I don't think salary has anything to do with it. To me it's about answering the question "can you win a championship if this guy is your best player?" That's the caliber of player that I am looking for. Bradley Beal and Zach Lavine are both on max contracts, do you think you could build a championship team if either of those guys was your best player? The answer is obviously "no", right? How about Sabonis? Siakam? Paul George? I think we can all agree that none of these can be the best guy on a team that wins a championship. And if the we agree to that, then where do you put that guy? What do you call him? They're in that space between "superstar" and "roleplayer" that you were asking about.
This is a dumb metric to use as nobody knows that until it happens. Who predicted Pacers would be in the finals and take OKC to 7 games? They could have won and Hali would be seen as a guy who you can win a championship with. Is Hali even a superstar now since they didnt win? Unless you got the eyes of an oracle you cant really say so this is just nothing but based on subjective opinions. In fact GSW won 2 times with KD as their best player but you dont see him as a star right? So really your metric doesnt really make any sense. Your argument is KD won so many years ago, he has declined since then but do you know if he has declined enough to no longer be the best player in a championship team anymore? Nobody can really know that and it applies to every single player who hasnt won anything the last couple of years. Jokic and Giannis also won a long time ago the same applies to them. Finally, winning a championship doesnt just require a best guy it also requires a great team. When Celtics won they did it on the back of a stacked squad besides having Tatum who tbh played like garbage for most of the playoffs. So again that throws another variable into your "can you win with him" question because someone like Luka Doncic for example can you win with him or not? He got a team to the Finals but he hasnt won yet so you dont know if he can be that guy or just a flawed star like James Harden. You have to build a stacked team that complements him and only then you can answer that question if he wins a ring. If it doesnt happen like with the Lakers how can anybody say if he is a star or not based on your logic? Nobody can say lol. Again it all boils down to subjective feelings with no set standard. Thats why you think KD isnt even a star and IMO he is a superstar. Guys like Bradley Beal and Zach Lavine the first thing people say is they are overpaid so IMO the star definition should definitely be based on salary, not his actual salary but his production or market value if he was a. FA right now. If a guy is performing at a max level or better than he is a star. If he is performing at a super max level then he is a superstar. KD by this definition is def better than the max but not worth the 70M super max, which reflects his 10-20 ranking in the NBA.
Of course nobody knows, it’s an opinion question. That doesn’t make it dumb, that’s what makes it interesting. It’s up for you to decide! That’s the whole point! Yes KD was a superstar, and yes he’s declined due to age. Is he still up there? I don’t think he is. And it sounds like you do, which is fine. Neither of us have to be wrong about it. That’s why places like clutchfans exist, so fans can talk about this stuff with each other. It’s subjective. It’s not about being an oracle or absolute truths, it’s just about having your own sports opinions. And yes, obviously you need a good team. You’re further proving the point I was making to you earlier in this thread about “just because you are a superstar doesn’t automatically make your team a contender.” You’re discovering the points on your own that I was trying to explain. if you want my personal opinion on Luka I definitely think he is a superstar. I also think harden was. But some people don’t and that’s fine too.
Yes, there are examples, Harden, Barkley, Malone, T-Mac, etc. are obviously bona fide superstars. But that’s not the point at all, these examples only weaken your argument, the teams that they were on didn’t win a title. OTOH, players like Duncan, Kawhi, maybe even Bill Russell would not be considered superstars without the rings. So when people say Chauncey’s Pistons were the only exception, I just don’t buy that. There are many championship teams with "superstars" that are validated by the ring, not by their stats. Which is the whole argument. You say we don’t have superstars because we don’t have stats leaders…. I say that’s wrong.
I never disputed your statement that just because you have a superstar doesnt mean your team is a contender. I think everybody knows that. My point is that you are saying the Rockets have no star based on that Andy dude's ranking but Lakers have the no 3 and no 14 guy and they are a lot worse than the Rockets who you say have no stars. Everybody knows NBA is a star driven league but the Rox are top 5 offensive net rating and top 10 defensive rating with no stars? That seems illogical to me. My question is why you think Luka and Harden are superstars? They have never won a ring. Based on your question "can you win with them as the best guy" the answer so far is no so they also shouldnt be stars in your eyes. Harden also will never win a ring as the best guy so the answer for him is definitely NO but you still think he is a superstar? Ok lol. That just doesnt make any sense esp when everyone agrees KD has been better than Harden from day 1 to now. I dont think its interesting if its just 100% opinion based. Thats just he said she said with no resolution other than agree to disagree.
We lack a coach that understands which lineups work defensively. Ime has 50 years of NBA experience with a defensive mindset and still doesn't know what works.
There are about 450 active players each year. If you are a Top 10 player that means you are in the top 2% of the league. I think teams that win the Championship generally have a handful of players in the Top 30 (Top 5%) in order to pull it off or someone who is so unstoppable, a la Jokic, that hes going to do it all and you're basically helpless. I'm not able to look at the roster construction of the past few Championship teams but I'm fairly confident several players in the top 30 were a prerequisite to win it all.
