Speaker 1: The Volume. All right, welcome to Hoops tonight. You're at
Speaker 1: the Volume. Happy Tuesday, everybody. Hope all of you guys
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Speaker 1: We are continuing our player rankings today with number four
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant. You guys know the drip before we get started.
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Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts. Under Hoops tonight, all right,
Speaker 1: let's talk some basketball. So, in my opinion, Katie's become
Speaker 1: one of the more underrated players in the league. And
Speaker 1: there's a bunch of different reasons for that, right, Like,
Speaker 1: it's the classic conundrum we see all the time that
Speaker 1: I've been dealing with with the lebron situation there in
Speaker 1: the late teens early twenties where it's like every time
Speaker 1: there's a new up and coming player, we always get
Speaker 1: are really quick to shelve the guys who have been
Speaker 1: doing it, you know, at a bigger stage, at a
Speaker 1: higher level, for a very long time. I think it's
Speaker 1: just a human nature thing where people are just quick
Speaker 1: to try to embrace the new. I think that's part
Speaker 1: of it. I think the way KD acts on Twitter,
Speaker 1: which I don't really have a problem with, I think
Speaker 1: that rubs some people the wrong way. And then I
Speaker 1: think overreactions to a couple of playoff runs which really
Speaker 1: weren't that bad but maybe don't line up with Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant's like personal standard right particularly the Celtics series from
Speaker 1: two years ago. I don't think people realize just how
Speaker 1: good KD was in this playoff run, even though his
Speaker 1: jump shot wasn't following. But as I kind of look
Speaker 1: at KD and where he is in the league right now,
Speaker 1: even after what's been a couple of underwhelming playoff runs,
Speaker 1: I have a top three in the league that involves
Speaker 1: Steph Giannis and Jokic in some order, right, I think
Speaker 1: those guys are all a slight level above everyone else,
Speaker 1: just in terms of their consistency in the regular season
Speaker 1: the last three years and their playoff success in the
Speaker 1: last three years. I don't think anybody can complain with that.
Speaker 1: All three of them have won finals MVPs in the
Speaker 1: last three years. All three of them have been pretty
Speaker 1: consistently available and great in the regular season over the
Speaker 1: last three years. I think those three guys are clearly
Speaker 1: at least deserving of the recognition of being above the
Speaker 1: rest of the field. But as I look through the
Speaker 1: rest of the group, the Superstar group, right, which is
Speaker 1: you know, Katie Embiid and then Anthony Davis, Jason Tatum,
Speaker 1: Jimmy Butler, Lebron James Luke, Doncicz, Kawhi Leonard, and Devin Booker.
Speaker 1: As I look at the rest of that group, those
Speaker 1: guys are all really close. But I also think Katie
Speaker 1: is clearly the best player in that group of guys.
Speaker 1: So for me, of all the different decisions I had
Speaker 1: to make in my top twelve, all of them were
Speaker 1: really hard, but there were two of them that were very,
Speaker 1: very easy for me. It was very easy for me
Speaker 1: to put Yokich at number one. That was like the
Speaker 1: very first pick I made. That's just as clearcut a
Speaker 1: deserving of the Crown type of season as you could
Speaker 1: possibly put together. And then KD at four because among
Speaker 1: the guys that aren't in that at like recent Finals
Speaker 1: MVP tier, I think Kd's clearly better than the rest
Speaker 1: of those guys. So I didn't really have a lot
Speaker 1: of trouble with that particular decision. We'll see. I'm interested
Speaker 1: to see how you guys feel about it. But to me,
Speaker 1: I think KD is clearly the best of the rest
Speaker 1: in the Superstar tier. Now why is that? Why do
Speaker 1: I feel that strongly about KD? Well, since leaving Golden State,
Speaker 1: he has been the most efficient volume scorer in the
Speaker 1: NBA twenty nine points per game, and nobody in the
Speaker 1: NBA has been able to beat his sixty six percent
Speaker 1: true shooting percentage sixty six percent true shooting percentage over
Speaker 1: a three season span, just thirty points per game. Steph
Speaker 1: Curry hasn't been able to beat that, Joel Embiid hasn't
Speaker 1: been able to beat that. The only guy who's come
Speaker 1: close in terms of efficiency is Nikola Jokic, and he
Speaker 1: scores at a significantly lower volume. In the span since
Speaker 1: KD left Golden State, he's only at about twenty five
Speaker 1: points per game. So KD like, regardless of how you
Speaker 1: feel about what happened in the last two playoff runs,
Speaker 1: especially when you couple it with his playoff resume before that,
Speaker 1: he is the best scorer in the NBA, still at
Speaker 1: volume at absurd efficiency. And then he couples that with
Speaker 1: being an above average playmaker, an above average defensive player,
Speaker 1: and he can plug and play with any roster in
Speaker 1: the league because of his versatility offensively and what he
Speaker 1: can do on and off the basketball. So to put
Speaker 1: it simply, he has the best top end skill out
Speaker 1: of anybody in that four to twelve range, and he
Speaker 1: doesn't have a significant weakness, whereas all the players beneath
Speaker 1: him do. Katie has a couple of weaknesses, and we'll
Speaker 1: talk about them, and I think that they're you know,
Speaker 1: pretty standard for players of his particular archetype, and we'll
Speaker 1: get to that when we get there. But compared to
Speaker 1: the guys beneath him in this four to twelve range,
Speaker 1: his weaknesses are much easier to manage and kind of
Speaker 1: like a build into the scheme of a basketball team.
