“He’s A Top 20 Guy”

[Jvalin]

ESPN’s top 25 list of NBA players playing on Christmas (10 teams): https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/35293605/nba-christmas-day-ranking-top-25-players-hitting-court-espn-five-game-feast

Interestingly, Chris Paul is picked after Jaylen Brunson, Marcus Smart and even Al Horford. I think many think that Chris Paul is cooked. His playoff collapses can’t help. I think he is one of the more overrated players of the last 10 years, along with Harden and Westbrook. Luka and Trae are heading in that same direction.

To make it into the top echelons of NBA players, you have to win. It’s why I still have problems declaring Tatum as a top 3 player until he wins a chip.

Highly doubt he'll be considered a top 3 player even if he wins a chip. Top 5? Possibly. Top 10? He's already there in my book.

(in random order)
Jokic, Giannis, Luka, KD, Steph, Tatum, AD (assuming he comes back healthy), LeBron, Butler, SGA(?) (not sure about the 10th spot)

[MarcusSmartFanClub]

Why are people falling in love with Luka’s stats? Didn’t Harden and Westbrook do similar things? High usage players that aren’t good enough to win the whole thing.

[Jvalin]

Why are people falling in love with Luka’s stats? Didn’t Harden and Westbrook do similar things? High usage players that aren’t good enough to win the whole thing.

Cause Luka is a killer in the clutch (thanks to his elite BBIQ), whereas Harden and Westbrook are chokers. Not Luka's fault that the Mavs have failed to pair him with a reliable second option. Not his fault that they hired Kidd either. He underachieved in his previous coaching jobs, yet for some reason he got the Mavs job.

[Kernewek]

Why are people falling in love with Luka’s stats? Didn’t Harden and Westbrook do similar things? High usage players that aren’t good enough to win the whole thing.

Players aren’t good enough to win the whole thing - teams are. The post-Jordan paradigm shift where individual talent became equivocal to ‘counting the raaaangz’ is insidious for a lot of reasons, but the idea that the only thing that matters to a career is championships is first among them.