Stephen Curry...Greatest individual season of all time? **POSSIBLE NBA SPOILERS!**

I like this Lebron. Assertive. Aggressive. Takes the outside shot when he has a good shot without much hesitation. Focused. Very little hot doggin' and chest poundin'. Missed quite a bit of shots in the 4th quarter though, but Kyrie was on fire. Make no mistake , Kyrie can score and do it efficiently. They need Green bad. I'm not sure if the Warriors can take another one in Cleveland this time around. No Bogut puts Warriors in an edgy situation.

 

Yep, it's a grudge match now.

CLE has bullied their way back into it.

The pretty boys will need a strong backbone to close it out now.

 

Kyrie and Lebron were practically unstoppable tonight. Amazing offense performance by the Cavs duo. Klay was amazing for a half. Curry again played #2, and without Draymond they needed him to be amazing if they would pull game 4 out. You can really see the effect of not having Draymond Green, particularly on the defensive end. Iggy played well for a while, but Lebron just had a great game. Lebron pretty much had a free run to the basket for layups. Now that Bogut is injured, the dubs will need draymond even more. I think the Warriors can still win in Cleveland, but if the Cleveland duo scores like they did tonight, especially if Lebron hits outside shots. This will likely go 7, and the dubs will still be favored to win, unless Draymond gets another flagrant and is gone again...

 

Glad my prediction was wrong and hope game 6 is a nail biter

 

The greats have off days in the regular season, not in the Finals.

Can you name any game when Jordan had an off game in the Finals? Magic? Bird? etc...

 

Sure I can...no problem...

1996 NBA finals game 4 against Seattle Supersonics. Coach George Karl of the Sonics finally decided to let Gary Payton, "the glove" play Jordan 1 on 1, much to Payton's pleading. Payton responded by locking up MJ into a 9/16 night and "only 23 points". As the sonics rolled to a 21 point blowout...

The Sonics also won the next game with again Payton limiing Jordan to "only 26 points in game 5.

Keep in mind 1996 was the season that the Bulls won 72 games (now eclipsed be the Golden Stare Warriors)
I was a big Gary Payton fan back then, as I had his basketball shoes (much preferred them to Jordan's) and he was from Oakland and still represents the Bay Area well to this day...

Yes everyone has bad days...

 

but can k love ever have a good day? what a waste! cavs much better with rj instead. and rj looked washed up recently esp when played for spurs. what is his secret? he better hope he doesn't get drug tested

 

Yeah, I am surprised that Love is not doing better. RJ looked good because there was no Draymond and no Bogut for most of the game and there was no interior defense put up by the Warriors. Did you see how easy Lebron and Kyrie had paths to the paint? Minus the 2 time runner up for defensive NBA MVP in Draymond Green and one of the most feared shot blockers in the game (former 2nd team all NBA defensive team) in Andrew Bogut, This was not the same championship defense that the Warriors have had through this banner 73 win year. The NBA and Lebron got their wish in extending this series, and it is quite shameful an OFF THE COURT decision may likely go down as the turning point of the series. Bad luck in losing Bogut will hurt this team. He is the best passing center in the league and the best screen setter for Curry and Thompson.

Curry really needs to up his offensive game in one of the next 2 games if the Warriors are to win the championship this year. There are reports that Curry has suffered a right shoulder injury, likely in game 4 when he was fouled hard in the paint. Of course, no flagrant foul, or even common foul was called. I have stated many times in the past that the NBA refs let all these things to go on to Curry. The report stated that he may need surgery, but Curry has denied this report. Before game 5 during interviews you can see Curry weeding a large ice-bag on the right shoulder. Perhaps this may be affecting him...

It is now a series, as the NBA has wished for...

 

That's not a bad game, that's being defended by one of the best defenders ever.

Bulls went on to win that series.

 

What goes around comes around I guess. Cavs lost Love and Irving last year either before or during the Finals, and now the same seems to be happening to the Warriors.

Officiating has been terrible all around, although I think everything has at least mostly balanced itself out. Not sure if you saw last night or not, but there was one (completely wrong) call when the ref said Irving dribbled the ball on the line, and since it happened outside of 2:00, they couldn't review it. Not only did the ball not touch the line (it wasn't even very close), Irving got shoved out of bounds right after the call by a Warriors player and the refs missed everything.

 

For the undisputed greatest basketball player of all time, MJ, 23 points with poor efficiency and a 31 point blowout loss to the Sonics was a bad game...

My point is that sometimes true history is not how we always remember it...Sometimes the greatest hero's in our youth come out a bit more heroic than they really were. We tend to think that these legends were perfect, when in fact they ay have been far from it.

In comparison to Curry's "lackluster" 2016 NBA playoffs, his worst game so far was the game 3 blowout at the hands of OKC where he "only scored 24 points with poor efficiency from 3 point land.

Other 2106 playoff games where Curry's performance has been criticized were in game 1 and 2 of the Cleveland series where he scored shy of 20 points on both occasions. In game 2 another Warriors blowout win, he shot 7/12 and was very efficient. In games 1 and 2 both Curry and Thompson were held down due to strong perimeter defense, that the Warriors team mentality subsequently moved the ball in cuts to the paint where "the other guys" destroyed the Cavs interior.