Speaker 1: Than what you see with some of these other players.
Speaker 1: So that's why I have him at number four. Let's
Speaker 1: do a quick season recap. He played in forty seven
Speaker 1: games this season. Now, that's one thing with KD that
Speaker 1: you kind of have to add as an important footnote here.
Speaker 1: He has pretty consistently suffered significant injuries in the regular
Speaker 1: season that have limited the amount of games he's been
Speaker 1: able to play. But this has not been a situation
Speaker 1: where he hasn't been able to get it together and
Speaker 1: be healthy in time for the playoffs. Now, I would
Speaker 1: argue that, particularly in the last two seasons, he had
Speaker 1: about a month going into the twenty twenty two playoff run,
Speaker 1: and he had about what I think like five games
Speaker 1: going into the twenty twenty three playoff run. So like
Speaker 1: in each of the last two seasons, he's gone into
Speaker 1: the postseason still kind of on a ramp up from
Speaker 1: an injury. And I do think that's an important context
Speaker 1: when we talk about his playoff struggles, because, again, especially
Speaker 1: with pull up shooting, so much of it is about
Speaker 1: being in such a good groove with your rhythm and
Speaker 1: your conditioning, and that being disrupted can have a significant
Speaker 1: effect on your ability to knock down shots, But I
Speaker 1: do think it's important context with KD. He has suffered
Speaker 1: some regular season availability problems that have not manifested in
Speaker 1: any sort of missed playoff time, which I think if
Speaker 1: you're gonna miss games, the regular season is the time
Speaker 1: to do it right. In forty seven games this year,
Speaker 1: twenty nine points, seven rebounds, and five assists, sixty eight
Speaker 1: percent true shooting. Again, there's nobody in the league that
Speaker 1: scores in terms of volume and efficiency the way that
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant does. Here's the play type data, and I'm
Speaker 1: going with all from Brooklyn here because the eight regular
Speaker 1: season games he played in Phoenai uh just too small
Speaker 1: of a sample and he was pretty banged up and
Speaker 1: during that stretch. So I'm just gonna zoom in on
Speaker 1: his shot creation data from when he was in Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: Absolutely off the charts. Half court static shot creation data.
Speaker 1: Look at this in pick and roll situations, the Nets
Speaker 1: scored three hundred and sixty points on two hundred and
Speaker 1: ninety one Kevin Durant pick and rolls. Think about how
Speaker 1: I'm saying that is that's a point in a quarter
Speaker 1: per possession, one point twenty four points per possession. For
Speaker 1: a perspective, Luka was the best volume pick and roll
Speaker 1: guy in the league this year at one point one
Speaker 1: point five. Now obviously lower volume but in large part
Speaker 1: because of injuries. But to give you an idea, in
Speaker 1: the smaller sample size, which you know, not a non
Speaker 1: existence sam so I, still almost three hundred pick and rolls.
Speaker 1: Kadie was scoring or generating points a full tenth of
Speaker 1: a point per possession better than Luka Doncic, who was
Speaker 1: the best volume pick and roll ball handler in the
Speaker 1: league this year. That's insane passing was the one that
Speaker 1: stood out to me all season long. The teams that
Speaker 1: were guarding Kevin Durant and pick and roll when he
Speaker 1: was with Brooklyn were being outrageously aggressive. They were consistently
Speaker 1: defending the action three on two, constantly trapping and blitzing
Speaker 1: and hard hedging and all these different things, just doing
Speaker 1: everything they could to get the ball out of his hands.
