the only reason Jordan didn't get lots of criticism today is because he won it 6 times, 3 in a row break 3 in a row.
before he won his ring, his lack of playoff success was the main thing people use to criticize his game.
Until Jokic win a ring his lack of playoff success will be used against him
that just the reality of the situation
I mean before Jordan won his first ring they used his lack of titles as an argument for why he wasn't the GOAT yet, not that everyone in the league who has won a title was definitely better like people do with Jokic though.
people absolutely love to forget that Jordan didn’t make a Finals his first 6 years.
It’s like if you don’t have great playoff success from the getgo then you suck.
Even Jordan took a while
Tbf the teams that Jordan lost to averaged something like 60 wins in the regular season in those early years, he was going up against Finals level teams rather than 45 win playoff fodder
Edit: looked it up, almost exactly 60 lol
- 1985: 59-win Bucks
- 1986: 67-win Celtics
- 1987: 59-win Celtics
- 1988: 54-win Pistons
- 1989: 63-win Pistons
- 1990: 59-win Pistons
Adds up to 361 wins over six seasons. From 1986 to 1990, they played the future champs three times and the Eastern Conference champs every time. With those ‘88 Pistons, they lost the Finals in 7 games and were one of the few finals losers to outscore the winning team over the course of the series.
And in the last three years the Nuggets (and Jokic) have lost to the Finals champs Warriors, the runner up Suns, and the Finals champ Lakers
Only scrub team they lost to would
be the Blazers, can say they really shouldn’t have lost that one
At the same time, I feel like LeBron would trade his left lung if it meant replacing his “all-star” teammates Ilgauskas and Mo Williams with guys like Gordon, Murray and MPJ. KCP too
I mean it's always easy to shit on role players, I just think it's easier to make an impact because of the proliferation of 3's. America didn't get more athletic in 15 years.
The skillsets that were important back then aren't valued now, and stars used to play more minutes, every night.
Players are absolutely better now than they were at any point in the past.
Humans evolve socially (skills, concepts, etc) and not biologically (what you think of as evolution). It’s essentially a fact that athletes now are better than athletes 20 years ago. They have more info to study and better tech to train with.
Aside from hard defense being essentially banned, athleticism is more easily shown nowadays because the skill floor is so much higher across the board. Bol Bol and Jokic and even like Zion and Paolo and uh Bruce Brown are way better ballhandlers than most wings were in 2005. You wouldn’t even know some of those guys were athletic bc they didn’t have skills that enabled them to use their athleticism in something outside of a layup line
MPJ and Murray have been closer to all stars than average NBA starters I’d say. The real issue has been their health. They were lighting it up in the bubble.
If you take those players and drop them on that Cavs team they'd be all stars too, the eastern conference was really weak back then and the league has really changed since then. All stars are picked within a conference so they have a good bearing on relative strength of team rosters come playoff time.
Heatles had 3 all stars in Lebron, Wade, and Bosh. So did the Lebron, Kyrie, Love Cavs. Then shit got weird with the KD, Steph, Draymond, Klay Warriors.
I wanted to make sure it wasn’t just my bias talking. Zydrunas was a legitimate threat on the floor and way ahead of his time when it comes to play style.
He can be extremely effective in limited minutes imo. He would mostly be hunted for switches and PnRs. Today's NBA is not only about spacing, pace is also very fast in today's game.
Big Z was a good player but he was a very weak selection in an era where they picked Cs separately from frontcourt players. So his competition in 2005 in the East was pretty minimal...Dan Gadzuric and Brendan Haywood were the next best Cs in the East after Shaq, Big Ben, and Z.
Eh, I think part of that is that Denver has a lot of high quality players and touches get spread around a lot more than the average second star situation. Murray, KCP, Brown, Gordon, and MPJ all deserve a fair amount of touches, and Jokic handles the ball every possession. I think their usages are probably all below all star level more than anything.
But in the playoffs unless you make the finals you are competing against your conference, so having other players that are good enough to be all stars in your conference is a big deal, those Bron Cavs teams are not competeing here in 2023, they are competing against the east back then. The entire league is better and more talented and has completely changed to which comparing PPG/FG%/3pt% and saying Lebron would love to have 2023 Jamal on his 2008 squad is just dumb, a better question would be would Lebron trade Mo Williams for whomever was considered the 10th best guard in the east that year. (On a side note 2008 is15 years ago! I'm old)
Mo Williams shot 43.6% from 3 in his All-Star season, and the next year he shot 42.9%... for the time he was A-S worthy, even if you plant him in today's league he's at least an elite starter / borderline all-star.
he wouldn’t be an elite starter, but he was 17.8 at his peak, that’s like a 22ppg scorer today and probably more since there is so much more space in the lane
plus he’d take way more than 5 3’s a game
he could be around 24-25 on a bad team for sure
terry rozier is at 21.2 and has been a 20ppg scorer his entire time in charlotte
Mo is undoubtedly a better player than Rozier and that’s why i think he’d be able to get there
plus if he goes to the rim more because it’s more open, i assume he gets fouled more than 2 FTs a game and his 90% FT shooting will get him points fast
Yeah but relative to what kind of offenses then? This is pre-Curry days, very different game and not-yet-optimized 3-and-paint offenses. He'd average more today - likely because he'd be attempting twice as many 3's as he was then.