Of course none of this matters much if the Warriors don't win the series in the next 2 games, which has been made much more difficult-by luck, karma or whatever you say... But I contend that the NBA has deliberately gone out of their way to give the Cavs some help since they were fearing a sweep or a 5 game series.

 

If Steph was really an MVP having the greatest season ever, he would transcend the lack of a single player and put the team on his shoulders and win. He did not.

Many moons ago, Magic Johnson played center in game 6 vs. the Sixers and scored 40, had 15 rebounds and 5 or 6 assists, LA won the game and the series. That's an MVP, that's a great player. The Lakers lose their starting CENTER, and their starting GUARD plays his position and they won.

Golden State did not win last night, in part because their best player doesn't have a complete game. He's not a big man, so he can only shoot them out of trouble. He's not gonna pass them out of trouble either. So, in a game where he needed to score 40 to make it work, he didn't, LeBron did, game over.

I still think GS wins the series, but I think this may be another nail in the coffin of the concept that this is the greatest individual season of all time.

D

 

Judgements will be made when the season is all well and done. We will have to put all the information together to see if Steph's season is or is not the greatest individual season of all time. I contend that so far, his individual accomplishments, including MVP accolades, individual records broken, team records broken, effect on popular culture, and effect on the game put him at or near the top of this list.

Obviously championship in 2016 will also have to be considered in this.

So in comparison Michael's 1996 season where he won 72 games and was dominant in the finals is probably the best individual season of all time? Do you want to consider Wilt's Philadelphia Warriors year where he scored 100 in a game but lost out in the early round of the playoffs? One of Magic's or Kareem's best showtime years? Oscar Robertson's best year, One of Kobe or Shaq's best years, One of Lebron's 2 championship years, one of Bird's best years?

 

I just dont think curry's style of play can dominate in playoffs as easily as regular season. Its too exhausting for a small player to get open and hit 25 foot bombs vs playoff defense.

 

I agree with this, this is why when he does dominate, Curry is truly doing something special...something that has never been done before. This is why whatever he still amazes me.

It is sort of like when Alonso was with Ferrari and he was truly competing with Vettel in the much better Red Bull. Everyone knows that the Red Bull was the much better car, but Fernando was performing some magic in the Red car that almost (should have) had him a championship for Ferrari-derailed by some much bad luck and ultimately the inability for Fernando to pass on the last race of the season...still leaving a sour taste to this day...

Curry should not be able to dominate and he can, though not as consistent in this playoff year. The series is still not over and maybe there is some magic left in him...

 

I agree, officiating has been horrible in general for both sides. How about just before the half in game 4 when Iguadala got hammered just before he put up the 3 point shot and there was no foul called.

 

Officiating has always been and always will be horrible in the NBA

 

I think we can all agree on this, ha ha...

 

Its an impossible job. They should have 4 refs per game

 

Lol. I don't ever remember the officiating ever being good, it's always been brutal.

 

It's not the number of officials that is the issue, it's the inconsistent decision making. Doesn't matter if you have 3, 4, or 10 officials out there. The difference between 3 officials and 4 officials is 3 ****ty officials or 4 ****ty officials

 

Shooting 9/16 isn't an off game...6/19 could be, though (which is what he actually shot in that game), but 23 points on 19 shots isn't a bad night. The goal defending Jordan was to try to get him to have more shots than points, but the Sonics were not able to do that in any game. He had a 27/5/4/2 line for the series and they still won 4-2. That was an extremely tough defensive series for both teams with one of the teams breaking 100 points only 3 times in 6 games (and never both in the same game). Neither team broke 90 points in the last two games. It was a great series and Payton was a great player, one of if not the best defender in the league at the time. I may actually have that series taped on VHS tapes somewhere.

I think what set Jordan apart from say Curry, is that in his 6 finals appearances there was never even a little bit of a question or debate as to whether he'd win finals MVP, it was a formality.

His '93 season may have been better individually if you include playoffs. They 'only' won 57 games but he averaged 32ppg during the season, then put up 41/9/6/2 in the finals, 41ppg being an all time record. I don't think I've ever seen a higher level of basketball played than Jordan in the '93 finals, it was unreal. It was the only time I ever remember a team triple teaming a player and it didn't even matter. He was at the magical point where he still had all of his athletic ability but had fully developed his fadeaway jumper to the point that there was literally nothing you could do to stop him. Even if you had him bottled up he could jump so high and was so accurate with the fadeaway that he could still score at will. Then he decided to go play baseball.

 

This is an excellent post.

 

My bad, it was 6/19, scoring only 23 points ON 19 SHOTS and combined with a 31 point loss by MJ and the Bulls to Payton and the Sonics, this was not a good game by any measure.

In contrast, I contend that Curry's game 2 against the Cavs this year was a much better game from Curry where he "only" shot 7/11 fg's and "only 4/8 from the 3 point line to score "only 18 points, to go along with 9 rebounds and 4 assists. He was taking what the defense has given him, given he was double to triple teamed in the perimeter at all times and the Warriors moved the ball around to the open paint player to score a 33 point win...

Many people would contend that Jordan's game was better here just cuz he scored more, but this is indeed not he case...

 

He will have to continue to do what he is doing for (probably)
6-8 more years to ever be considered for the 'top' of the list.

Still, if I was forming a team today, Curry would not be my first
choice, nor probably the 2nd, 3rd, 4th or 5th, but he would be
in my first ten.