The thing about Russell Westbrook is that he's just. ot a smart basketball player. He relies more on his athleticism to play the game than his understanding of the game. One a game to game basis, it wouldn't surprise me to him see explode for 40+ pts, but I can say the same if he jacks up 25 shot attempts and has 7 or 8 turnovers.
Its not even about him taking less shots, just better ones. It doesn't take a lot for him to get caught up in a game of one-up with an opposing player and stop effectively running the offense. Is it on Durant to reel him in at that point? Maybe. But let's not pretend that Russell doesn't have his own history of throwing tantrums and pouting on the sidelines.
And yes, I do agree with some that Kevin Durant could stand to be assertive, but we were all saying similar things about LeBron a few years ago.
The criticism of Lebron and Durant is not the same because they have different style of games. People wanted Lebron to be less a facilitator and more of a scorer, and while I always thought it was fooey, you could at least understand it since the Cavs offense ran through Lebron. Durant is not the facilitator of that team and he never will be. It isn't his style of play. His game is much more like Kobe's and he needs to have a lot more of Kobe's mentality in him. He doesn't have to go crazy selfish like Kobe does a lot, but he does need to be more aggressive like Kobe is.
I disagree with the Kobe comparison - true, Kevin isn't the fascilitator LeBron is but its clear OKC is trying to develop that aspect of his game and he's more willing to develop that part of his game than Kobe seems to be. My main point in the comparison with LBJ and Kevin was that at one point people questioned LeBron's killer instinct. It really ramped after they lost in the Finals to Dallas - there were questions as to why he didn't have that killer instinct like Jordan or Kobe or even Dwade. Now it Kevin turn to deal with that criticism.
Durant is in the midst of his career best APG at 4.7. Kobe Bryant has matched or exceeded that number in 12 of his 17 seasons. Durant is simply a taller Kobe without the aggressiveness.
I think you're over simplifying to try to make the Kobe Bryant / Kevin Durant comparison work. Kevin leads OKC in scoring as well as being tied as their leader in rebounding and clearly OKC thinks he can grow as a facilitator and become a very well rounded player. For some players, aggression isnt inherent, they have to work on it. I see no reason why Kevin can't.
If you want a Kobe Bryant comparison, I'll give you one. Like Russell Westbrook, Kobe in his younger years could explode by defenders at will. But Kobe also has a high BBIQ and fundamentals, and as his athleticism has waned, he's been able to redefine his game. If Russell had to do the same, I'm not sure he could pull it off. I'm not saying Russell is a bad player, clearly he's not. But he's a bit overrated in my opinion. I think OKC would've just as good or better with a Durant/Harden tandem instead of a Durant/Westbrook tandem.
Topic: Westbrook shoots 25 pts with 27 shots, and durant only shot 13 times (Read 8106 times)