Was Westbrook really the best player for OKC in the playoffs? *stats*

[knicksman]

people really just look at stats without looking at the big picture. LOL these box scores heroes. Having two players jacking 20+ shots isnt going to work esp for a jumpshooting team or a team who relies on rhythm. Theres no chance for role players to get hot same with durant. Thats why durant plays better without westbrook. With westbrook they live and die with him but most often hes cold so they die with him. Hes what you call a cancer. An iverson whos impact is not even better than a reggie miller yet considered a superstar in this league. Durant is steroid version of reggie miller while westbrook is a poor mans iverson. And thats the gap between them. Only idiots think they are equal. Hes like marbury that once replaced by kidd, they went to the finals instead of a below .500 team.

Durant has proven he can carry the team without wb whereas what has score first pg done in this league. None. They havent won anything in this league as the man.

[SillyRabbit]

I watched every single Thunder game these playoffs and the majority of their games during the season. This is what I saw:

Durant was dominant during the regular season. Anyone who doesn't think he deserved the MVP is a complete moron.

Durant wasn't the same player in the playoffs. He looked exhausted and therefore transitioned into a more passive role. Playoff Durant wasn't nearly as good as regular season Durant.

Westbrook was flat out amazing these playoffs. He had some "Westbrook" moments of course, but overall he was the best player in the entire playoffs. Only James has a legitimate case against him, and considering the difference of competition, I think Westbrook comes out on top.

Durant still played well in the playoffs despite not being true to his MVP form, but Westbrook was better. This is not a slight on Durant, as Westbrook was better than everyone.

You also have to realize that defences plan their strategy around stopping Durant, and with a potato coach like Brooks who doesn't know how to adjust accordingly, Durant wasn't able to get very many open looks, easy switches or mismatches.

Westbrook on the other hand, was able to exploit mismatches and take advantage of teams who were too concerned with Durant.

Overall, Westbrook played better than Durant but that doesn't mean that Durant was bad, it just means that Westbrook was amazing. Brooks' overplaying of Durant during the regular season and playoffs contributed to Durant's passive play as he was exhausted for most of the post season. Not only did Durant lead the NBA in minutes played during the regular season and post season, but he plays hard minutes. I've never seen a superstar have to work so hard to make tough shots because his coach doesn't know how to draw up plays to get him easier baskets.

[DMAVS41]

people really just look at stats without looking at the big picture. LOL these box scores heroes. Having two players jacking 20+ shots isnt going to work esp for a jumpshooting team or a team who relies on rhythm. Theres no chance for role players to get hot same with durant. Thats why durant plays better without westbrook. With westbrook they live and die with him but most often hes cold so they die with him. Hes what you call a cancer. An iverson whos impact is not even better than a reggie miller yet considered a superstar in this league. Durant is steroid version of reggie miller while westbrook is a poor mans iverson. And thats the gap between them. Only idiots think they are equal. Hes like marbury that once replaced by kidd, they went to the finals instead of a below .500 team.

Durant has proven he can carry the team without wb whereas what has score first pg done in this league. None. They havent won anything in this league as the man.

Yea....Durant/Thunder looked great last year without Westbrook in the playoffs....

What you are doing is failing to realize that the playoffs are a whole different animal. Keep using meaningless regular season games against scrub teams as evidence though...LOL

[BigBoss]

Prime example for why stats are overrated

[DMAVS41]

I watched every single Thunder game these playoffs and the majority of their games during the season. This is what I saw:

Durant was dominant during the regular season. Anyone who doesn't think he deserved the MVP is a complete moron.

Durant wasn't the same player in the playoffs. He looked exhausted and therefore transitioned into a more passive role. Playoff Durant wasn't nearly as good as regular season Durant.

Westbrook was flat out amazing these playoffs. He had some "Westbrook" moments of course, but overall he was the best player in the entire playoffs. Only James has a legitimate case against him, and considering the difference of competition, I think Westbrook comes out on top.

