Who would you rather build around: Durant or Lebron

Assuming they are at their current age, Durant. If they come in the league at the same time, lebron

 

When LeBron loses his athleticism he will be just a jump shooter, which is not his style. KD shoots mainly jumpers. Give me KD over a 10 year period of time.

 

Durant.

 

OP did not say more specific
I guess it's Prime Lebron 25, 26 yrs versus Prime Durant in 2 years

 

Let's talk about all star level players if you don't like the example of Hughes. The two years before LeBron took his talent to south beach. Wade was in NBA first team. He's in 2nd and 3rd team since.
Bosh was once in NBA 2nd team and he's in all star every year, now he can't make it at all and he has been regularly referenced as 0.5 star by Heat fans.

Now back to the year before Shaq joined the Cavs. He was 18/8 in Suns and made all star roster. He got the biggest slump in his career the year he joined Cavs.

This is not mysterious. I've been calling that for years. LeBron makes teammates worse due to his style. He's a PG that goes to the hole regularly. You need shooting bigman in the perimeter to spread the floor for that. So bigmen ain't going to be efficient by being jump shooters, you can't use their post-up game. They won't be in good position for offensive rebounds either. LeBron is also a ballhog that can't play off ball. Thus he can't be compatible with Wade. What's worse, he also chokes in 4th quarter and defers when it counts. By deferring the difficult shots, he also makes himself more efficient. Unfortunately BB is a game about team efficiency. Something LBJ couldn't help.

 

If that's the case give me LeBron.

 

As a person I like Durant more, as an athlete I like
Lebron more.

If they were both same age I'd take lbj; if the rockets had to choose right now I'd take Durant. I think Durant is more of a clutch shooter, although I do think this "lechoke" stuff is a bit exaggerated as I have seen lbj make some real tough clutch plays. Lbj is more diverse of a player while Durant is limited.

I think there are other key variables that would go into choosing which player to build around.

Overall, I've gotta give it to lebron.

 

Big deal Wade goes from 1st team to 2nd and 3rd. Not shocking considering LeBron is basically the better version of him.

Bosh was once an NBA 2nd team. Keyword "once". You bring up Chris Bosh you do realize that he has made the all-star both times since joining the Heat right? With two ball dominating guys of course his stats would go down.

And last but not least Shaq. Lmao, you mean the same Shaq that was pretty much injured in his only year with LeBron. So since LeBron is to blame for Shaq getting worse in Cleveland surely Shaq would have been back to his normal self in Boston right? Oh but he wasn't. You do realize Shaq played 53 games for Cleveland compared to 75 in Phoenix right?

 

That's actually legit. Before Wade, Lebron and Bosh joined they were all in top 4 PER:
http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/holl...spn.go.com/nba/hollinger/statistics?year=2010

What happened then? No, they didn't become worse players, but someone ballhoged ball more.

Chris Bosh Usage Percentage 2009-10: 28.7
Chris Bosh Usage Percentage 2010-11: 23.5
Chris Bosh Usage Percentage 20011-12: 24.2

Dwyane Wade Usage Percentage 2009-10: 36.2
Dwyane Wade Usage Percentage 2010-11: 31.6
Dwyane Wade Usage Percentage 2011-12: 31.3

Lebron James Usage Percentage 2009-10: 33.5
Lebron James Usage Percentage 2010-11: 31.5
Lebron James Usage Percentage 2011-12: 32.0

 

Less PPG is expected. But you should realize Bosh's declining in both points and FG%. He's shooting 2% less than before he left Raptors. His rebounding numbers goes down significantly too. From 10.8 to 8.3 and 7.9 last 2 years. And the reason is exactly as mentioned. He's forced to be a perimeter jump shooter to complement LeBron. LeBron fanbois boasted how Bosh would be made better because he would now have wide open shots and that. But the reality is just very different. In comparison, Pau Gasol has had higher FG% and more rebounds since joining the Lakers, with slightly less PPG.

Can LeBron play off the ball? Can LeBron play in the post? It isn't like LeBron has no way to makes teammates better. It's because he doesn't have those skills.

I don't understand why Wade going to 2nd and 3rd teams is expected, at least not 3rd team. Tony Parker and Westbrook aint' expected to be better player than Wade before the season starts. If LeBron is the better version of him, he should make him better. Wade is a guard, it wasn't like they compete for the spots either. Pippen didn't have problem making all NBA teams the years MJ was there. In fact, MJ was the reason Pippen made those teams. Gasol made 3rd and 2nd teams since he joined Lakers. He never made it before.

 

As far as I understood it... LBJ worked with the Dream on his post game...
He posts better Field Goal stats
I think he makes teammates better, namely the role players, just not his superstar friends

 

And that's not a big issue? They have no way to get high quality roles due to 3 max salaries they have. Now he's also limiting his super friends.

 

Didn't they play in the Olympics together under Krzyzewski? (That included practicing and playing together every year in the off-season)

 

This.

 

Durant is younger.
If LBJ is reverted to a younger version, it means 'the decision' is just around the corner.

 

Ive said this before. Lebron didnt need the superfriends to succeed. he needed better role players and most importantly a real coach.

flame away but if Lebron were to replace Yao on our 2008 team then we would have won the championship.

 

Unfair question because Durant is so much younger. He's the choice because of that, but if they're both the same age, then it's definitely Lebron. NOBODY else in the NBA can do all of what he can do each and every game.

 

Durant.

 

I'm not even sure whether we will see him dominate the NBA for 1 season.