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

This is always a dishonest argument when someone bring up rings. "Oh, so you're saying Steve Kerr is better than Barkley?!" it's dishonest because you know that's not what anyone is saying that someone on the bench is better than a star player just because he got a ring. You know that's not what I'm saying.

Also, funnily enough Westbrook won the MVP award over Harden because of people obsessing over stats and not Team Success like they usually do.

Yeah, I don't care about efficiency so I'm not making that argument.

I can argue that having an inefficient player makes the team better because he's a great player and there is more to the game than if you hit 50% of your shots. Remember that if Russ simply connected on two dunks and the other shot he missed he'd have a good night shooting against Philly...an efficient shooting night...and I'm to believe that it would have wiped out all the bad things he did that game? Nah. I'm sorry.

When your team is down 6 points with 3 minutes left to go, your regular-season efficiency doesn't matter. Remember, the person I'm arguing thinks Westbrook makes the team WORSE,

KAT individual ratings put him as one of the best players in the NBA but people watching the game can see how Jokic is better. I remember a few games ago against the Pacers he simply took over when it mattered, making every shot, a few circus shots...and got his team a tough win. That's what matters.

This is why I don't care much about CP3s 'efficiency' because it's not around when we need it to be.

 

well IF Russ would've made the 3 simple dunks not only would his efficient been 50 percent for the night but Philly would not have scored on the other end of the court...those were 5-10 point swings...that's not gonna happen often but it did so yea in that game Russ being more efficient scoring on those 3 dunks would've pushed the lead up towards 20 points versus reducing the lead down to 5 points or whatever it was. including the swing in momentum back in philly's favor..but I take it as a "one off" rare big foot sighting he missed 3 dunks..not gonna trip on it

 

It's impossible to say if it would have staved off their run though as Russ was also just making bad decisions in general. Philly didn't have to score either, the team was back on defense on IIRC two of those plays, they could have gotten a stop and thus wiped out the miss...but in the end when it mattered Russ controlled himself better at the end, hit some big shots, and we won the game against one of the better teams in the NBA.

One interesting stat is that both Russ and Harden's clutch +/- (since that's so important to some) is higher this year than last year. Maybe it's just a coincidence but if you ask me Russ tends to come up with big plays near the end of the game, big rebounds, usually for some reason hits a big a three, and usually has an and1 in there or so.

 

Russ had a nice sequence in the 4th against Philly where he hit a midrange J and a 3. He also does not hog the ball when its winning time. He generally gives it to Harden to initiate and then waits for the ball so he can attack. On offense, we are okay. It’s the defense that will need to pick up

 

Yep. If Capela can continue to play the way he did against Philly and Russ plays the same way and make his dunks I like their chances in making a nice run in the playoffs. Heck if we can get anything out of Daniel House/Tucker on offense as well this team has a high ceiling. A lot of things gotta go RIGHT but that Philly game was a nice blue print for them to follow for the rest of the season. I would think Russ/Harden +/- being higher is no coincidence..good to know!

 

Yep, that's the post I just made and I know you mentioned it before but Capela really is the key to a championship run. He has to develop into basically a borderline all-star player if not an all-star player. He has to become downright elite with finishing around the rim (and I think he can get there if he stops going up to lay up and just tries to dunk everything around the rim) and hopefully his chemistry with Russ improves.

 

Paul doesn't even lead their team in scoring. And if he were still here we'd be a worse team. He's still good but not what we need anymore.

 

How is something that strongly correlates to reaching the NBA finals not talking about winning it all?

It is a proven fact that high net ratings correlates the strongest to reaching the finals.

It is ludicrous to ignore irrefutable evidence that one player is hurting us just because things are better than 1 down year. Like literally insane to ignore how bad his shooting is. It’s not just slightly below league average. This is several levels lower than league average.

Each game each team has an equal number of possessions. The name of the game is to be more efficient in your possessions than your opponent is with theirs. Westbrook plays are lowering our overall team efficiency. Fact.