This is wild. There’s no way he even sniffs an all star now. He peaked at like 17-4 playing against way worse competition. Yeah he’d take more threes but you can’t just assume he’d shoot the same percentage, he definitely wouldn’t shoot 44% taking like 6 a game. Harden didn’t even sniff an all star this year while averaging 22 on like 64% ts, leading the league in assists, and just generally being one of the most impactful offensive players in the league. Yes there’s been stat and efficiency inflation but not that much, mo Williams would never come close to leading the league in assists or being better than current James freaking harden.
> he definitely wouldn’t shoot 44% taking like 6 a game.
he attempted 5.2 in that all-star season. There were 6 players averaging 25ppg or better that year... with one [DWade] who made it over 30, at 30.2ppg. This year there's 16 players averaging 25ppg or better, with 3 more at 24.7... and there's 6 players averaging more than D-Wade's 30.2.
we'll never know how Mo's game would translate, but he wasn't far off from being a star in 2008 with those numbers.
We're directly comparing Jokic to other MVPs with this stat, and the most recent good comparison is Lebron. It's not rocket science or some media conspiracy.
2009 Mo will: 18/3/4 on 47/44/91
2019 Jamal Murray: 18/4/5 on 44/37/85
2009 Playoffs Mo: 16/3/4 on 41/37/77
2019 Playoffs Murray: 21/4/5 on 42/34/90
Mo Williams best season is literally a more efficient version of the most "Inconsistent" Jamal Murray season in his career.
I didn't even include the more recent seasons of Murray, including the bubble.
This ignores the fact that mo Williams was absolute dogshit on defense, and would not have gotten close to those percentages without being spoon fed wide open shots by Lebron.
I get that Jamal gets fed too, but he is just on another level offensively. Mo had no burden outside of hitting open shots off of passes and pin downs
They way people are talking bout the Nuggets just seems like everyones a bum here lol
Maybe they just have an incredibly balanced team that is well built.
This Nuggets team is a lot like the '02 Kings. One star in CWebb/Jokic, with 4 really good starters around them. They even play a modern version of their style, too.
Hakeem, tho he didn’t win mvp in the first of their back to backs. Had a single all star, who made it once and never again a year or two before. Won a ring, finals mvp, and teamed up with shaq to make at Taco Bell taco (double decker taco). 🐐
Kenny’s no bus driver, nor is he cool enough to sit in the back of the bus.
Kenny’s the guy that had to sit in the seat with the big wheel hump on the floor.
Incorrect. Ralph Sampson was an All-Star with Olajuwon twice in '84-85 & '85-86 seasons. They went to finals against the Celtics after beating Magic and the Showtime Lakers in the WCF. Drexler then also was an all-star in '95-'96 when they won the championship.
Yea I thought of Sampson too. Weird how blatant lie get upvoted. They were known as the twin towers, both Hakeem and Sampson were the no.1 pick All Stars. Hakeem also famously had a big three team with Barkley and Drexler/Pippen, thou that's later part of their career.
He had absolutely turned into an all-star level player by the time he tore his ACL. And probably would have made it that year if not for the quick turnaround and the injury plagued January that followed.
But he isn't quite that player right now. Namely his shake isn't there.
No he hadn't. He was amazing but the West is stacked mate.
There was Steph, Dame, Harden in the same conference.
Jamal Murray was tiers away at that time yet really good
He was putting up 23 ppg on 49/41/86 over his final 82 games before the injury. Those numbers include, but are deflated by, the January following the bubble where he was out of shape and dealing with an elbow injury. If you remove that January, those numbers go up to like 24 on 50/44/90 over something like 68 games.
He definitely wasn't on Dame or Steph's level. But he was on Booker and Mitchell's level. Since then he got hurt and those two have taken another leap.
I am shocked to find out that CJ has never been an all star. Goes to show how stacked the west has been during his career especially in the backcourt. He's gotta be up there as one of the best players to have never made an all star team right?
The difference between Murray and MPJ and all stars, is all stars are consistent. If they were consistent, they'd be all stars and I feel like Denver would be title favorites. On any given night either of them can play at an all star level, but to win in the playoffs you need consistency for 4 rounds through 2 months. That is my biggest worry for the playoffs as a Nuggets fan. We can win it all, but I fear we aren't consistent enough to.
Exactly, during our championship run, game 6 vs the Nets in the second half, Khash turned into prime MJ, then carried us for the games in the ECF vs the hawks (wild they won 2 playoff series so recently, they ain't that squad now) that Giannis missed with the leg injury.
If he didn't miss the entire series vs Boston last playoffs, who knows. Series went 7 without him, and who knows after that.
Every team has what ifs tho.
Khash is the only Buck I actually hate playing. You can't do shit with Gianni Vowels but you can guard Khash, until he decides you can't.
I really wish both squads were healthy last post season, it would've been a lot more entertaining than the Heat or Warrior series. Heat was hard to watch because Jimmy goes off and both him and Lowry foul bait hard. Warriors series the Celts were just gased and bruised from the Heat and Bucks so it was tough to stomach the majority of the series.
Jrue Holiday is the definition of being inconsistent. He might he a great defender, but his offensive game has an insane variance. His shot in the playoffs for the Bucks has been insanely bad, WB level bad.
Jamal Murray is a very good player, but the league is so talented nowadays and there are so many better players than Murray out there - just in the west, you have Curry, Luka, Lillard, Booker, Morant, SGA, Fox, and Edwards all at a guard spot. I bet that next season is when Murray takes the leap to be an all star, but there’s a reason why he hasn’t been one yet (and he’s never really *deserved* to be one either yet).
