If the Cavs called tomorrow...

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PapaG said:
How many championship teams in recent years was the PG the 'focal point' or No. 1 player? I suppose the Spurs in 2007 with Parker, but during the season Duncan was the focal point. Other than that, I can't think of an NBA champion since Magic Johnson where the PG was the 'focal player' for the team, and Magic never won a title w/out Kareem, anyhow.
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For as 'great' as Chris Paul is, he's never been the conference finals. He's been on some pretty good teams.
 
OneLifeToLive said:
For as 'great' as Chris Paul is, he's never been the conference finals. He's been on some pretty good teams.
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I had this conversation the other day in a thread about LMA getting a max. Paul has a history of bad knees/missing games, he's the same age as LMA, yet nobody would blink giving him a max deal. He's gone as far in the playoffs as Damian Lillard has in 4.5x the seasons. He's only played over 70 games once in the last 5 seasons.

Chris Paul is my favorite non-Blazer player to watch, fwiw.
 
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PapaG said:
I had this conversation the other day in a thread about LMA getting a max. Paul has a history of bad knees/missing games, he's the same age as LMA, yet nobody would blink giving him a max deal. He's gone as far in the playoffs as Damian Lillard has in 4.5x the seasons. He's only played over 70 games once in the last 5 seasons.

Chris Paul is my favorite non-Blazer player to watch, fwiw.
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Paul generally makes everyone around him better. That's extremely valuable. He's not a guy that's going to carry a team though. He's not an Isiah Thomas. He's not a Stephon Marbury. He's a John Stockton. How good would the Jazz have been without Malone? Obviously Stockton was amazing, but could he have carried that team? I don't think so. Similarly, I don't think Rondo can carry the Celtics. There's two types of point guards. There's guys like Derrick Rose, John Wall, and Damian Lillard, who are scorers. They can carry a team offensively, but they don't really make others around them better. That's not to say Dame isn't a good point guard, but he's not a pure point guard. Paul is cut from a different cloth. There aren't many like him.
 
PapaG said:
How many championship teams in recent years was the PG the 'focal point' or No. 1 player? I suppose the Spurs in 2007 with Parker, but during the season Duncan was the focal point. Other than that, I can't think of an NBA champion since Magic Johnson where the PG was the 'focal player' for the team, and Magic never won a title w/out Kareem, anyhow.
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That would be the Pistons with Isaiah Thomas.
 
BBert said:
Nobody said championship teams didn't have a power forward. The question was, on how many championship teams was the power forward the team's 'focal point' or No. 1 player, and in the context of whether in today's NBA, is a power forward more important to a championship than guards and wings?
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In today's NBA guards and wings are more important by far. In the 80's and most of the 90's it was the other way around. Power forwards actually played with power, Even centers played with more power back in the 80's and 90's then they do in today's NBA. In today's NBA most power forwards want to play like wings and pretty soon it wont be long till centers play like wings because everyone just wants a jump shot. Today's NBA is more finesse & flashy. There's no real contact in today's NBA where the league use to allow defenders to be more physical.
 
BigGameDamian said:
In today's NBA guards and wings are more important by far. In the 80's and most of the 90's it was the other way around. Power forwards actually played with power, Even centers played with more power back in the 80's and 90's then they do in today's NBA. In today's NBA most power forwards want to play like wings and pretty soon it wont be long till centers play like wings because everyone just wants a jump shot. Today's NBA is more finesse & flashy. There's no real contact in today's NBA where the league use to allow defenders to be more physical.
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Of the 5,000 posts by BGD this is his first decent one.
 
More often than not the title team has the best player in the NBA a lock for the Hall of Fame. There have been a couple of exceptions but teams shouldn't be built based on exceptions.
 
Schilly said:
More often than not the title team has the best player in the NBA a lock for the Hall of Fame. There have been a couple of exceptions but teams shouldn't be built based on exceptions.
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So what you're saying is, Damian is a lock for the hall of fame?
 
Natebishop3 said:
Paul generally makes everyone around him better. That's extremely valuable. He's not a guy that's going to carry a team though. He's not an Isiah Thomas. He's not a Stephon Marbury. He's a John Stockton. How good would the Jazz have been without Malone? Obviously Stockton was amazing, but could he have carried that team? I don't think so. Similarly, I don't think Rondo can carry the Celtics. There's two types of point guards. There's guys like Derrick Rose, John Wall, and Damian Lillard, who are scorers. They can carry a team offensively, but they don't really make others around them better. That's not to say Dame isn't a good point guard, but he's not a pure point guard. Paul is cut from a different cloth. There aren't many like him.
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You can make all the excuses you want, but Chris Paul has yet to make it out of the 2nd round of the playoffs. This year's team with Jordan/Griffin/Redick/Crawford couldn't do it.

That's 2 All-Stars, the 6th Man of the Year, and an all-defensive player in Jordan.
 
So, title teams aren't built around either a PF or a PG, outside of the Spurs. Yet the Blazers are built around a PF and PG. Hmm...
 
I always thought title teams were built around 6 elite players, 3 great players, 3 mentors and 3 talented projects under a great coaching staff
 
RoyToy said:
Chauncey Billups

And yes, Tony Parker does count
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That team was built around Ben Wallace and Rip Hamilton as much as it was Billups. The crazy thing about Billups is that he was 29 y/o before he ever made an AS team. Talk about a late bloomer.
 
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BlazerCaravan said:
If he wins a title in his career? Possibly so. Two titles, and he's a lock.
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The Hall Of Fame isn't about championships it's about stats. Unless he breaks a lag or something goes terribly wrong he's pretty much a shoe in. You can pretty much tell if a guy's going to be a hall of fame player or not.
 
