OT: I was wrong about Steph Curry

[alfonse]

This is an interesting comparison for sure. I mean Lebron has been the man for a while. But Lebron is bigger and stronger than people. He either shoots an open jump shot or takes it to the hoop and overpowers his opponent. Of course his speed for his size is pretty ridiculous too. What is amazing about Curry is he is doing things differently than people have done before. I mean he gets open from lots of moves and fakes and such. But what is shocking about some of his shots, is how he shoots them while being well defended. I mean people love Ray here, I mean I loved Ray he was amazing. But he shot when he was open. Curry will drill it in your face and these are nba players knowing full well hes going to do that. On top of that he is shooting over 50% somehow shooting in people's face and probably over half of his shots being 3 pointers. Its amazing to watch because nobody has done it consistently like that before. Hes the best in the nba right now. Lebron still has it but he seems tired. All of those years add up, I know hes not old but they add up. I expect Lebron will raise his level again at some point, and I hope he does cause it will be great to watch.

 

[KingOPancakes]

Curry didn't win an NBA championship ,the Warriors did,he has a great cast around him.
Put Curry on last year's Cleveland team without Lebron,and how far would he have carried them. Certainly not into the finals.

Lebron didn't win a championship, the Heat did. Let's not act like he didn't have 3 other sure fire future hall of famers helping him out in Miami, one of which some people in this very thread say is a better shooter than curry.

Put lebron on last years warriors and they're no better than last years cavs with curry.

 

[superjohn]

Curry didn't win an NBA championship ,the Warriors did,he has a great cast around him.
Put Curry on last year's Cleveland team without Lebron,and how far would he have carried them. Certainly not into the finals.

Idiotic, Lebron won with an all-star team and hand picked a new all-star team when he went back to Cleveland.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

Idiotic, Lebron won with an all-star team and hand picked a new all-star team when he went back to Cleveland.

Kevin Love isn't really all star level consistently anymore, Kyrie is constantly injured and their bench is pretty bad. I wouldn't say this Cleveland team is an all star team.

 

[superjohn]

Kevin Love isn't really all star level consistently anymore, Kyrie is constantly injured and their bench is pretty bad. I wouldn't say this Cleveland team is an all star team.

Irving was considered right there with Curry for best young point guard in the league and a top 10 league player, Kevin Love was considered by some to be the best pf in the league. For you people that claim Lebron makes his teammates better than Curry does, why is it that Curry's teammates seem to be improving while Lebron's are regressing and Curry's team is much better than Lebron's? You can't have it both ways.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

Irving was considered right there with Curry for best young point guard in the league and a top 10 league player, Kevin Love was considered by some to be the best pf in the league. For you people that claim Lebron makes his teammates better than Curry does, why is it that Curry's teammates seem to be improving while Lebron's are regressing and Curry's team is much better than Lebron's? You can't have it both ways.

I think alot of the reason why KLove is regressing is because he insists on being a corner specialist for some reason. And Kyrie still had a great season last year, he just got injured at the end and obviously hasn't been the same since, but he will be fine in a little time. About LeBron not making his teammates better like Curry does, how about all those Cleveland teams his first 7 season? Who were his best teammates? Mo Williams? Antwan Jamison? Daniel Gibson? He consistently averaged 5-7 assists and has been a great defender his whole career. He never had a team remotely near to what Curry has in his first stint with Cleveland.

 

[Phorcys]

I was never proven wrong, so...

Google it.

 

[aceboon]

I think alot of the reason why KLove is regressing is because he insists on being a corner specialist for some reason. And Kyrie still had a great season last year, he just got injured at the end and obviously hasn't been the same since, but he will be fine in a little time. About LeBron not making his teammates better like Curry does, how about all those Cleveland teams his first 7 season? Who were his best teammates? Mo Williams? Antwan Jamison? Daniel Gibson? He consistently averaged 5-7 assists and has been a great defender his whole career. He never had a team remotely near to what Curry has in his first stint with Cleveland.

Love isn't insisting on being a corner or 3 point shooting specialist, that's how he's being used and what he's reduced to while having to play a diminished role next to Bron and Irving. Its no different that what happened with Bosh when he left Toronto.

 

[superjohn]

I think alot of the reason why KLove is regressing is because he insists on being a corner specialist for some reason. And Kyrie still had a great season last year, he just got injured at the end and obviously hasn't been the same since, but he will be fine in a little time. About LeBron not making his teammates better like Curry does, how about all those Cleveland teams his first 7 season? Who were his best teammates? Mo Williams? Antwan Jamison? Daniel Gibson? He consistently averaged 5-7 assists and has been a great defender his whole career. He never had a team remotely near to what Curry has in his first stint with Cleveland.