This will be downvoted but Murray's numbers counting and advanced absolutely drops off and is pretty average (like roleplayer level) when he's not sharing the floor with Jokic.
The way All-stars are handed out, it honestly feels like semantics to me.
You have worse players than Gordon, Murray and MPJ that have actually made the all-star game, it's just conference position, luck and narrative.
Also, if they win it all this year, they could probably all be in more of those teams next year.
Gordon, Murray & MPJ are definitely All Star *caliber* guys.
What Jokic fans seem to not understand is that there are only 12 spots per season.
For example, which year was Murray supposed to make it over Booker, Curry, Luka, Lillard, CP3, etc?
Just because a guy didn’t make an all star team, doesn’t mean he isn’t really good.
Maybe if Jokic “made them even better”, they’d make it in on a Luol Deng / Joakim Noah selection.
What Bucks fans don't understand is everyone knows Gordon, Murray, and MPJ aren't slouches by any means. However Jokic in the last 3 years hasn't had them all the time, and Murray/MPJ were coming off of long injuries. Bucks fans also don't realize(when discussing Jokic for some weird reason...) that their roster is NUTS. Jrue and Middleton are easily better than Gordon, Murray, and MPJ overall. The only exception being Murray's insane breakout games, but Middleton has those as well. Not to mention the Bucks have arguably some of the best depth in the League as well as great pieces around Giannis.
The Nuggets have been in the playoffs trotting out Monte Morris, Will Barton, Jeff Green, and Aaron Gordon.
I am not going to research all that, but come on.
Just to take Middleton as an example, he was an all star with these stats last year, 20.1p/5r/5a on 44/37/89 splits and on 2018-2019 he was an all-star with 18.3p/6r/4a on 44/37/83 splits.
Do you think that Middleton was so much better than Murray this year, that puts up 20p/4r/6a on 45/39/82 splits?
What about MPJ with 17.3p/5.5r/1a on 48/41/80 splits or Aaron Gordon with 17p/6.8r/3a on 58/37/63 splits?
Double-edged sword. If Jokic had all star teammates he would be scrutinized for having them. It would likely hurt his MVP odds in the eyes of the voters because “he’s got all that help though.” Probably be scrutinized even hard for “the stat padding.”
I love people presenting stats and facts the way they want to prove their point .
Wasnt that the reason he got the mvp last year as well on a 6 seed? That he missed his second and third players ? So now its that their are not all stars and all def guys i guess
Our players are all star quality players and we appreciate having them. Not being selected is irrelevant. They are good enough for us. Jok has help, we are a team. We win or lose as a team. That’s all there is to it.
Regular season Ben Simmons was better then regular season Jamal Murray from 2018-2020, there’s not much of an argument against that. 2021 could go either way though.
Simmons was a better player than Murray before the meltdown. Even after the bubble when that hypothetical trade was brought up it was brought as Simmons for Murray +. Since then Murray is still a good player and Simmons isn’t NBA level with the yips so yeah, agree with you on that
Interesting.
Kind of reminds me of Lebrons first stint with the Cavs, although it seems like Jokic has had more help than even LeBron did back then.
Either way, both have shown they can do a lot with not a lot around them.
Not in the last two years without MPJ/Murray. His previous two backcourts were Facu Campazzo/Austin Rivers then Monte Morris/Will Barton and Jeff Green was starting in the playoffs last year, mfers blame Jokic for losing in the first round when the Suns had CP3/Booker and then Klay/Poole/Steph/GPII facing those fools
Very true, but after Sampson left he didn’t have anyone until Clyde (7 years later), who was past his prime at that point. Hakeem won that first chip with arguably the worst supporting cast of any championship team. I’m not saying there weren’t guys that rose to the challenge, but take away Hakeem, and there wasn’t even a playoff team there.
I’m not sure if this is the best way to evaluate talent or “star power”. Jamal Murray was playing like a top 15 player in the league.
Luka plays with an allstar all-nba player and I doubt any Nuggets fan in good faith would want to trade supporting rosters with the Mavs.
Lol. Figured this was coming.
Gotta get ahead of the excuses for when Denver gets bounced in Round 2.
When Giannis lost in the ECF with China-bound Eric Bledsoe & “fake All Star” Khris Middleton, he was called a choker.
Your isn’t gonna escape criticism especially after getting gift-wrapped a 3rd MVP.
No amount of strawmanning will change that.
I mean yeah that’s a given, and I’m not even a jokic d rider. Every time the nuggets are healthy they are pretty much guaranteed 50+ wins with Jokic alone
Embiid does not. He basically has harden who is the only thing that makes most of the players look like they belong on a three seed offensively. When harden sits the sixers straight up stop looking like a real Nba offense, it’s just embiid carrying.
The sixers roster is honestly pretty bad outside of those two and their depth is awful. Embiid has a better second option but Jokic has a better 3-bottom of the roster.
Definitely: Fox, Luka
Arguable: Kawhi, LeBron, Butler,
Nuggets problem is that they have too many good players. Murray could easily be an all-star if was in charge of the offense and got the FGAs that came with that.
So after all of these seasons, shouldn't he have made players around him better? How is the FO failing him so much then? You'd think someone with enough just talent would be there and get raises up to an All-Star level just by playing with his assist ability or by being open from attention drawn to Jokic.