BigGameDamian said:
The Hall Of Fame isn't about championships it's about stats. Unless he breaks a lag or something goes terribly wrong he's pretty much a shoe in. You can pretty much tell if a guy's going to be a hall of fame player or not.
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If he breaks a lag there would be a ton of gamers that would love him.
 
PapaG said:
You can make all the excuses you want, but Chris Paul has yet to make it out of the 2nd round of the playoffs. This year's team with Jordan/Griffin/Redick/Crawford couldn't do it.

That's 2 All-Stars, the 6th Man of the Year, and an all-defensive player in Jordan.
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It's hilarious how you literally use the playoffs as your trump card in every single argument about point guards.

Andre Miller? Playoffs.

Chris Paul? Playoffs.

You talk about certain advanced stats and how they're an imperfect way to measure production, and yet you use the absolute dumbest way of measuring singular success. It's a team game. No one player wins games. It's extremely difficult to advance past the first round in the west, let alone the second, and yet that seems to always be your excuse when ever we're talking about point guards. And you seem to use it for point guards over any other position. Why is that? John Stockton never won a championship. Does that mean that Avery Johnson was a better point guard? Jason Kidd never won one. Neither did Gary Payton. Does that mean that Ron Harper and Steve Kerr were superior at the position?

Chris Paul has never made it out of the second round, but Russell Westbrook has, so obviously RW is the better point guard, right?
 
Natebishop3 said:
It's hilarious how you literally use the playoffs as your trump card in every single argument about point guards.

Andre Miller? Playoffs.

Chris Paul? Playoffs.

You talk about certain advanced stats and how they're an imperfect way to measure production, and yet you use the absolute dumbest way of measuring singular success. It's a team game. No one player wins games. It's extremely difficult to advance past the first round in the west, let alone the second, and yet that seems to always be your excuse when ever we're talking about point guards. And you seem to use it for point guards over any other position. Why is that? John Stockton never won a championship. Does that mean that Avery Johnson was a better point guard? Jason Kidd never won one. Neither did Gary Payton. Does that mean that Ron Harper and Steve Kerr were superior at the position?

Chris Paul has never made it out of the second round, but Russell Westbrook has, so obviously RW is the better point guard, right?[
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I'll even go a step further. IIRC, Boobie Gibson was the PG for the Cavs...
 
Boston sends Rondo and #6 to the Cavs and the Cavs send #1 and filler to Boston. Then the Celtics turn around and deal that #1 to Portland with filler for Aldridge. Is that to far fetched?
 
Russell Westbrook has yet to win a title, too. Good point!
 
If the Cavs could convince Deng to stay by trading away some of their troublemakers (they already got rid of their lame coach), then a Aldridge-Irving-Deng core would be very enticing if I were a Cavs fan and a playoff team in the East for sure.

Similarly, a Lillard (1990)-Batum (1988)-Wiggins (1995) core is enticing as a Blazers fan, especially as 2 of them would be on their rookie contracts. We'd be good for a very, very long time.
 
BigGameDamian said:
Boston sends Rondo and #6 to the Cavs and the Cavs send #1 and filler to Boston. Then the Celtics turn around and deal that #1 to Portland with filler for Aldridge. Is that to far fetched?
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When you learn that everything you think of in terms of trades is too far fetched.... I think that answers it.
 
Wizard Mentor said:
Similarly, a Lillard (1990)-Batum (1988)-Wiggins (1995) core is enticing as a Blazers fan, especially as 2 of them would be on their rookie contracts. We'd be good for a very, very long time.
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Enticing so we can return to mediocrity? Here's what an NBA team scout said of Wiggins:

He will be lost in an NBA half-court offense. He is great in transition, but he has no ball skills. All right hand, no idea what to do without the ball. He struggles with confidence. He actually reminds me more of Gerald Green than any of these studs he’s compared to. He’s an erratic shooter and has no plan when attacking the rim. He will be easy to coach against with his limited game right now.
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http://grantland.com/the-triangle/r...l-scouts-on-wiggins-randle-embiid-and-parker/
 
Draco said:
Enticing so we can return to mediocrity? Here's what an NBA team scout said of Wiggins:



http://grantland.com/the-triangle/r...l-scouts-on-wiggins-randle-embiid-and-parker/
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This guy sucks too:
Weaknesses: All the hype at such a young age is inconceivable. Can he stay focused and continue to work hard to improve his game? His free throw shooting must improve. Defensive intensity must get better. Right now, he's under 70%, but this should definitely improve with experience. LeBron still tends to go for the spectacular at times when a solid play is all that's necessary. But it's probably nitpicking as he likes to put on a show, and usually only brings out tricks when the game is in hand. Which for him on the HS level is usually the entire game. No one has ever had to overcome this kind of hype as a highschool player.
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Weaknesses: All the hype at such a young age is inconceivable. Can he stay focused and continue to work hard to improve his game? His free throw shooting must improve. Defensive intensity must get better. Right now, he's under 70%, but this should definitely improve with experience. LeBron still tends to go for the spectacular at times when a solid play is all that's necessary. But it's probably nitpicking as he likes to put on a show, and usually only brings out tricks when the game is in hand. Which for him on the HS level is usually the entire game. No one has ever had to overcome this kind of hype as a highschool player.
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Those are the most positive 'weaknesses' I think I've ever seen for a player. Basically, he can't control the hype, and his FT shooting is under 70%.

...and that's it. What a lock that guy was to be an MVP. Comparing Wiggins to James is just so unfair to Wiggins. I think Wiggins will have a nice Rudy Gay career, and possibly become Paul George if he learns how to shoot.
 
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