressing needs.Time will only tell what all these future picks we gave away will turn out to be. We already know what we lost in Beverley, Williams, Harrell, and others.

 

HOLY CRAP I didn’t say best net rating = championship. I clearly said having one of the top net ratings almost always puts you in the finals.

And I definitely never said record doesn’t matter.

Talk about straw man Jesus Christ.

Generally the two teams in the finals every single year are top 5 net rating teams.

Westbrook is bringing our net rating down. He is hurting us. We are currently 7th in net rating. We could be much better and therefore would have a better win loss record. Which would get us better playoff seeding which gives you a better chance to win it all.

How have you been a fan of this team in particular and not learned this stuff just by osmosis yet? This is the stuff Morey and his guys started the Sloan Sports Conference for.

This info comes straight from the man running our team. It’s widely accepted across all sports. You don’t judge a pitchers value by win loss record. That’s dinosaur thinking. The best teams win the most by the most. High net efficiency yields high win totals.

All the results based stats say Westbrook is hurting our efficiency. Not based on some convoluted formula. Based on the team results when he is on the court playing for our team.

We should be better than we are and there are plenty of people on this team that could play better. But Westbrook is numero uno. He’s paid to be that guy, He has the role to be that guy. He gets the shots to be that guy. He has the ball in his hands the 2nd most on this team. No one else on this team has more responsibility to be better than he does.

 

Your argument has devolved into ring counting and award winning now? Horry is better than Hakeem having won 3 more chips? Westbrook was better than Harden when he won MVP because of the triple double thing?

Individual greatness does count toward team success, a lot. Team success, however, has a lot to do with the team makeup, not just individual stats. You can't argue that having an inefficient player somehow makes the team more efficient.

I don't think one can argue one way or the other definitively whether the Paul-Westbrook trade made us better or worse. Our offensive efficiency has dropped slightly from last season's. It might have something to do with Gordon's injury. But we do have a few more shooters than last year. And Harden somehow manages to up his efficiency even more by shooting better at 3. Westbrook is clearly an inefficient player, even when he is not the primary scorer. That is just a fact that shouldn't even be debatable. Do his other positives negate his negatives AND even up CP's contribution? That is debatable.

 

I've been talking about championships this entire time man, I don't know why you're not getting that. I don't care about net rating if it doesn't get your team the championship then it doesn't matter much. You're lowering the goal post as if anything else matters outside of winning championships.

Bringing our net rating down compared to what? It is better this year than it was last year. We've improved when it comes to Net rating.

I mean, I'm sure like Morey you think Harden is better than Jordan too.

Your argument of "They could be playing better..." is an argument literally every team can say. We could have played better last year too, much better, we didn't.

The reality is they are right in the mix of things when it comes to contending.