Durant still played well in the playoffs despite not being true to his MVP form, but Westbrook was better. This is not a slight on Durant, as Westbrook was better than everyone.

You also have to realize that defences plan their strategy around stopping Durant, and with a potato coach like Brooks who doesn't know how to adjust accordingly, Durant wasn't able to get very many open looks, easy switches or mismatches.

Westbrook on the other hand, was able to exploit mismatches and take advantage of teams who were too concerned with Durant.

Overall, Westbrook played better than Durant but that doesn't mean that Durant was bad, it just means that Westbrook was amazing. Brooks' overplaying of Durant during the regular season and playoffs contributed to Durant's passive play as he was exhausted for most of the post season. Not only did Durant lead the NBA in minutes played during the regular season and post season, but he plays hard minutes. I've never seen a superstar have to work so hard to make tough shots because his coach doesn't know how to draw up plays to get him easier baskets.

This man gets it.

Only thing I disagree on is that other teams structured their entire defense to stop Durant. While this is at times true, it's not like he saw an absurd amount of attention. He was often singled by smaller players the entirety of the playoffs...and the Spurs even yielded and switched by far their best defender onto Westbrook for games 5/6 of the series.

Not doubt the lack of offensive system and coaching hurt Durant in the playoffs, but he also simply has to be able to dominate teams when they single him like this.

[knicksman]

Yea....Durant/Thunder looked great last year without Westbrook in the playoffs....

What you are doing is failing to realize that the playoffs are a whole different animal. Keep using meaningless regular season games against scrub teams as evidence though...LOL

yeah coz adjustment takes place after a few games. Werent they losing during the first few games of the season too without westbrook. Losing a player takes time to figure esp if youre losing a pg. ala nash/amare.

And they werent beating scrub teams tho w/o wb. They can beat any team. while they were losing against scrub teams w/ wb. It is what it is. The team was enjoying with wb out coz they have touches. They never want westbrook as a teammate just like most players dont like playing with the marburys or iverson. Theres a reason why wb was never projected top 5 and thats because he never impacts like his stats says.

[knicksman]

I watched every single Thunder game these playoffs and the majority of their games during the season. This is what I saw:

Durant was dominant during the regular season. Anyone who doesn't think he deserved the MVP is a complete moron.

Durant wasn't the same player in the playoffs. He looked exhausted and therefore transitioned into a more passive role. Playoff Durant wasn't nearly as good as regular season Durant.

except that durant wasnt the same since westbrook came back instead of just the playoffs. They never fit. In fact most of the role players dont fit with westbrook. Lamb, jackson, ibaka were playing well without westbrook..

[J Shuttlesworth]

Prime example for why stats are overrated

This goes beyond the stat sheet. A lot of people, including some OKC fans, who watched all their games feel that Westbrook had a bigger impact on the court, especially late in the game.

[SillyRabbit]

This man gets it.

Only thing I disagree on is that other teams structured their entire defense to stop Durant. While this is at times true, it's not like he saw an absurd amount of attention. He was often singled by smaller players the entirety of the playoffs...and the Spurs even yielded and switched by far their best defender onto Westbrook for games 5/6 of the series.

Not doubt the lack of offensive system and coaching hurt Durant in the playoffs, but he also simply has to be able to dominate teams when they single him like this.

Yes you're right, when the Spurs realized that Durant/Brooks weren't going to be able to exploit having Danny Green on Durant then they decided to put Leonard on Westbrook because he was destroying Parker/Mills.

Same thing happened in the Clippers series when Paul was put on Durant because he couldn't handle Westbrook, who was getting to the rim at will.

Westbrook has the ability to abuse smaller/weaker defenders while Durant doesn't. He just tried to shoot over them which wasn't good enough when his jumper wasn't falling.

I place the blame here on Brooks just as much as I place it on Durant however, because they could've done so many things to get Durant the ball in more efficient areas, or run screens to switch a different defender onto him.

