Glad the series is tied and the teams are relatively well matched, but from a talent perspective, is this not the worst NBA Finals in years upon years? I don't remember two worse teams...
Giannis is the best player in the world. Sure the team around him is only good and not great, but when your best player is better than everyone else he makes up for a lot. The Suns are a very good team. 3 All NBA caliber players and a lot of strong role players around them. The fact that they don't have an uber talent does hold them back some though
No he’s not. Maybe the most dominant force, but I’d take KD or a healthy Kawhi over Giannis every day of the week. Both guys are better two way players. Bucks wouldn’t have even gotten by Brooklyn If the Nets had 2 of their star players healthy.
Giannis is a far more complete 2 way player. It isn't close. Giannis is not only the best defender of the 3, but he is also the most versatile defender of the 3. He is also the most balanced offensive player. In fact, the ONLY thing that either Durant or Leonard does better than Giannis is shoot the ball (and even with that Giannis has a better eFG and TS% than Leonard and isn't all that far behind Durant). Shooting is obviously very important, but it doesn't make up for the fact that literally everything else Giannis is better at. He is a better ball handler, he is a better passer, he gets to the line more, he rebounds better, he is much more suited for actually running an offense, etc. Giannis is the best player in the world, has been for the last couple of years, and almost certainly remain so for the next couple of years. Frankly, barring major injury, the only person in the league that could overtake him as best player in the league at any time in the next 5 seasons is Doncic.
The dude can’t even score outside of the paint! LMA0. Stopped reading after that.
Sure he can, but even with his deficiency he still scores more efficiently than Kawhi. So what does that say about Kawhi.
I'm with Goldstar88. I'd even go as far as to say that Giannis is overrated. He's an elite defender. One of the best of all time. He's also close to unstoppable 1-on-1. That said, he scores the vast majority of his points in the paint or via free throws. Whenever opposing treams create a wall in the paint, Giannis has 2 options: either he settles for a long jumper/a one-legged fadeaway or he finds the open man on the perimeter (which is the correct basketball play). To his credit, he's a great passer. Most of the times he makes the right play. My point is, he's not a closer. Middleton is the closer for the Bucks, exactly because Giannis cannot consistently create his own shot in the half court (especially in the clutch when FT% comes into play). It's a bit like the PP-KG situation in Boston. KG was our best player, but PP was our closer. To put it another way, Giannis needs a go-to scorer next to him. He cannot be the #1 option in the clutch. This is a big weakness in my book.
Personally speaking, I'd rather have LeBron, Jokic, Luka, Kawhi (if he were healthy), KD and Steph over Giannis (the order is completely random). All these guys are better shot creators in the half court compared to Giannis. But that's just me. Don't get me wrong, Giannis is amazing. At the end of the day, you can't go wrong with any of these players.
Shaq wasn't a closer either, still the best player in the world for a 3-5 year period. The league's all time leading scorer took just 18 3 pointers in his entire career making just 1. The league's 2nd all time leader scorer shot 27.4% from 3. The guy many regard as the greatest player ever shot just 32.7% from 3 and had nearly as many seasons under 20% as he did over 30% (5 to 6). And Giannis has certainly had some stretches of very poor foul shooting, but he is a career 71.7% shooter from the line, which isn't that far off from guys like Lebron and Luca.
People still think of Giannis as this skinny kid playing on the wing, but Giannis is a massive and legit PF/C. You don't need those guys bombing 3 pointers. In fact, you are better served when they don't. Giannis on the year hit shots from 0-3 feet at 83.7% (he takes 45.1% of his shots from that range which was the smallest percentage in his career). That is absolutely insane. As a comparison, Shaq's best season since they started keeping the stat (96-97) was 79.2% in 00-01 (when Shaq was in the middle of that 3 reign of dominance). Giannis shooting in the post is unquestionably the best shot in all of basketball. There is no better shot anyone can take. Period.
Nobody expected from Kareem, Malone and Jordan to become above average 3pt shooters. The league has come a long way since the 70's, the 80's and the 90's.
Agreed that Giannis is close to unstoppable 1-on-1 in the paint. Problem is, he cannot get to his spots in cramped spaces. Elite defensive teams can wall him out of the paint. Look no further than last night's game. He was great as a facilitator, but he couldn't score at will like he did in games 2 and 3. Middleton was the one carrying the offensive load for the Bucks. Giannis scored plenty of his points as a cutter or even as a roller. Middleton was running the PnR.
Agreed that Giannis shouldn't be bombing 3 pointers. Imo, he should be playing off the ball more often in the half court. If only the Bucks had an elite PnR ball handler. Middleton and Jrue are great 2-way players, but they are nothing special as PnR ball handlers.
Regarding Shaq, he was dominating the paint against 7-foot behemoths. Most of modern-day bigs aren't as tall/strong/heavy, cause they are expected to play D on the perimeter as well.
Giannis scored 26 points last night on 19 shots. It isn't like he didn't score and I also don't think he was stopped from doing so, there were just guys with better looks, so he passed it to them.
Middleton was creating most of his looks by himself (especially in the clutch). Giannis couldn't consistently do the same thing, hence he was often relying on his teammates to create looks for him (via rolling or cutting to the basket). He was also creating looks for his teammates as well (including for Middleton). This is part of the reason why he's an elite player. He ain't forcing his shots. He takes whatever the defense gives him. But again, he's not a closer. This is my point. Imo, it's a big weakness. I'd rather have (for instance) Jokic over him, cause he's an elite closer.
You seemed to have watched a different game than I did. Giannis and Middleton were playing the 2-man game in the clutch of the game.
Middleton had the better looks, so Middleton was taking the shots, but Middleton had those looks because the defense was focused heavily on stopping Giannis. Sometimes the best closer is the one that doesn't take the shot himself. That has been a criticism of James throughout the years as well, it was nonsense then and it is nonsense now.
And if you had Jokic instead of Giannis you wouldn't need to worry about closing out games because Jokic would give up 120 points and his team wouldn't in the game at the end.
Don't think LeBron is an elite closer either. Imo, he's a better closer than Giannis, cause he's a way more versatile scorer. He can drive the lane and bully his way to the rim, he can score from the perimeter, he can create his own shot out of the PnR, he can post up shorter/weaker opponents, he can do it all. That said, he still relies a lot on his teammates in the clutch. This ain't a knock on LeBron. Not in the slightest. I absolutely love his pass-first / team-first mentality. Just like Giannis, he usually takes whatever the defense gives him. He's trying to make the right basketball play.
You act as if Jokic is some kind of scrub. The way I see it, you can't go wrong with any of these guys. It's just a matter of personal preference. LeBron is probably the only one separating himself from the rest of the group (assuming he's healthy). When all is said and done, I believe Luka will be up there as well. Imo, he's a GOAT candidate in the making. Was watching him a few days ago leading tiny little Slovenia to the Olympics for the first time in their history. It seemed as if this kid was always making the right play. His BBIQ is out of this world!
Agree to disagree on game 4. Imo, Giannis cannot create his own shot when the opposing team is walling the paint. He ain't versatile enough as a scorer to consistently create his own shot, especially in the clutch. Guys like KD and Luka (among a few others) are litearally unstoppable no matter how you defend them. All you can do is just hope they miss their shots. I'd put Tatum in this group as well. His step-back 3 is unguardable. He's also an elite PnR ball handler for his size.
