Has Blake Griffini surpassed Prime Amare?

[Dizzle-2k7]

what yall think

[Lensanity]

what yall think

Offensively no. The rest of his game yes. Can't go wrong either way

[ShawkFactory]

Ew. No

[SaltyMeatballs]

Ew. No

What are you, a girl?

[clipps]

Amare was a dunker with a decent midrange jumper. Blake is a better passer, on par with shooting if not better, can create for himself and others, and has better defense(well, that one is not saying much).

[ShawkFactory]

What are you, a girl?

Burned me

[RidonKs]

it's a good comparison and it would largely come down to circumstances. prime stoudemire was the superior first option to get a bucket. griffin has the talent but i still don't trust him in isolation. he settles too much and hasn't mixed up his moves much since two years ago.

they are two very weird players defensively. all the potential in the world, just never able to put it together.

amare just didn't have the instincts and understanding of the game, so he had to make up for it with his athleticism. that meant jumping for everything, which meant foul trouble, often. the numbers bear that out, in his best years he was top 5-10 in fouls per game. and pretty much the only offensively adept guy ranking up that high. and now after injuries and aging, he's just a total liability on that end, right there with boozer and love and a few others.

griffin is different. he just doesn't appear to give a fk. i mean he literally doesn't APPEAR to give a fk, as in he's got that perpetual deadpan look carved into his face. at first i thought i'd been fooled by that face, and really, like shaq wit his ft's, blake gave it his all when it really counted. but the more i watch him the more i think he really has no fire in the belly, no burning drive. like the anti-westbrook. which makes for a weird dynamic with paul who is one of the most competitively constipated dudes in the league.

with blake, he makes most of the right plays. but he doesn't make them like he could, with a gusto and a sense of urgency. he just kinda lollies about until he has the ball or the ball is loose or his man is rising for a shot and then he decides to kick it into high gear. but as awesome a physical specimen as he is, that is not enough nor will it ever be. we'll see if he learns that lesson this playoff.

its another case of a guy with star power thinking his athleticism will carry him... until it can't. rondo is the same imo, all that nonsense about how "the big three made him" is bull, dude was a baller who relied too much on his quickness and craftiness. post surgery, he is a dud because he blew out his competitive advantage. at least blake developed a jumper..



imo the answer to the thread is a more or less resounding yes, even though that gap isn't crazy wide or anything. griffin is just so damn talented though. the ballhandling and passing are beyond anything amare was ever capable of. the defense tops it off. there are only a select few circumstances that would make me take 07 amare over 15 blake. and neither do the run n gun suns nor the lob city clips make that list.

still blake has a lot of work to get up to the top tier where his talent and body and mind surely belong. it's been a disappointing two years for that guy. he has to meet high expectations because he has wild potential. the ability to make 45% of knockdown 20 footers is not the factor to put him over the top. next season perhaps.....

[ArbitraryWater]

For me this is Blake rather easily tbh

[SCdac]

A part of me feels like Griffin surpassed him in his first season, when he won ROTY averaging 23 ppg & 12 rpg, but that's not fair to Amare who was probably better for a short stretch and made it to the WCF as the Suns leading scorer. Despite Amare's monster scoring, he seems more one-dimensional and just feel like Griffin has "it". At least more than Amare. Griffin could still use improvement though

[bizil]

Blake surpassed prime Amare long ago. And it's mainly due to Blake's all around game. Blake's game has become kind of similar to guys like a Barkley, KG, or Chris Webber. They are PF's who can play like a point power forward WHILE also playing big on the glass. And of course they can dominate a game scoring as well. The only thing Amare did great at his peak was score. And he could do it with the best of them in his era. But Blake can dominate scoring, passing, and rebounding.

[BuffaloBill]

Burned me

[SugarHill]

Amare had a 30/11 playoffs

[Hit_Em]

They about = but if one was slightly better it would be amare

[bizil]

A part of me feels like Griffin surpassed him in his first season, when he won ROTY averaging 23 ppg & 12 rpg, but that's not fair to Amare who was probably better for a short stretch and made it to the WCF as the Suns leading scorer. Despite Amare's monster scoring, he seems more one-dimensional and just feel like Griffin has "it". At least more than Amare. Griffin could still use improvement though

I agree! Peak Amare was more one dimensional than the other great PF's in the last 15 years. When u look at Duncan, KG, Webber, Blake, Davis, K Love, Gasol, LaMarcus, McDyess, Sheed, etc. Scoring wise, he's as good or better than all of those guys. But the other guys were much more well rounded.

In a sense, Amare and Dirk are similar in that way. But Dirk was so durable and revolutionary that it trumped his shortcomings. But typically, most of the legendary PF's were at least great scorers and great rebounders in one. Amare never fit that bill and his defense was average at best.

[senelcoolidge]

Blake easily. Better all around game. An offensive machine inside and now outside. Blake can defend when he tries. Look at last night for instance. Duncan was scoring on DJ easily, but when Blake was on him he had to work and often missed his shot attempts. Blake was playing defense. He's just lazy on defense or preserving himself for scoring.