One day it will dawn on you that efficiency is the most important thing in basketball. I’m honestly quite surprised a fan of the most analytically driven team hasn’t seen, understood and accepted the irrefutable evidence that the correlation of high net rating leading to more success. This kind of stuff became widespread accepted knowledge years ago to be honest.

Again why accuse me of strawmanning if that’s all you are going to do? Who said **** about Harden vs Jordan?

Westbrook has been and still is a player that is sooo inefficient and has such a high usage that it has become impossible for his positives to consistently outweigh his negatives.

 

Yeah...and so does winning a lot of games which is what I've said.

I was asked if I'd rather the team be 10-0 or 8-2 with a better net rating, I said 10-0 because usually the team with the best records go on to win championship.

It is also ludicrous to downplay last season as "1 down year" and ignore that our net rating is better this year because it counters the argument you just made about net rating lol.

Actually, considering the league average is anywhere between 420-450 for shooting he is shooting slightly below league average. Not sure what the average this year is though.

The name of the game is to have more points than your opponent does at the end of the game, not to do it more efficiently. I don't think its a coincidence that Harden's and Westbrook's +/- clutch stats are better than last years. It looks like Harden has an easier time finishing off games with Russ on the floor than CP3.

One day it will dawn on you that you can be efficient as **** and miss the last 3 shots and all that efficiency means nothing because you didn't make shots when it mattered. You can keep going on and on about efficiency stats but they do not always tell the full story.

Unless again...we really think Trez has more value than PG13 and KAT >> Jokic the stats support this.

Who applied that to you? I said that's what Morey said. Morey literally said that Harden is better than Jordan and used stats for this argument. Not even here on this forum did people agree with that nonsense. I bring it up because you brought in Morey as some authority on basketball as if he's figured it all out. Clearly he hasn't and I'm sure he'd disagree with your idea that stats can tell the final value of players, he just uses them to ASSIST in his evaluation of players.

So, are you really going to stand by Westbrook being a historically inefficient player? You should look at where he stands with those stats you love, PER, +/-, etc etc...he's been one of the best in history lol.

Your hate for this player is amazing, I bet you root for us to lose just to make your point. You sure didn't post this much about him when he was playing well for 2 months.

 

haha deja vu with you here and we've move on from Dwight now moved on from CP3..we def on same page on this one!

 

Yea man wtf?!? Paul is a scoring guard—what’s up with his sucky ass looking to pass instead of score

 

Welp you have been on a slow but steady pace leading to making no sense at all.

You really just cited FG% in reference to shooting efficiency and are seriously trying to downplay how sadly inefficient Westbrook is.

This is comical.

Here’s your first tip to efficiency enlightenment.

At the end of each game the team who won the game WAS the most efficient with their possessions. It’s a mathematical certainty.

Take the time. Go through the last 30 years. Look at the teams in the finals and where they ranked in net rating that year. After seeing the results you either would have to not understand numbers or just being willfully ignorant to not see that high net ratings teams are consistently making the finals.

Westbrook’s efficiency numbers are lower than our teams as a whole. That by mathematical definition means he is lowering the overall efficiency of the team. That means our net rating that is better than last year SHOULD be a hell of a lot better if it weren’t for him eating up so many possessions with his inefficiency.

Your blind love for this player is astounding. You literally ignore reality.

You can keep pointing to random outliers with certain stats, but the problem here is I’m not using one single stat. And not all the stats have outliers for the same players.

I mean would you like to argue that Harden ISNT the most impactful, high efficiency, highest value added player this season? Because that’s what all the stats say. But to you these stats don’t mean much. Well I’m guessing they don’t mean much because you don’t agree with what they say about your baby boy Russ and a handful of random outliers.

 

these guys could easily be 14 out of 15

 

No. Can’t be. He sucks. He’s everything wrong with the Rockets. He’s the new Melo. I want CP3. Waaaaaah.