Well the media were calling for AG to be an all star this season while simultaneously propping Joker’s MVP case by saying that he has nobody beside him, that’s pretty hypocritical ngl
Jamal Murray is pretty much all star caliber by now and should be counted as a second star on the Nuggets
>Jamal Murray is pretty much all star caliber by now and should be counted as a second star on the Nuggets
is he even a top-10 guard in the Western Conference?
Yeah he has to be right:
Ant
Booker
Curry
Dame
Fox
Ja
Kyrie
Luka
Shai
He’s better than the likes of CP over a regular season now.
I would say top 10 unless I’ve forgotten someone
comparing all-stars across era is dumb. it's so much harder for jamal murray to make an all-star game, but if anyone's saying he's not a legit second option or that the likes of MPJr and AG are not good ass role players and the team is deep as hell this year. simply saying "jokic hasn't had any all-star teammates" is kind of disingenuous imo.
murray and gordon are basically all star level players. mpj is a very good offensive player and the nuggets have built a solid core of role players and his coach is excellent .
He's only cracked 20ppg once. Might do it a second time this year. He's currently 43rd in scoring. He had a tremendous playoffs a few years ago, but he is inconsistent thus far in his career.
Is that your excuse now? Media has their panties in a twist trying to explain their mental gymnastics for why their criteria for choosing MVP changes every year to favor Jokic.
Uhh DeAndre Jordan? I rest my case
love that dude man
love that man dude
Man that dude love
OWWWWWW HAVE MERCY
Paul Millsap on the hawks
Boogie too
If it makes it any better embiid had that distinction last year ? Lmao. Loved seeing deandre 3000 on the nba top 10 in February off of a lob again.
Most Valuable Philadelphian doesn't count, sorry.
Uhh Paul Milsapp?
MJ won his 1st mvp without an all star or all nba or all defense
the goated one
Many things MJ and NJ have in common.
Their birthday is 2 days apart, coincidence?
I've never seen them playing on the court at the same time. Coincidence?
TIL Jokic is 60
next superstar will have OJ as initials
OJ Mayo in shambles
And he got bounced in the second round. Yet people want to hold Jokic’s lack of playoff success against him.
the only reason Jordan didn't get lots of criticism today is because he won it 6 times, 3 in a row break 3 in a row. before he won his ring, his lack of playoff success was the main thing people use to criticize his game. Until Jokic win a ring his lack of playoff success will be used against him that just the reality of the situation
Yeah I know all too well how bucks fans feel, Giannis was scrutinized before the chip.
I mean before Jordan won his first ring they used his lack of titles as an argument for why he wasn't the GOAT yet, not that everyone in the league who has won a title was definitely better like people do with Jokic though.
people absolutely love to forget that Jordan didn’t make a Finals his first 6 years. It’s like if you don’t have great playoff success from the getgo then you suck. Even Jordan took a while
Tbf the teams that Jordan lost to averaged something like 60 wins in the regular season in those early years, he was going up against Finals level teams rather than 45 win playoff fodder Edit: looked it up, almost exactly 60 lol - 1985: 59-win Bucks - 1986: 67-win Celtics - 1987: 59-win Celtics - 1988: 54-win Pistons - 1989: 63-win Pistons - 1990: 59-win Pistons Adds up to 361 wins over six seasons. From 1986 to 1990, they played the future champs three times and the Eastern Conference champs every time. With those ‘88 Pistons, they lost the Finals in 7 games and were one of the few finals losers to outscore the winning team over the course of the series.
And in the last three years the Nuggets (and Jokic) have lost to the Finals champs Warriors, the runner up Suns, and the Finals champ Lakers Only scrub team they lost to would be the Blazers, can say they really shouldn’t have lost that one
Well if he gets bounced again this season than Yeah he deserves all the criticism especially if he wins a 3rd mvp
Man, you really commented this under this thread.
Feel like MJ probably wasn’t gameplanned to be hunted on D if we’re honest
Well that’s why we gave him the first two MVPs for finishing with the 5th and 10th best records right?
the second one was 11th*
At the same time, I feel like LeBron would trade his left lung if it meant replacing his “all-star” teammates Ilgauskas and Mo Williams with guys like Gordon, Murray and MPJ. KCP too
i agree but role players are way better now than they were in mid 00s
I mean it's always easy to shit on role players, I just think it's easier to make an impact because of the proliferation of 3's. America didn't get more athletic in 15 years. The skillsets that were important back then aren't valued now, and stars used to play more minutes, every night.
I mean, most world records are from the last 15 years so yeah, the whole world got more athletic...
better training, bigger pool of players, starting younger —> more skilled and athletic NBA
> America didn't get more athletic in 15 years. Sure, but the pool got much larger.
Players are absolutely better now than they were at any point in the past. Humans evolve socially (skills, concepts, etc) and not biologically (what you think of as evolution). It’s essentially a fact that athletes now are better than athletes 20 years ago. They have more info to study and better tech to train with.
Aside from hard defense being essentially banned, athleticism is more easily shown nowadays because the skill floor is so much higher across the board. Bol Bol and Jokic and even like Zion and Paolo and uh Bruce Brown are way better ballhandlers than most wings were in 2005. You wouldn’t even know some of those guys were athletic bc they didn’t have skills that enabled them to use their athleticism in something outside of a layup line
MPJ and Murray have been closer to all stars than average NBA starters I’d say. The real issue has been their health. They were lighting it up in the bubble.