Speaker 1: And he's so damn tall that he could make all
Speaker 1: the raids out of it. It was particularly this like
Speaker 1: kind of looping pass over the top to the role
Speaker 1: man or a quick bounce pass he could make the
Speaker 1: skip pass to the shooters. He was just picking teams
Speaker 1: apart in pick and roll and doing it really with
Speaker 1: a selection of players which were good, not great, like
Speaker 1: he was doing it with a bunch of league average
Speaker 1: role player type guys, right, And I thought it was
Speaker 1: honestly some of the most impressive individual shot creation that
Speaker 1: I saw during the regular season last year. If you remember,
Speaker 1: before Kevin Durant's injury, I said on this show that
Speaker 1: I thought he was playing better basketball than anybody in
Speaker 1: the league, and it was his injury that derailed what
Speaker 1: could have been an MVP. He campaign for it, which
Speaker 1: would have been a wild turn of events after what
Speaker 1: happened during that summer. But I do think again, like
Speaker 1: this is why I say like, I think Kevin Durant's
Speaker 1: become a little bit underrated, And I understand why the
Speaker 1: injuries in the regular season keep you out of the
Speaker 1: frame of mind for a while. Suddenly people start to
Speaker 1: heavily focus on the guys that are on the court
Speaker 1: playing every day. He's had a couple of playoff runs
Speaker 1: that haven't quite meshed up with his standard. I get it,
Speaker 1: but this guy is so freaking insanely good at basketball,
Speaker 1: and I feel like the basketball world has forgotten and
Speaker 1: I think people are making a mistake there because the
Speaker 1: dudes got mileage left in those legs. And I don't
Speaker 1: want it to be one of those situations where things
Speaker 1: come together and he wins a title and everyone's like, oh,
Speaker 1: look at this Kevin Durantz back and it's like he's
Speaker 1: been here the whole damn time, and I think we've
Speaker 1: just been overlooking him a little bit. One point zero
Speaker 1: four points per isolation thirteenth out of twenty five players
Speaker 1: to run at least two fifty not his best isolation season.
Speaker 1: One point one four points per post up seventh out
Speaker 1: of forty three players to attempt at least one hundred,
Speaker 1: so very very good post up season for him, really
Speaker 1: all fueled by the simple fact that he is the
Speaker 1: most efficient shot maker in the NBA. It's not particularly
Speaker 1: close either. Fifty five percent effective field goal percentage on
Speaker 1: catch and shoot jumpers that's really good. Sixty percent effective
Speaker 1: field goal percentage on pull up jumpers that's like freaking outrageous.
Speaker 1: That's second best in the league behind Steph Curry and uh.
Speaker 1: In terms of individual field goal percentage, it's much higher.
Speaker 1: Steph just takes a bunch of pull up threes That
Speaker 1: kind of gives him a one percent edge there. Katy
Speaker 1: was fifty five percent on floaters and seventy nine percent
Speaker 1: in the restricted area, which is amazingly efficient. But Katy
Speaker 1: only made eighty three shots in the restricted area all season.
Speaker 1: That's only one point eight per game. To give you
Speaker 1: some perspective, there were two hundred and two players in
Speaker 1: the NBA this season who made more shots in the
Speaker 1: restricted area than Kevin Durant. So I would say that
Speaker 1: if you had to find one particular weakness for Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant in his game, in his game, he does not
Speaker 1: generate nearly as much rim pressure as his peers, which
Speaker 1: can somewhat limit his effectiveness when his jump shot is
Speaker 1: not falling. It's it's I wouldn't call it a crippling weakness,
Speaker 1: but it's definitely the weakest point in his particular game.
Speaker 1: And what ends up happening is when his pull up
Speaker 1: jump shot is not falling, he can experience some limited impact.
Speaker 1: I think you saw that a lot more in the
Speaker 1: Celtics series than you did this year in the Denver series.