Jesus man, it's not about that one guys rankings. I just threw up his rankings as a list to look at because you were just listing box score stats at me. His list is not perfect, and it's not my list. I could have also posted the ringer top 100, or some other blog that decided to rank the top players. I think Luka and Harden are superstars because of how good they are at basketball. The question is not "did you win a ring" its "can you win a ring" which is why I have Harden in there. It's not like you get disqualified from being a superstar if it never actually happens. That's why guys like Barkley, Malone, Chris Paul, Nash, etc are superstars too. I think Harden absolutely could've won a ring, probably multiple rings, if he had better roster construction, better teammates, better coaching, a little bit of luck, or whatever else. And the same goes for the other four I just mentioned. Here is the list of the best player on the last 20 championship winners - Tatum, Jokic, Curry, Giannis, Lebron, Kawhi, Steph/KD, Tim Duncan, Dirk, Kobe, KG, Dwyane Wade. That's your group of winners, and I think you need a player on your team that belongs in that group if you want to win it all. You can use metrics if you want, although I suspect you would get mad and insult me (or the metric) if I picked one in particular, but Luka and Harden belong in this group based on pretty much any metric you want to choose. Lets just say they're all All Stars and also they're all All-NBA players. Or if you just want to use the good old eye test, they belong using that as well. At least to me they do - it's very clear just from watching them play that both are as good as these guys, and belong in the club. To me, that means you can win a championship with them. Conversely, to use my other examples, it is very clear that Zach Lavine and Paskal Siakam do not belong in that group. So if either of those is your best player, I am confident in saying "that team isn't going anywhere." And that's unfortunately how I feel about the rockets this year.
You say there are many championship teams with superstars that are validated by the ring, can you name one? I'm curious, because I looked back 30 years and I can't find one, aside from Chauncey. Tim Duncan and Kawhi are both laughable examples, Duncan won multiple MVPs and was all-nba for 15 years, Kawhi was in MVP talks for multiple years, 2x DPOY, 6x all nba...these guys were very obvious superstars regardless of rings.
yes, sure. 1999 Spurs 2006 Heat 2019 Raptors These are the title runs that validated Duncan, Wade and Kawhi as superstars. They were not considered superstars at the time. However, since you also consider superstars PAST their prime unable to lead a team to the title, like KD, I should add: 2014 Spurs 2022 Golden State Just off the top of my head….
the 06 heat also a guy named shaq, if you remember him. Idk who didn’t have kawhi as a superstar in 2019 when he was widely considered a top 5 player and had finished 2nd and 3rd in mvp his previous 2 seasons he played. The spurs in 14 are a fair example but they did have 4 HOF, and the rockets have nobody close to 22 steph (and that team needed ungodly injury luck with every good team going down).
How can you say you can win a ring with Harden when he has never won a ring and will never win a ring as the best guy? There is literally no way Harden will win a ring anymore in his career. Even funnier lots of people will say KD is better at basketball than James Harden but you dont even see KD as a star. And he even won two rings so unlike Harden you know for a fact you can win with KD as your best guy. Respectfully, it makes zero sense just like your definition of a star. Like I said this is what makes your entire argument just a case of opinions with no way to see common ground unless you both have the same opinion. And its fine we can totally disagree. Its just funny you have no actual basis other than your opinion.
David Robinson was the clear best player on that 1999 spurs team, Wade was an allstar and 2nd team all-nba in 2006 (they also had a slightly washed Shaq who was still an allstar and 1st team all-nba), and Kawhi was very obviously an established superstar by 2019. Curry in 2022 was obviously still a superstar, still an allstar, still all-nba, and they also got super lucky with opponent injuries to win that title. The only good example on here is actually the 2014 spurs, and that is actually a good one. You could say that's an outlier or that it "breaks" my theory, because they really don't have anyone that fits my criteria. They did have a lot of the same dynasty pedigree though. But still, that is a good example.
Every players career is basically a sample size of 1. There's a lot of luck/variance that goes into championships. For example, if Garnett never asked out of minni, he never wins a ring. Does that mean he wasn't good enough to do it? Of course not, since we know he did it. If you replay harden's career 100 times, in some of those careers he wins a title, or 2, or more. Maybe he stays in OKC and they win 4-5. Maybe the injury luck breaks differently in some of the seasons (for example in 21 the nets EASILY win the title if he and kryie don't get hurt).
I'm sorry if this concept of a hypothetical isn't something that makes sense to you. If you can't wrap your head around "he never did, but he was good enough, and he could have" then I think we can just stop the discussion here.
But KD did it twice no ifs and buts no hypothetical needed and he isnt a star to you So the hypothetical guy who has never done it but could have is a superstar but the guy who actually did it isnt a superstar?
He did it at 28 and 29, he's now 37 post achillies tear. Are you of the opinion that he's the same guy he was?
Harden is also no longer the same guy he was so why is he still considered a superstar? KD at prime was considered top 10 in NBA history. Even if he fell off he can still be considered a star due to how high his peak was. He doesnt need to be at his peak since his peak was one of the best ever.