This whole discussion is about who is better right now yet you and many others keep bringing up Lebron leading the Cavs to the finals 9 years ago. Yes Lebron was a million times better than Curry at that time but it has nothing to do with anything. Jason Kidd also led two Nets teams to the finals where Kenyon Martin was the second best player and Luscious Harris was one of the best players, that also isn't relevant but shows how awful the East has been over the last 15 years. If your argument is Lebron made his teammates better than Curry did 9 years ago then you win.

 

[superjohn]

Love isn't insisting on being a corner or 3 point shooting specialist, that's how he's being used and what he's reduced to while having to play a diminished role next to Bron and Irving. Its no different that what happened with Bosh when he left Toronto.

Bingo, Love will be shipped out soon.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

This whole discussion is about who is better right now yet you and many others keep bringing up Lebron leading the Cavs to the finals 9 years ago. Yes Lebron was a million times better than Curry at that time but it has nothing to do with anything. Jason Kidd also led two Nets teams to the finals where Kenyon Martin was the second best player and Luscious Harris was one of the best players, that also isn't relevant but shows how awful the East has been over the last 15 years. If your argument is Lebron made his teammates better than Curry did 9 years ago then you win.

Oh okay, I thought we were comparing the players leading different teams my bad. Steph is playing the best right now and has since probably mid-last season, although, and I know you and some others might argue this, I did think Harden should've won MVP. But, I do think LeBron is still superior in more facets of the game, just my opinion.

 

[TasteofUConn]

Idiotic, Lebron won with an all-star team and hand picked a new all-star team when he went back to Cleveland.

You're off the hook. You keep suggesting that LBJ "hand picked" his team, as if - even if true - that should count against him.
No Love and no Irving and no Verajao and one other guy was gimpy in the finals and he STILL took two games from your team. That is a monstrous accomplishment. He sure didn't hand pick Delavedova to be his starting point guard.

Curry has been in the league for 6 full seasons. The first three, his team made the playoffs ZERO times. DID . . . NOT . . . EVEN . . . MAKE . . . THE . . . PLAYOFFS. Further, he was 21 years old already when he came into the league. The next two years, he gets booted in the 2nd round and then booted in the 1st round. 1st round boot! GONE! In his first five seasons the guy only gets out of the 1st round one time, then promptly loses.

This strikes you as "great player who can carry his team?"

LeBron took a bunch of BUMS past the first round every year for his first six years. BUMS, I tell ya, BUMS. Here's the list from his first year:

Andriuskevicius, Martynas, Gooden, Drew, Graham, Stephen, Henderson, Alan, Hughes, Larry, Ilgauskas, Zydrunas, Jackson, Luke, Jones, Damon, Marshall, Donyell,Murray, Ronald Shaw, Newble, Ira, Pavlović, Aleksandar, Snow, Eric, Varejão, Anderson

Amazing.

Finally, take a hard look at Curry's stats from last year versus the previous two years, when his team got bounced in the 1st round and the 2nd round. They are virtually the same as they were last year. Point is, why was Curry not carrying his team past the 1st round if he is that awesome? Answer - he's not in the same echelon as a guy like LBJ. He finally made it out of the first round when he had a dominant team around him.
Guy has one - ONE - year's worth of success and people are comparing him to LBJ.

 

[Huskyforlife]

You're off the hook. You keep suggesting that LBJ "hand picked" his team, as if - even if true - that should count against him.
No Love and no Irving and no Verajao and one other guy was gimpy in the finals and he STILL took two games from your team. That is a monstrous accomplishment. He sure didn't hand pick Delavedova to be his starting point guard.

Curry has been in the league for 6 full seasons. The first three, his team made the playoffs ZERO times. DID . . . NOT . . . EVEN . . . MAKE . . . THE . . . PLAYOFFS. Further, he was 21 years old already when he came into the league. The next two years, he gets booted in the 2nd round and then booted in the 1st round. 1st round boot! GONE! In his first five seasons the guy only gets out of the 1st round one time, then promptly loses.

This strikes you as "great player who can carry his team?"

LeBron took a bunch of BUMS past the first round every year for his first six years. BUMS, I tell ya, BUMS. Here's the list from his first year:

Andriuskevicius, Martynas, Gooden, Drew, Graham, Stephen, Henderson, Alan, Hughes, Larry, Ilgauskas, Zydrunas, Jackson, Luke, Jones, Damon, Marshall, Donyell,Murray, Ronald Shaw, Newble, Ira, Pavlović, Aleksandar, Snow, Eric, Varejão, Anderson

Amazing.