Speaker 1: I was really impressed by Kevin Duranton this particular season
Speaker 1: in that Denver series with his jumper not falling and
Speaker 1: him responding by starting to attack the rim more. And
Speaker 1: I think I think you primarily saw that in free
Speaker 1: throw attempts, and he generated a shit ton of free
Speaker 1: throw attempts in that series that helped bolster his offensive
Speaker 1: production when a shot wasn't falling. So now this is
Speaker 1: the real, the real like drop off point for KD
Speaker 1: in these last two postseasons. So this is a guy
Speaker 1: who pretty consistently in the last couple of years has
Speaker 1: been about sixty percent an effective field goal percentage on
Speaker 1: pull up jump shots in the regular season. In the
Speaker 1: Boston Celtics series, he shot in the low thirties in
Speaker 1: field goal percentage on pull up jump shots. In this
Speaker 1: particular postseason run, he went down from sixty percent effective
Speaker 1: field goal percentage of forty five percent effective fielgal percentage.
Speaker 1: Pretty significant drop off. And I think this is the
Speaker 1: reason why people got off the KD bandwagon. They're like, oh,
Speaker 1: if you started missing jump shots, and again, you got
Speaker 1: to accept it for what it is, which is a
Speaker 1: small sample size, little bit of variance. Like, again, guys,
Speaker 1: there's gonna be some drop off. It's more physical, it's
Speaker 1: more intense, there's better defenses. So yeah, I would expect
Speaker 1: his effective field goal percentage on pull up jumpers to
Speaker 1: drop from sixty to maybe fifty two to fifty three, right,
Speaker 1: But I think we can all agree that KD was
Speaker 1: missing a lot of shots that he normally makes and
Speaker 1: it wasn't really that bad forty five percent in effective
Speaker 1: field goal percentage, which we can consider again a massive
Speaker 1: drop off for KD. Paul George shot forty eight percent
Speaker 1: for the entire regular season on pull up jump shots,
Speaker 1: so what we consider to be a massive drop off
Speaker 1: for KD is only slightly below where one of his
Speaker 1: significant peers in the league is during a good scoring
Speaker 1: regular season for him, And again, it wasn't even as
Speaker 1: bad as it looked this postseason. I think you guys
Speaker 1: would probably be surprised to know that KD averaged twenty
Speaker 1: nine to nine and six on sixty percentury shooting. How
Speaker 1: many players in the league can even do that, And
Speaker 1: that's Kd's shots not following postseason sixty percent of shooting
Speaker 1: twenty nine points per game with nine rebounds and six assists.
Speaker 1: Like I think, I think again, this is the same
Speaker 1: problem we've had with Lebron for a while too, where
Speaker 1: we become so accustomed to this like kind of like
Speaker 1: vaunted expectation of what their ceiling is, which we've kind
Speaker 1: of like we've turned into something mythological that all of
Speaker 1: a sudden when there's some sort of drop off, which
Speaker 1: a lot of times it is just a change. Like
Speaker 1: Katie is better at manufacturing points by pressuring like downhill
Speaker 1: pressure and drawing fouls. He's better at that now than
Speaker 1: he's ever been. So even if there was a version
Speaker 1: of this story in the past where he made more
Speaker 1: jump shots, like this is a damn effective postseason. Same
Speaker 1: thing with Lebron. It's like, oh, jumper wasn't following this year.
Speaker 1: You're right, Lebron had a bad jump shooting season, but
Speaker 1: he's like as good scoring out of the post. He's
Speaker 1: better scoring out of the post than he's ever been.
Speaker 1: And so even in this like limited version of Lebron,
Speaker 1: he was still successfully dissecting defenses in the playoffs. So
Speaker 1: it's all relative, and yeah, relative to Kd's absolute best postseasons,
Speaker 1: it wasn't his best. But as I actually look at
Speaker 1: the list of guys like Anthony Davis led his team
Speaker 1: to the Western Conference Finals. That was not a perfect postseason,
Speaker 1: very up and down offensively. Jason Tatum led his team
Speaker 1: to the conference finals. Wasn't perfect. That was pretty up
Speaker 1: and down. Jimmy Butler unbelievable in the Buck Series, pretty
Speaker 1: normal Jimmy Butler after that for three rounds. So like,
Speaker 1: if you have this built up expectation like what Jokic
Speaker 1: did where you kick everyone's ass for four rounds, there's
Speaker 1: maybe one dude who does that every year, maybe one.
Speaker 1: In some years, there's not even a guy who does that.
