Hi all,
I was just running through Kyrie's history, and there are a few interesting points I came across that makes me very hopeful for his future here. I hope the points below help to give other's hope too.
1. Parralels with Steph Curry
The biggest criticism right now is that Kyrie is a one dimensional player - he is really just a scorer/shooter and offers little else.
But then again you could argue the Steph Curry was a pretty one dimensional player when he first had his breakout year as well. Leading up to the 12/13 season he had career highs of 18.6 points, 5.9 assists and 4.5 rebounds and at the time was considered to be a pretty mediocre defensive player. He was largely seen as a guard who really didn't offer much beyond scoring.
Then when he turned 24 Curry's scoring jumped from 14.7 PPG to 22.9 PPG, his assists jumped from 5.3 APG to 6.9 APG, and his defence improved significantly...and suddenly some people started recognising him as a guy who had potential to become someone pretty special.
Then about 3 years later, then at the age of 27, he eventually exploded out of nowhere to average 30 PPG, win the league MVP, and carry his team to an NBA championship.
Ironically, Kyrie was also 24 last season when his scoring jumped up dramatically from his usual 19.6 PPG to 25.2 PPG, his assists jumped from 4.7 APG to 5.9 APG, and he recorded the lowest turnover rate (10.3%) of his career. So we are seeing similar jumps in scoring and playmaking from Kyrie at 24 year old as we did from Steph when he hit 24. And while his defence has yet to show promise, we should also note that he is playing for a poor defensive team that rarely puts emphasis on that end of the court. While the Warriors from memory were always a strong defensive team, and really exploded once their offense came to form.
If anything Kyrie's leap is even more impressive because Curry has been the #1 option in Golden State since that first breakout year, while Kyrie has been a #2 option behind Lebron (while also sharing the ball with a prime Kevin Love) since the 14/15 season, when he was 22 year old. And that brings me to my second point...
2. Excelling behind Lebron
If there is one pattern we have seen from every star who's joined one of Lebron's teams, it's that their offensive production always drops off a cliff as soon as they come on-board with the ball dominant LBJ.
Dwyane Wade:
Before Lebron (7 seasons) - 25.4 PPG
During Lebron (4 seasons) - 22.3 PPG
Chris Bosh:
Before Lebron (7 seasons) - 20.2 PPG
During Lebron (4 seasons) - 17.3 PPG
Kevin Love:
Before Lebron (6 seasons) - 19.2 PPG
During Lebron (3 seasons) - 17.0 PPG
We can see here that every time a player goes from being a #1 option on their own mediocre team, to joining Lebron on a contender, their individual scoring tends to drop by 2-3 PPG due to the fact that Lebron is the clear #1 and everything goes through him.
Eveyrbody except one guy...
Kyrie Irving:
Before Lebron (3 seasons) - 20.7 PPG
During Lebron (3 seasons) - 22.4 PPG
Not only has Kyrie's scoring NOT reduced by the standard 2-3 PPG when Lebron and Kevin Love came to town - it actually INCREASED by 2-3 PPG instead.
What this tells me is that if you read between the lines, Kyrie has been showing a level of improvement that isn't clearly reflected in the stats. While his actually scoring numbers had not jumped at all until this season, recent patterns would suggest that if Kyrie DIDN'T improve as a player, we should have seen a 2-3 PPG drop off since Lebron came onboard. The fact that his scoring has increased by 2-3 PPG instead indicates that h's improved dramatically over that stretch - you could argue that he's essentially a 4-6 PPG better scorer then he was before Lebron came to Cleveland...it's just not showing in the stats because that the usually 2-3 PPG "Lebron teammate drop off" is hiding that.
While I didn't run the numbers, I would imagine that Lebron's teammates have probably seen a similar drop off in assist numbers since joining Lebron, since Lebron is always the point-forward on every team he plays on and tends to dominate the ball and make all of the plays. I'm pretty sure both Kevin Love (from ~5 APG to ~3 APG) and D-Wade (from ~7 APG to ~5 APG) saw significant drops in their assist numbers after joining with Lebron.
3. Predicting the future
So with all that taken in to account, lets take a look at Kyrie's current stat line - 25.2 Points, 3.2 rebounds, 5.8 assists. Looking at past history of the "Lebron team mate effect" I would expect Kyrie's scoring to increase by 2-3 PPG and his assists to increase by around 2 APG. His rebounding also has a high chance of increasing slightly, since he's going from a team with Lebron/Love/Thompson to a Celtics team that has zero rebounders.
If this holds true, it wouldn't be out of the question for Kyrie to come out next season putting up numbers in the 28 / 7.5 / 4 range. Now by no means is this the most scientific prediction, but I think I don't think it's out of this world either - and if Kyrie did put up those numbers next year, this would put him in some pretty exclusive company right up there in the Steph Curry realm, and well within the MVP discussion.
Topic: Some points that might make you feel better about our future with Kyrie (Read 3241 times)