Finally, take a hard look at Curry's stats from last year versus the previous two years, when his team got bounced in the 1st round and the 2nd round. They are virtually the same as they were last year. Point is, why was Curry not carrying his team past the 1st round if he is that awesome? Answer - he's not in the same echelon as a guy like LBJ. He finally made it out of the first round when he had a dominant team around him.
Guy has one - ONE - year's worth of success and people are comparing him to LBJ.

How is any of this relevent to this year?

 

[polycom]

He is serious even after being presented several links and quotes - here you go.

It's worth reading most of the 4th page.

Reading this is upsetting. Whats even more upsetting is they allow people who are this dense to drive. How do we know they wont just make up their own traffic rules.

 

[Adios]

Curry is definitely a better GM than LeBron.

 

[Huskyforlife]

I'd like to see Curry play meaningful defense on someone who can score. But with defenders like Green, Andre, Thompson, who can defend the perimeter, he doesn't have to.

 

[polycom]

I'd like to see Curry play meaningful defense on someone who can score. But with defenders like Green, Andre, Thompson, who can defend the perimeter, he doesn't have to.

When you say someone who can score are you saying another PG or just another player in the NBA?

 

[KingOPancakes]

You're off the hook. You keep suggesting that LBJ "hand picked" his team, as if - even if true - that should count against him.
No Love and no Irving and no Verajao and one other guy was gimpy in the finals and he STILL took two games from your team. That is a monstrous accomplishment. He sure didn't hand pick Delavedova to be his starting point guard.

Curry has been in the league for 6 full seasons. The first three, his team made the playoffs ZERO times. DID . . . NOT . . . EVEN . . . MAKE . . . THE . . . PLAYOFFS. Further, he was 21 years old already when he came into the league. The next two years, he gets booted in the 2nd round and then booted in the 1st round. 1st round boot! GONE! In his first five seasons the guy only gets out of the 1st round one time, then promptly loses.

This strikes you as "great player who can carry his team?"

LeBron took a bunch of BUMS past the first round every year for his first six years. BUMS, I tell ya, BUMS. Here's the list from his first year:

Andriuskevicius, Martynas, Gooden, Drew, Graham, Stephen, Henderson, Alan, Hughes, Larry, Ilgauskas, Zydrunas, Jackson, Luke, Jones, Damon, Marshall, Donyell,Murray, Ronald Shaw, Newble, Ira, Pavlović, Aleksandar, Snow, Eric, Varejão, Anderson

Amazing.

Finally, take a hard look at Curry's stats from last year versus the previous two years, when his team got bounced in the 1st round and the 2nd round. They are virtually the same as they were last year. Point is, why was Curry not carrying his team past the 1st round if he is that awesome? Answer - he's not in the same echelon as a guy like LBJ. He finally made it out of the first round when he had a dominant team around him.
Guy has one - ONE - year's worth of success and people are comparing him to LBJ.

But the conversation is who is the better player right now. Not who has had the better career. Also, you just called Donyell Marshall a bum.

 

[polycom]

But the conversation is who is the better player right now. Not who has had the better career. Also, you just called Donyell Marshall a bum.

Calling Zydrunas Ilgauskas a bum is also crazy. He was an all-star twice and averaged 13 and 8 over his 13 year career....

 

[k9fanatic]

I mean people love Ray here, I mean I loved Ray he was amazing. But he shot when he was open. Curry will drill it in your face and these are nba players knowing full well hes going to do that.

You are either very young or didn't watch much NBA during Ray's prime. Either way, you are wrong. In his prime Ray scored in all kinds of ways, while usually being guarded by the other team's best defensive player.

 

[Dogdeacon]

I'd like to see Curry play meaningful defense on someone who can score. But with defenders like Green, Andre, Thompson, who can defend the perimeter, he doesn't have to.

That's right, Curry's defense is statistically similar to Larry Bird's. Great team defender, but Larry wasn't shutting anyone down mano-a-mano.

Lookit, I LOVE Curry and would much rather watch him than LeBron. Adding the qualifier that 'history' doesn't count whether its nine years ago, two years ago or last year's finals is essentially admitting that LeBron HAS been the better player. So the pro-Curry crowds wants desperately to dethrone LeBron and crown Curry's . We all know LeBron saves an extra gear for the playoffs and until Curry is the finals MVP he's simply hasn't demonstrated elevating his game on the biggest stage which is what LeBron, Kobe, Jordan etc have done to be the reigning king of the hill. It might even end up the Russell Westbrook or Durant is in this mix at year end. Certainly Westbrook head to head vs Curry is very close and there is a statistical case that Westbrook holds the advantage in these matchups. How can Curry be definitively the best player in the NBA when there is another player at his position that has eaten Curry's lunch at times?


http://www.basketball-reference.com/play-index/h2h_finder.cgi?request=1&p1=curryst01&p2=westbru01

 

[CallMeBruce]

While I don't really disagree with anything you said here, you'll always be the guy that still staunchly believes the powerball lump sum number already factors in taxes, even when presented with mountains of evidence to the contrary. So....