 

I don't think you understand the stats that you worship so much. It's kind of funny that you always think I'm making no sense yet whenever I make these points about Westbrook it seems I always get a ton of likes just for doing so. Perhaps the only one that fails to see sense here is you.

I brought up FG% because I have no idea what stat you are talking about, you always mention these stats in vague passing, and not all of these stats are concrete valuations of a certain skill. You seem to miss that point. eFG% is not a perfect evaluation of how efficient a player is...otherwise Harden would be behind a ton of players now wouldn't he?

Really now?

I looked at the Pelicans game, the Rockets shot more efficiently than the Pelicans and lost. So...it's not a mathematical certainty at all.

I don't know why you keep bringing this up. I was asked, "Would you rather be a 10-0 team or a 8-2 team with a higher net rating." and I said I would rather be the 10-0 team. Usually, the champion comes from a team with a top 5 best record. This is true too.

Once again, net rating is harder for a player with Russ's role to maintain...by this silly logic, you'd also be saying that Morant also MAKES HIS TEAM WORSE.

Does Morant make his team worse? Does Beal?

The reality of the Rockets being one of the best teams in the NBA with apparently one of the worse players in the NBA playing heavy minutes?

You are right, I wouldn't agree that James is the best or most important player in the league. You are right about that lol. Doesn't mean I HATE Harden, he's still a top 5 player, but he's not better than Lebron until he proves it and gets his team past that man.

I think team results matter. I watch the games, you watch the numbers, it is what it is.

 

LOL

 

You know when people bring up Horry or Kerr, they are using the ad absurdum argument, using an extreme case to show a logical flaw. Ring counting is a dishonest argument. If you are not comparing players by counting their championships, then stop bringing that up. Is Kobe greater than Hakeem then? Or is Bill Russell better than Kareem? You want stars, argue with those then.

That's another dishonest statement IMO. You REALLY do not care about efficiency? If Harden wasn't so efficient, what kind of player would he be?

 

I never ring counted though? I never said (Player X is better than player Y because he has more rings)

I said that Hakeem will always be higher on the high time list and asked "Why is that?" He never attempted to answer but the reason is quite clear that Hakeem has WON and he did produce when it mattered.

No, Kobe is not greater than Hakeem, anyone that brings up rings is not bringing up role players that won rings, they are talking about how that superstar player lead their teams to wins in relation to other superstar players.

Should we not bring up championships AT ALL when discussing the GOATs? Because your reply seems to imply championships just should not really matter in such a discussion.

I explained this in the rest of the post.

If it is Rockets v Clippers and we are in a pivotal game 5- tied 2-2...do you think Russ's regular season efficiency matters if he were to dominate and lead the team to a game 5 win?

That is the point I'm making. I guess we've seen this happen before right? A bunch of inefficient players took over against the Clippers when it mattered?

 

effective field goal and true shooting are the 2 marks of efficiency. Effective field goal does a better job of showing your ability to shoot the ball from the field efficiently while true shooting does the best at showing the efficiency of all your scoring

Regular Field goal percentage is used by uninformed dinosaurs.

efficiency with your possessions does not mean the same thing as scoring efficiency. Scoring efficiency is measured by effective field goal and true shooting efficiency. Possession efficiency is measured by net rating.

https://stats.nba.com/game/0021900488/advanced/?sort=NET_RATING&dir=1

Pelicans net rating +14
Houston’s net rating -14

Mathematical certainty. Every time. The winning team will have been more efficient with their possessions. Every single time.

As for the 10-0 team with the lower point differential vs the 8-2 team with the higher point differential....

https://www.nbastuffer.com/analytics101/point-differential/

 

Dude you are preaching to the choir I'm just talking about the logic why Morey made the trade at the time. At the time WB wasn't available so Morey got who was and that was Cp3. I def agree with the WB trade you should argue with other people here on the thread lol.