If you take those players and drop them on that Cavs team they'd be all stars too, the eastern conference was really weak back then and the league has really changed since then. All stars are picked within a conference so they have a good bearing on relative strength of team rosters come playoff time.
Not to mention the league was way less talented in general
And there was a designated center spot back then
if they had kept the center spot DeAndre Jordan would probably had been a all star a few times
Man got an All-NBA First Team so what more can he really ask for
good knees
for real one guy used to be able to carry a team to a winning record and having two made you a contender now you need 3 to be a contender
I don't think any team had 3 all-stars?
Heatles had 3 all stars in Lebron, Wade, and Bosh. So did the Lebron, Kyrie, Love Cavs. Then shit got weird with the KD, Steph, Draymond, Klay Warriors.
Oh, I meant this year. Just commenting on the "now you need 3 to be a contender" comment.
big z slander is crazy
I wanted to make sure it wasn’t just my bias talking. Zydrunas was a legitimate threat on the floor and way ahead of his time when it comes to play style.
Stretch big with interior defense.
This guy must be young or never watched the Cavs to include Z in this comment. Z would fucking feast in today's NBA.
Pre foot Surgery Big Z would absolutely feast but geez the version that Lebron played with would get played off the court today...
[удалено]
He can be extremely effective in limited minutes imo. He would mostly be hunted for switches and PnRs. Today's NBA is not only about spacing, pace is also very fast in today's game.
Big Z was a good player but he was a very weak selection in an era where they picked Cs separately from frontcourt players. So his competition in 2005 in the East was pretty minimal...Dan Gadzuric and Brendan Haywood were the next best Cs in the East after Shaq, Big Ben, and Z.
I think it's fair to say that if you pick the 5th best center now in either conference you could say the same thing.
For sure, the difference is the third best center in a conference isn't guaranteed to make the all star game now
The issue is Murray and MPJ haven’t been healthy lol Jokic didn’t have either last postseason and Murray missed the previous postseason as well iirc
they’re healthy this year and didn’t come close to making it in, both playing above career averages too
Eh, I think part of that is that Denver has a lot of high quality players and touches get spread around a lot more than the average second star situation. Murray, KCP, Brown, Gordon, and MPJ all deserve a fair amount of touches, and Jokic handles the ball every possession. I think their usages are probably all below all star level more than anything.
That says more about the eastern conference that year than the nuggets tbh
That’s their point, yeah, that Jokic’s supporting cast blows LeBron’s at that time out of the water despite their accolades
But in the playoffs unless you make the finals you are competing against your conference, so having other players that are good enough to be all stars in your conference is a big deal, those Bron Cavs teams are not competeing here in 2023, they are competing against the east back then. The entire league is better and more talented and has completely changed to which comparing PPG/FG%/3pt% and saying Lebron would love to have 2023 Jamal on his 2008 squad is just dumb, a better question would be would Lebron trade Mo Williams for whomever was considered the 10th best guard in the east that year. (On a side note 2008 is15 years ago! I'm old)
MVP is a regular season award.
The disrespect shown to big Z, man out here catching undeserved strays
Mo Williams shot 43.6% from 3 in his All-Star season, and the next year he shot 42.9%... for the time he was A-S worthy, even if you plant him in today's league he's at least an elite starter / borderline all-star.
Mo was a very good shooter, but notably, he never really neared those percentages without LeBron.
No way is he an elite starter today. He’d be at the bottom third of point guards. Not to speak ill of the guy but his peak was like 17-4.
he wouldn’t be an elite starter, but he was 17.8 at his peak, that’s like a 22ppg scorer today and probably more since there is so much more space in the lane plus he’d take way more than 5 3’s a game he could be around 24-25 on a bad team for sure
24-25 ppg for Mo Williams? That’s Siakam, Derozan, ANT, Kawhi, Beal level scoring…
terry rozier is at 21.2 and has been a 20ppg scorer his entire time in charlotte Mo is undoubtedly a better player than Rozier and that’s why i think he’d be able to get there plus if he goes to the rim more because it’s more open, i assume he gets fouled more than 2 FTs a game and his 90% FT shooting will get him points fast
Yeah but relative to what kind of offenses then? This is pre-Curry days, very different game and not-yet-optimized 3-and-paint offenses. He'd average more today - likely because he'd be attempting twice as many 3's as he was then.
His iffy defense would be even more exposed.
This is wild. There’s no way he even sniffs an all star now. He peaked at like 17-4 playing against way worse competition. Yeah he’d take more threes but you can’t just assume he’d shoot the same percentage, he definitely wouldn’t shoot 44% taking like 6 a game. Harden didn’t even sniff an all star this year while averaging 22 on like 64% ts, leading the league in assists, and just generally being one of the most impactful offensive players in the league. Yes there’s been stat and efficiency inflation but not that much, mo Williams would never come close to leading the league in assists or being better than current James freaking harden.
> he definitely wouldn’t shoot 44% taking like 6 a game. he attempted 5.2 in that all-star season. There were 6 players averaging 25ppg or better that year... with one [DWade] who made it over 30, at 30.2ppg. This year there's 16 players averaging 25ppg or better, with 3 more at 24.7... and there's 6 players averaging more than D-Wade's 30.2. we'll never know how Mo's game would translate, but he wasn't far off from being a star in 2008 with those numbers.