Basically the TL;DR is that Westbrook's size and skillset allow him to overcome coaching deficiencies by Brooks, whereas Durant is hurt much more by poor coaching decisions. Blame also falls on Durant as he needed to step up and take advantage of mismatches or at least yell at Brooks to run some plays that would get him the ball in more efficient areas.

[DMAVS41]

Yes you're right, when the Spurs realized that Durant/Brooks weren't going to be able to exploit having Danny Green on Durant then they decided to put Leonard on Westbrook because he was destroying Parker/Mills.

Same thing happened in the Clippers series when Paul was put on Durant because he couldn't handle Westbrook, who was getting to the rim at will.

Westbrook has the ability to abuse smaller/weaker defenders while Durant doesn't. He just tried to shoot over them which wasn't good enough when his jumper wasn't falling.

I place the blame here on Brooks just as much as I place it on Durant however, because they could've done so many things to get Durant the ball in more efficient areas, or run screens to switch a different defender onto him.

Basically the TL;DR is that Westbrook's size and skillset allow him to overcome coaching deficiencies by Brooks, whereas Durant is hurt much more by poor coaching decisions. Blame also falls on Durant as he needed to step up and take advantage of mismatches or at least yell at Brooks to run some plays that would get him the ball in more efficient areas.

Agreed completely. I have been saying Brooks is the biggest problem with this team for a long long time.

I just have to hold Durant accountable as well. Even despite shit coaching...he's now been in the league 7 years and has a ton of playoff experience with all these same players. He should know how to get what he wants and lead this team.

But it seems like he still can't do it. He just gets pushed around a lot and then hides in the corner.

Durant has definitely regressed in the playoffs these last two years from his play in 11 and 12. He was a better player back then and while his playmaking has improved, his turnovers (often at the worst times) have increased as well. He also seems to attack the basket much less and settles for jumpers. Even good ones.

Old Durant was dunking on people (the Haywood dunk from the 11 playoffs still gives me nightmares)...now he just looks for space and settles for a jumper like you said.


If the Thunder didn't have a guy like Westbrook...who the hell is picking up the slack when Durant goes quiet for long stretches????? There are like a couple guys in the league capable of doing that...WB is probably the best one actually.

[SillyRabbit]

Agreed completely. I have been saying Brooks is the biggest problem with this team for a long long time.

I just have to hold Durant accountable as well. Even despite shit coaching...he's now been in the league 7 years and has a ton of playoff experience with all these same players. He should know how to get what he wants and lead this team.

But it seems like he still can't do it. He just gets pushed around a lot and then hides in the corner.

Durant has definitely regressed in the playoffs these last two years from his play in 11 and 12. He was a better player back then and while his playmaking has improved, his turnovers (often at the worst times) have increased as well. He also seems to attack the basket much less and settles for jumpers. Even good ones.

Old Durant was dunking on people (the Haywood dunk from the 11 playoffs still gives me nightmares)...now he just looks for space and settles for a jumper like you said.


If the Thunder didn't have a guy like Westbrook...who the hell is picking up the slack when Durant goes quiet for long stretches????? There are like a couple guys in the league capable of doing that...WB is probably the best one actually.

Yeah I myself was questioning why Durant wasn't driving to the basket more this post season. Especially after seeing how much success Westbrook was having doing it.

He seemed to get the ball knocked out of his hands a lot during his drives and maybe that discouraged him. Also the lack of calls in the playoffs probably got in his head and made him think that he'd be hacked and end up on the floor without getting a chance to go to the line.

Either way he could learn a lot from Westbrook about having an aggressive and competitive mentality. Part of me hopes that his poor play and decision making was due to being physically and mentally exhausted because he was definitely not the Durant we're used to seeing.

The old saying is "don't fall in love with the jumpshot" but for a player like Durant who had such an automatic jumper in the regular season you start to wonder if he got too comfortable with settling for a contested outside shot.