Speaker 1: So like, again, we gotta adjust our expectations here. This
Speaker 1: is an NBA two K. You don't have dudes go
Speaker 1: out there and play perfect every single night. And when
Speaker 1: you really get down to it, how many guys in
Speaker 1: a down shooting postseason are gonna give you a twenty
Speaker 1: nine nine and six on six two percent true shooting
Speaker 1: with above average defense. How many guys? Now? Again, Like,
Speaker 1: I actually thought this was one of similar similar to
Speaker 1: what I was talking about with the Lebron video where
Speaker 1: I was talking about how like it was one of
Speaker 1: my favorite postseasons rooting for him as I watched him
Speaker 1: as a competitor work through his struggles same thing with
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant. Game three, in particular against Denver was one
Speaker 1: of my favorite Kevin Durant games that I've ever watched,
Speaker 1: and I you know, I can think of a lot
Speaker 1: of great Kevin Durant games, and like, for instance, one
Speaker 1: of my all time faves is Game four against I
Speaker 1: want to say it was Game four against the Calves
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen. It was one of the best games
Speaker 1: I've ever seen a basketball player play where KD just
Speaker 1: absolutely picked the Calves apart as like this point forward passing,
Speaker 1: making every decision with the live dribble from the top
Speaker 1: of the key. I think he had a triple double.
Speaker 1: I think it was a forty point triple double if
Speaker 1: I remember correctly, and I remember walking away from that
Speaker 1: game like holy shit. Two of the greatest games I've
Speaker 1: ever seen players play in this series. Lebron in Game one,
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant in Game four. I can think of a
Speaker 1: bunch of games like that over Kevin Durant's career, and
Speaker 1: those are impressive in a different way as they reflect
Speaker 1: dominance and I enjoy those performances. But to me, like
Speaker 1: as a competitor, I've always appreciated the games where things
Speaker 1: aren't going well, where the command of the game isn't there.
Speaker 1: But like, you have a choice as a player in
Speaker 1: those situations, what are you going to do? Are you
Speaker 1: going to just be like, man, I don't have it tonight,
Speaker 1: or are you gonna be like, shit, man, I've got
Speaker 1: to do something to find a way to win this game.
Speaker 1: There was a game game three against Denver and Katie's
Speaker 1: jumper was broke. It's one for five from three, missed
Speaker 1: a bowlo to mid range pull ups, had nothing going.
Speaker 1: But like, if you watch the game, you could visibly
Speaker 1: see KD just pressuring and pressuring and pressuring off the dribble,
Speaker 1: just forcing the issue to manufacture points by manufacturing rim
Speaker 1: pressure and making nice kickout passes by drawing fouls by
Speaker 1: getting to the rim. And in a game where he
Speaker 1: could not make a damn jump shot, he finished with
Speaker 1: thirty nine to nine and eight in a win against
Speaker 1: a championship level team. How many guys in the league
Speaker 1: right now can give you thirty nine, nine and eight
Speaker 1: at all, let alone thirty nine nine and eight in
Speaker 1: a playoff game against a championship level opponent, in a
Speaker 1: game where his jump shots not falling, and like I
Speaker 1: remember after that game thinking that was awesome. He had
Speaker 1: nothing going. He had to literally just through sheer force
Speaker 1: of competitive will, find a way to help his team
Speaker 1: win a game and put up thirty nine, nine and eighth.