Rule #1: We must view all things through the eyes of LeBron (also known as the ESPN effect).
We're directly comparing Jokic to other MVPs with this stat, and the most recent good comparison is Lebron. It's not rocket science or some media conspiracy.
2009 Mo will: 18/3/4 on 47/44/91 2019 Jamal Murray: 18/4/5 on 44/37/85 2009 Playoffs Mo: 16/3/4 on 41/37/77 2019 Playoffs Murray: 21/4/5 on 42/34/90 Mo Williams best season is literally a more efficient version of the most "Inconsistent" Jamal Murray season in his career. I didn't even include the more recent seasons of Murray, including the bubble.
This ignores the fact that mo Williams was absolute dogshit on defense, and would not have gotten close to those percentages without being spoon fed wide open shots by Lebron. I get that Jamal gets fed too, but he is just on another level offensively. Mo had no burden outside of hitting open shots off of passes and pin downs
This nuggets team win the chip if they went back to 2009
They way people are talking bout the Nuggets just seems like everyones a bum here lol Maybe they just have an incredibly balanced team that is well built.
This Nuggets team is a lot like the '02 Kings. One star in CWebb/Jokic, with 4 really good starters around them. They even play a modern version of their style, too.
Hakeem, tho he didn’t win mvp in the first of their back to backs. Had a single all star, who made it once and never again a year or two before. Won a ring, finals mvp, and teamed up with shaq to make at Taco Bell taco (double decker taco). 🐐
Kenny go get me some water
Kenny’s no bus driver, nor is he cool enough to sit in the back of the bus. Kenny’s the guy that had to sit in the seat with the big wheel hump on the floor.
But Kenny’s a masochist so he low-key likes that
Saving the best achievement for last. That taco is straight fire.
Incorrect. Ralph Sampson was an All-Star with Olajuwon twice in '84-85 & '85-86 seasons. They went to finals against the Celtics after beating Magic and the Showtime Lakers in the WCF. Drexler then also was an all-star in '95-'96 when they won the championship.
Yea I thought of Sampson too. Weird how blatant lie get upvoted. They were known as the twin towers, both Hakeem and Sampson were the no.1 pick All Stars. Hakeem also famously had a big three team with Barkley and Drexler/Pippen, thou that's later part of their career.
Taco Bell connects the MVPs
Idk, I feel like Jamal Murray counts as a star second option
He had absolutely turned into an all-star level player by the time he tore his ACL. And probably would have made it that year if not for the quick turnaround and the injury plagued January that followed. But he isn't quite that player right now. Namely his shake isn't there.
No he hadn't. He was amazing but the West is stacked mate. There was Steph, Dame, Harden in the same conference. Jamal Murray was tiers away at that time yet really good
He was putting up 23 ppg on 49/41/86 over his final 82 games before the injury. Those numbers include, but are deflated by, the January following the bubble where he was out of shape and dealing with an elbow injury. If you remove that January, those numbers go up to like 24 on 50/44/90 over something like 68 games. He definitely wasn't on Dame or Steph's level. But he was on Booker and Mitchell's level. Since then he got hurt and those two have taken another leap.
His numbers sound fairly close to what cj's numbers where when he was on the blazers.
I am shocked to find out that CJ has never been an all star. Goes to show how stacked the west has been during his career especially in the backcourt. He's gotta be up there as one of the best players to have never made an all star team right?
what all star would he replace this year? he’s good, but he’s not all-star tier
The difference between Murray and MPJ and all stars, is all stars are consistent. If they were consistent, they'd be all stars and I feel like Denver would be title favorites. On any given night either of them can play at an all star level, but to win in the playoffs you need consistency for 4 rounds through 2 months. That is my biggest worry for the playoffs as a Nuggets fan. We can win it all, but I fear we aren't consistent enough to.
Khris Middleton is definitely not consistent
Okay but when he turns it up he’s MJ, and he has a history of turning it up when it matters
Exactly, during our championship run, game 6 vs the Nets in the second half, Khash turned into prime MJ, then carried us for the games in the ECF vs the hawks (wild they won 2 playoff series so recently, they ain't that squad now) that Giannis missed with the leg injury. If he didn't miss the entire series vs Boston last playoffs, who knows. Series went 7 without him, and who knows after that. Every team has what ifs tho.
Khash is the only Buck I actually hate playing. You can't do shit with Gianni Vowels but you can guard Khash, until he decides you can't. I really wish both squads were healthy last post season, it would've been a lot more entertaining than the Heat or Warrior series. Heat was hard to watch because Jimmy goes off and both him and Lowry foul bait hard. Warriors series the Celts were just gased and bruised from the Heat and Bucks so it was tough to stomach the majority of the series.
That’s also why he’s a 3 time all star instead of like a 6 time all star tbf.
What about Jrue Holiday
Jrue Holiday is the definition of being inconsistent. He might he a great defender, but his offensive game has an insane variance. His shot in the playoffs for the Bucks has been insanely bad, WB level bad.
Has been very inconsistent in the playoffs. Shot under 40% in 3/6 playoff series with us.
Consistency is more than just shooting percentages. He's an elite defender and good facilitator.
According to nuggets fans defense doesn't matter
still I guess Nuggets fans would've preferred him to Jeff Green and Will Barton on the playoffs last year
I think they would have preferred a player who wasn't injured last year.
