There are other possible answers... 1) OKC's depth is really, really bad due to the Carmelo trade. 2) Their chemistry was worse because of Carmelo. 3) The newness of a play maker like George (and Carmelo somewhat) tends to hold back the team flow, and consequently the record, a bit the first year.
Yes, their depth suffered in both trades last summer, but it was a trade off: better starters vs. better bench. Still, if their two best players were really better than our best player, they should have had a better record than us. It's not like we had great depth. OKC had the lowest scoring bench in the league at 25.9 ppg. POR was 27th at 27.6 ppg. So, our bench averaged 1.7 more PPG than their's. Was their chemistry worse because of Carmelo, or was it the same old shit because of Westbrook's hero ball mentality? Westbrook is the type of talent that will always insure his team is good, but he consistently holds them back from being great. He puts up huge numbers, but does so very inefficiently and tends to freeze out his more efficient teammates when the game is on the line. That had nothing to do with Carmelo. It was the same shit when he had Durant as a teammate. Again with Westbrook dominating the ball, there really isn't much of a "team flow" in OKC. It's basically Russ being Russ, getting, his numbers and everyone else getting his scraps. And, that's kind of my point. Shouldn't the best players make their teammates better? And, if they make their teammates better, shouldn't that lead to more wins? It does with Dame and it doesn't with Russ, even though Russ clearly has better teammates than Dame. SI may not recognize it, but the folks who vote for MVP and All NBA both rated Dame higher than Russ. I put more value in the consensus opinions of those voters than the subjective opinions of Ben Golliver and Rob Mahoney. BNM
The PG trade fits that mold, but it was only a marginal loss of depth. The Carmelo trade wiped out the remaining depth while doing nothing to improve the starters...despite the thoughts of the many on here who clamored for him. Dude's been over the hill for longer than half the guys have been in the league. I knew that was the gist of what you were getting at. Had to rib ya with a reply... In all seriousness, though, the team over-performed in support of Russ in that role a year earlier. Adding another selfish alpha player to the mix in Carmelo is what broke the fragile chemistry, IMO. You can sometimes survive one guy like that, but never two. I do think Dame had a better season than Russ, so I'd be in favor of swapping their positions. Would that make you happier with the overall rankings? I'd like to think CJ is better than 33, but most of the names ahead of him deserve to be there as much as he does. Steven Adams at 38 is a bit of a head scratcher, considering names like Jaylen Brown and Devin Booker rounding out the top-50, but he is a hell of an efficient role player.
It was fine with him before adding PG and Carmelo. I'm sure Russ isn't the easiest guy to get along with, but they had a good balance post-Durant, and PG seems to be cool with him.
If Aminu is 81, Ed Davis should also be in the top 100. They were equally good for us. Ed is always disrespected.