Either way it will be interesting to see what happens in the offseason for OKC. Will Westbrook become "wiser" as he said in his post-game press conference? Will Brooks be fired and replaced by an "X's and O's" guy who can run effective offensive plays and put together better rotations? Will Durant try to implement a post game? You have to imagine that Ibaka and Jackson will continue to improve and if Lamb and Adams actually get playing time next year they could become starters (Adams) and important scorers off the bench that OKC dearly needed.

[Dave3]

Westbrook played very well, but Durant also had very good games. People are way too quick to want to blame one or the other, but neither of them really played great, but they were both still VERY good. Durant missed a bunch of shots that he couldn't miss (even on purpose probably) in February, and Westbrook was also out of control at times. You can't really blame either of them though because the fact of the matter is, every single team loses eventually, with the exception of 1 out of the 16. Losing doesn't necessarily mean people failed, it just means that another team succeeded - it can't be championship or bust for 5 different teams if they're all gonna end up playing each other lol.

I do agree though with the OKC fans complaining about Brooks. The OKC offense was pretty much 90% iso, and I have a hard time believing Brooks kept bringing that up and drawing up plays just to get ignored. They have to be running some kind of offense, because talent won't get you anywhere by itself (ask 2008-2010 LeBron).

I won't sugarcoat it though, it's more than fair to say that Durant played slightly disappointing in this post season. There's a clear difference though between disappointing and failing, and he wasn't the latter. Westbrook did outplay him more often than I thought he would, but they got as far as they did without both of them playing the way they did.

People in here need to calm down though. They use every single loss (even half of a game) for proof that a player they don't like is overrated or anything else. Yeah it happens to LeBron more than anyone I've seen, but it's happening to other players too, including Durant, and it's not actually doing anything to change their perception, it's just making people look foolish.

[jrong]

And no...what makes Lebron/Wade work the most is their defense. WB plays Wade level defense....Durant is maybe like 10% as good as Lebron on defense when Lebron tries.

No, I explained this in the other thread. James and Wade's combined efficiency allows them to each be themselves, albeit Wade in a reduced role.

Wade scored 19 ppg on 14 FGA and 5 FTs this year. If he only shot 50% instead of 55%, that's 18 ppg. If he shot Westbrook/ Harden numbers, it's 16 - 17 ppg.

Those are shots he's not taking away from LeBron and his other teammates.

By the same token, LeBron scoring 27 ppg on 18 FGA and 8 FTs lets Wade still play like a still dominant wing when he has the ball, because he somewhat has it enough to be that player.

If LeBron was shooting 42% to get his 27 ppg, then Wade would average 14, and the Heat would lose a lot more and have lost for the year already.

[DMAVS41]

No, I explained this in the other thread. James and Wade's combined efficiency allows them to each be themselves, albeit Wade in a reduced role.

Wade scored 19 ppg on 14 FGA and 5 FTs this year. If he only shot 50% instead of 55%, that's 18 ppg. If he shot Westbrook/ Harden numbers, it's 16 - 17 ppg.

Those are shots he's not taking away from LeBron and his other teammates.

By the same token, LeBron scoring 27 ppg on 18 FGA and 8 FTs lets Wade still play like a still dominant wing when he has the ball, because he somewhat has it enough to be that player.

If LeBron was shooting 42% to get his 27 ppg, then Wade would average 14, and the Heat would lose a lot more and have lost for the year already.

I'm not discounting the efficiency completely, but it's not what makes them work. It's the defense.

Put it this way. Would you come to the same conclusion that Westbrook and Durant can't work if Durant played Lebron level defense in the playoffs?

I just can't imagine you would say the same stuff.

Also, the Heat get a lot of easy baskets off of their swarming defense. Which leads to part of that efficiency.

And honestly, WB/Durant have it so much easier. They now have Ibaka and Adams backing them up. Nobody on the Heat comes close to that...

[Jacks3]

lol these Wade stans. Mad because Westbrook is a far better player than Wade at this point. The Heat "work" in comparison because they play in a far weaker conference, have a much better supporting cast and coach, and have the greatest player in the world. It has nothing to do with Wade/LBJ being so much better as a duo. Delusional man.