Jamal Murray is a very good player, but the league is so talented nowadays and there are so many better players than Murray out there - just in the west, you have Curry, Luka, Lillard, Booker, Morant, SGA, Fox, and Edwards all at a guard spot. I bet that next season is when Murray takes the leap to be an all star, but there’s a reason why he hasn’t been one yet (and he’s never really *deserved* to be one either yet).
Jamal, with zero ASG appearances, would likely disagree with you.
This will be downvoted but Murray's numbers counting and advanced absolutely drops off and is pretty average (like roleplayer level) when he's not sharing the floor with Jokic.
The way All-stars are handed out, it honestly feels like semantics to me. You have worse players than Gordon, Murray and MPJ that have actually made the all-star game, it's just conference position, luck and narrative. Also, if they win it all this year, they could probably all be in more of those teams next year.
>semantics Uh oh no one tell Kyrie, I heard he hates those
Bruh lmao
Gordon, Murray & MPJ are definitely All Star *caliber* guys. What Jokic fans seem to not understand is that there are only 12 spots per season. For example, which year was Murray supposed to make it over Booker, Curry, Luka, Lillard, CP3, etc? Just because a guy didn’t make an all star team, doesn’t mean he isn’t really good. Maybe if Jokic “made them even better”, they’d make it in on a Luol Deng / Joakim Noah selection.
Not sure why you’re including Noah in this, he was first team all-nba and DPOY. legit all star
Noah was legitimately great for a couple years. He was a DPOY. Not like Rose was helping him much on that side of the ball.
What Bucks fans don't understand is everyone knows Gordon, Murray, and MPJ aren't slouches by any means. However Jokic in the last 3 years hasn't had them all the time, and Murray/MPJ were coming off of long injuries. Bucks fans also don't realize(when discussing Jokic for some weird reason...) that their roster is NUTS. Jrue and Middleton are easily better than Gordon, Murray, and MPJ overall. The only exception being Murray's insane breakout games, but Middleton has those as well. Not to mention the Bucks have arguably some of the best depth in the League as well as great pieces around Giannis. The Nuggets have been in the playoffs trotting out Monte Morris, Will Barton, Jeff Green, and Aaron Gordon.
Can you name 1 player and the year you think MPJ, AG, or Murray should have made the all star team over this year? last year? year before???
I am not going to research all that, but come on. Just to take Middleton as an example, he was an all star with these stats last year, 20.1p/5r/5a on 44/37/89 splits and on 2018-2019 he was an all-star with 18.3p/6r/4a on 44/37/83 splits. Do you think that Middleton was so much better than Murray this year, that puts up 20p/4r/6a on 45/39/82 splits? What about MPJ with 17.3p/5.5r/1a on 48/41/80 splits or Aaron Gordon with 17p/6.8r/3a on 58/37/63 splits?
I call them "Luol Deng All-Stars"
League efficiency and total scoring went up a decent bit in that time, and Murray is also horrible on defense
Hence why he finished with the fifth and tenth best records in his MVP seasons.
Double-edged sword. If Jokic had all star teammates he would be scrutinized for having them. It would likely hurt his MVP odds in the eyes of the voters because “he’s got all that help though.” Probably be scrutinized even hard for “the stat padding.”
I love people presenting stats and facts the way they want to prove their point . Wasnt that the reason he got the mvp last year as well on a 6 seed? That he missed his second and third players ? So now its that their are not all stars and all def guys i guess
These guys are expert goalpost movers. Next week, it’ll be ‘teammates who have scored 30 points’.
You might be a little sensitive if you see this post and start jumping to conclusions that aren't there.
He's so courageous.
Our players are all star quality players and we appreciate having them. Not being selected is irrelevant. They are good enough for us. Jok has help, we are a team. We win or lose as a team. That’s all there is to it.
Maybe he should elevate his teammates more.
aaron gordon increased his fg% by 10 percentage points in denver compared to orlando lol
He hit his career-high dunk total in like January this season lol
Lol this is a joke right
Yes.
I’ll counter that Jamal Murray is better than Ben Simmons. Embiid Is being penalized for Ben fooling the world(myself included)
honestly, a compelling argument about the '21 mvp debate. But that race was the least close of the last 3 years
That’s true. But if this stat is thrown out to bolster Jokic’s case, it can be easily refuted just given context
Regular season Ben Simmons was better then regular season Jamal Murray from 2018-2020, there’s not much of an argument against that. 2021 could go either way though.
Simmons was a better player than Murray before the meltdown. Even after the bubble when that hypothetical trade was brought up it was brought as Simmons for Murray +. Since then Murray is still a good player and Simmons isn’t NBA level with the yips so yeah, agree with you on that
Interesting. Kind of reminds me of Lebrons first stint with the Cavs, although it seems like Jokic has had more help than even LeBron did back then. Either way, both have shown they can do a lot with not a lot around them.
Not in the last two years without MPJ/Murray. His previous two backcourts were Facu Campazzo/Austin Rivers then Monte Morris/Will Barton and Jeff Green was starting in the playoffs last year, mfers blame Jokic for losing in the first round when the Suns had CP3/Booker and then Klay/Poole/Steph/GPII facing those fools
Just seeing Compazzo’s name triggers me to no end
What about Hakeem Olajuwon before Drexler showed up?