There's always an interesting mystery created by my ignore list when I see these posts.

 

[superjohn]

You're off the hook. You keep suggesting that LBJ "hand picked" his team, as if - even if true - that should count against him.
No Love and no Irving and no Verajao and one other guy was gimpy in the finals and he STILL took two games from your team. That is a monstrous accomplishment. He sure didn't hand pick Delavedova to be his starting point guard.

Curry has been in the league for 6 full seasons. The first three, his team made the playoffs ZERO times. DID . . . NOT . . . EVEN . . . MAKE . . . THE . . . PLAYOFFS. Further, he was 21 years old already when he came into the league. The next two years, he gets booted in the 2nd round and then booted in the 1st round. 1st round boot! GONE! In his first five seasons the guy only gets out of the 1st round one time, then promptly loses.

This strikes you as "great player who can carry his team?"

LeBron took a bunch of BUMS past the first round every year for his first six years. BUMS, I tell ya, BUMS. Here's the list from his first year:

Andriuskevicius, Martynas, Gooden, Drew, Graham, Stephen, Henderson, Alan, Hughes, Larry, Ilgauskas, Zydrunas, Jackson, Luke, Jones, Damon, Marshall, Donyell,Murray, Ronald Shaw, Newble, Ira, Pavlović, Aleksandar, Snow, Eric, Varejão, Anderson

Amazing.

Finally, take a hard look at Curry's stats from last year versus the previous two years, when his team got bounced in the 1st round and the 2nd round. They are virtually the same as they were last year. Point is, why was Curry not carrying his team past the 1st round if he is that awesome? Answer - he's not in the same echelon as a guy like LBJ. He finally made it out of the first round when he had a dominant team around him.
Guy has one - ONE - year's worth of success and people are comparing him to LBJ.

Again you are talking about Lebron from 8-9 years ago, Curry was at Davidson then. Yes, Lebron was way better than Curry back then and was better than him more recently but this discussion was about who is better right now and that's Curry. It was quite a feat that Lebron took "bums" to the finals close to a decade ago, it was also quite a feat when Jason Kidd took "bums" to the finals two years in a row before Lebron. While impressive both feats were possible because the East sucked so much. This is all nice to talk about but has zero to do with Curry being better than Lebron right now. You should focus on how Curry is kicking Lebron's arse in every offensive measure this season, his team is challenging the Bulls all-time record, and just curb stomped Lebron's team by 40 which paved the way for Lebron to get his coach fired.

 

[TasteofUConn]

but has zero to do with Curry being better than Lebron right now.

Oh. Right now?
Sure, there's an argument to be made that Curry, at this moment in time, is a more valuable (better) player than LeBron.

Curry will have to have about 10 more years like the last one and a half years before the conversation starts about which is better, in the aggregate.

 

[auror]

Curry has a great supporting cast, with several guys who are going to have excellent careers, and played last season with a guy coming off the bench who would have started on every other team in the league.

And they won 67 games and the title with one of the best point differentials ever. That's living up to the roster. Degree of difficulty is not inherently better as long as you achieve what you should with the good roster. Take away some of the supporting cast and put them in the East from 4 years ago and this year's Curry still wins 55 and makes Finals. Look at the teams the Cavs beat to get there. It was a joke.

Last year, for instance, LeBron managed to win 2 games in the finals against Curry's team. With Delavedova starting and guarding Curry!!!!! I mean, COME ON MAN!

It just occurred to me that I don't like Curry for the same reason I don't like Peyton Manning, which is to say that they're both great, but too many people argue that they're greater than they are.

What happened in the other games? We all love 2 game sample sizes. Warriors won the other games by 8, 21, 13, and 8 and in the wins Curry averaged 27.5/8/5/2stl and was +60. +60 in 4 games! (LBJ was -32 in those 4 for the record and only +7 in the 2 wins).

and until Curry is the finals MVP he's simply hasn't demonstrated elevating his game on the biggest stage which is what LeBron, Kobe, Jordan etc have done to be the reigning king of the hill.

Curry averaged 26, 6, and 5 on 44/39/89 and was +52 for the series. Slightly worse shooting numbers than normal (but considerably better shooting than Lebron in the series).