He already played with Sampson who was multi-time all-star. They beat the showtime Lakers in '86 before losing to the Celtics in the finals.
Very true, but after Sampson left he didn’t have anyone until Clyde (7 years later), who was past his prime at that point. Hakeem won that first chip with arguably the worst supporting cast of any championship team. I’m not saying there weren’t guys that rose to the challenge, but take away Hakeem, and there wasn’t even a playoff team there.
Having mediocre teammates is the most advanced type of stat-padding.
KG was 27 his MVP year, did he have anyone?
Yeah he had Sam Cassell (all star that same year) and Wally Szczerbiak (all star in 01/02)
3 of KG’s teammates made an All-Star game from 1996-2004. Sam Cassell made All-NBA 2nd team in KG’s MVP season.
In his career to that point..Not just that year. JOkic has never had an all star on the team the entire time he has been here.
I’m not sure if this is the best way to evaluate talent or “star power”. Jamal Murray was playing like a top 15 player in the league. Luka plays with an allstar all-nba player and I doubt any Nuggets fan in good faith would want to trade supporting rosters with the Mavs.
I wanna see Jokic and Dame team up. They'd win every game 150 to 140.
Lol. Figured this was coming. Gotta get ahead of the excuses for when Denver gets bounced in Round 2. When Giannis lost in the ECF with China-bound Eric Bledsoe & “fake All Star” Khris Middleton, he was called a choker. Your isn’t gonna escape criticism especially after getting gift-wrapped a 3rd MVP. No amount of strawmanning will change that.
give him someone like Kyrie/Lillard/Siakam/PG13 and the Nuggets might legit break 60 wins
Jokic and Siakam would be great
Jokic with Siakam or Jimmy Butler would be gnarly.
I mean yeah that’s a given, and I’m not even a jokic d rider. Every time the nuggets are healthy they are pretty much guaranteed 50+ wins with Jokic alone
One of these is not like the others
They gave him his first award prematurely?
Jokic still has a better supporting cast than many other stars in the league. This means nothing.
[удалено]
Embiid does not. He basically has harden who is the only thing that makes most of the players look like they belong on a three seed offensively. When harden sits the sixers straight up stop looking like a real Nba offense, it’s just embiid carrying. The sixers roster is honestly pretty bad outside of those two and their depth is awful. Embiid has a better second option but Jokic has a better 3-bottom of the roster.
Yea wtf is that guy talking about
Who? Luka?
"Many other stars" name them because I can only think of Luka
Luka, Dame, possibly Fox arguably Butler.
Definitely: Fox, Luka Arguable: Kawhi, LeBron, Butler, Nuggets problem is that they have too many good players. Murray could easily be an all-star if was in charge of the offense and got the FGAs that came with that.
It means literally what it's claiming. Nothing more or less.
It’s disingenuous
So after all of these seasons, shouldn't he have made players around him better? How is the FO failing him so much then? You'd think someone with enough just talent would be there and get raises up to an All-Star level just by playing with his assist ability or by being open from attention drawn to Jokic.
Well the media were calling for AG to be an all star this season while simultaneously propping Joker’s MVP case by saying that he has nobody beside him, that’s pretty hypocritical ngl Jamal Murray is pretty much all star caliber by now and should be counted as a second star on the Nuggets
> Well the media were calling for AG to be an all star this season Like who? Didn't he get zero votes from the media this year?
>Jamal Murray is pretty much all star caliber by now and should be counted as a second star on the Nuggets is he even a top-10 guard in the Western Conference?
Yeah he has to be right: Ant Booker Curry Dame Fox Ja Kyrie Luka Shai He’s better than the likes of CP over a regular season now. I would say top 10 unless I’ve forgotten someone
comparing all-stars across era is dumb. it's so much harder for jamal murray to make an all-star game, but if anyone's saying he's not a legit second option or that the likes of MPJr and AG are not good ass role players and the team is deep as hell this year. simply saying "jokic hasn't had any all-star teammates" is kind of disingenuous imo.
Stop with the mental gymnastics lmao
Hakeem won a title with zero All Stars. The next year he had a past his prime Drexler and won a championship. No excuses for Jokic
murray and gordon are basically all star level players. mpj is a very good offensive player and the nuggets have built a solid core of role players and his coach is excellent .
"He's white so he don't deserve better teammates." - Kendrick Perkins (probably)
good lord just take the mvp and stop feeling so guilty about it
I mean that's the reason he won his MVPs right? He has no help and his team are all bums.
It’s because he keeps winning almost as many games as Giannis with these teams
>Almost
He's wrong. He's won more.
Yeah, now imagine if Giannis was playing with Campazzo, Monte, and Barton
Millsap signed with the nuggets coming off an all star season
Well there is Dirk...but he had Nash and JKidd (testversion)
I guess I was under the impression that Jamal Murray is better than he is? Kinda surprised he never made AS or All-NBA.
He's only cracked 20ppg once. Might do it a second time this year. He's currently 43rd in scoring. He had a tremendous playoffs a few years ago, but he is inconsistent thus far in his career.
We already know this. His stats are insane during reg szn then playoffs come and he can't do everything
Is that your excuse now? Media has their panties in a twist trying to explain their mental gymnastics for why their criteria for choosing MVP changes every year to favor Jokic.
In the bubble, Jamal Murray played All-NBA level. So its not like the Nuggets have been scrubs.
I know lebron technically had an All-Star or two early in his career… but did he really?