Speaker 1: That's what I appreciated in general about that postseason. Like again,
Speaker 1: it shot creation situations in the postseason. Zero point eighty
Speaker 1: six points per ISO. Oh that's not good. Zero point
Speaker 1: seventy three points per post up. That's even worse. His
Speaker 1: shots wort falling in post up in ISO situations, he
Speaker 1: was twenty seven for seventy five from the field. And
Speaker 1: if you ask Kevin Durant, and he's talked about this,
Speaker 1: he talked about it during his injury. He was obsessed
Speaker 1: with the concept of one on one basketball, just perfecting
Speaker 1: beating a matchup in individual situations. So Katie's bread and
Speaker 1: butter failed him, and he still put up twenty nine
Speaker 1: to nine and six on sixty percent TRU shooting. How
Speaker 1: he had one of his best transition postseasons. He scored
Speaker 1: seventy points in transition in two rounds. For example, Jimmy
Speaker 1: Butler had eighty in four rounds. So he manufactured points
Speaker 1: in transition, he manufactured points by moving without the basketball
Speaker 1: coming In off screen situations he shot four forty percent,
Speaker 1: was deadly attacking closeouts like he just found a way
Speaker 1: to help his team win. And so again, like I
Speaker 1: said earlier in summary, I think KD is one of
Speaker 1: those guys like Lebron where really the older generation just
Speaker 1: in general, where we're just so quick to try to
Speaker 1: embrace the new and we're so numb to what they're
Speaker 1: capable of that we just assume, because they're down a
Speaker 1: level from their individual peaks, that they're not at the
Speaker 1: same level as the guys above them. But I think
Speaker 1: it's just flawed perspective. And if we actually really looked
Speaker 1: at these dudes and viewed them as anonymous, like just
Speaker 1: this playoff run, which we I've all agreed is below
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant's normal level, if that was brandon Ingram. If
Speaker 1: brandon Ingram averaged twenty nine nine and six on sixty
Speaker 1: percent through shooting, shot forty five percent effective field goal
Speaker 1: percentage on pull up jump shots, and had a thirty
Speaker 1: nine to nine to eight game against Denver in the
Speaker 1: second round, we'd be leaving the postseason talking about whether
Speaker 1: or not he was like capable of being the best
Speaker 1: player in the world, Like we'd be celebrating the dude,
Speaker 1: But because it's Kevin Durant, and because we've seen him
Speaker 1: hoist the trophy twice, and because we've seen him have
Speaker 1: all these big playoff moments, we're just like, ah, not
Speaker 1: the same KD. And And I think that has been
Speaker 1: hopefully one of the themes that I've gotten across over
Speaker 1: the course of the last couple of years. Don't be
Speaker 1: in a rush to displace guys that are proven and
Speaker 1: that are still doing it at that level, because chances
Speaker 1: are if they end up in a playoff series this year,
Speaker 1: they're going to be more confident, more comfortable in that
Speaker 1: situation than their peers because they've done it so many
Speaker 1: damn times. One thing I would say, again, like I
Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, that he could still improve at this phase
Speaker 1: of his career, is just finding a way to attempt
Speaker 1: more shots at the rim. I think KD is very
Speaker 1: aggressive as a scorer, but I also think he's extremely
Speaker 1: picky about when he shoots, and I think that's a
Speaker 1: good quality. I think that's what helps him be very
Speaker 1: easy to plug and play into other teams like you
Speaker 1: don't have to worry about Kdie taking shots outside of
Speaker 1: the flow of the offense. He's one of the unique
Speaker 1: players in the league in his ability to be super
Speaker 1: aggressive but in the flow and so it doesn't really
Speaker 1: disrupt the flow, Whereas, like if Luca decided to be
Speaker 1: super aggressive in a quarter, it would be kind of
Speaker 1: like ugly as he just dribbled the ball off the
Speaker 1: court and shot every single time, right, Whereas like KD
Speaker 1: he could take six shots and ten possessions, but like
Speaker 1: two of them would be coming off a wide pin down,
Speaker 1: one would be on a post up, another would be
Speaker 1: in pick and roll, two of them would be ISOs,
Speaker 1: one would be on the live dribble on the wing,
Speaker 1: another one would be kind of like a face up ISO,
Speaker 1: and you'd be like, man, like, all six of those
Speaker 1: were different. Four of them came off of action, one
Speaker 1: was in transition, whatever it is. There's just so much
Speaker 1: variety in what he does. It's easy to plug in, right,
Speaker 1: But I mean, this is the part where I see
Speaker 1: an area of opportunity. His rim efficiency is outrageously good,
Speaker 1: like seventy nine percent in the regular season at the rim.
Speaker 1: In the restricted area. He was ten for eleven on
Speaker 1: shots in the restricted area against Denver ten for eleven,
Speaker 1: that's ninety one percent. So at a certain point, I'd
Speaker 1: like to see him be a little less picky and
Speaker 1: just get more shots up at the rim. You know,
Speaker 1: most most of his peers are around like seventy seventy
Speaker 1: five percent, and it's because they're taking a lot of
Speaker 1: shots down there. And again, like we talked about a lot,
Speaker 1: like missed shots at the rim carry residual value provided
Speaker 1: that you run back on defense, and that is it
Speaker 1: occupies the rim protector. And when you occupy the rim protector,
Speaker 1: you do a lot of different things for your team.
Speaker 1: You're either going to open up an offensive rebound opportunity
Speaker 1: or if you're reading the defense at a higher level,
Speaker 1: as soon as the rim protector comes over, the guy
Speaker 1: from the low man out of the weakside corners coming
Speaker 1: to tag the big man to box him out, and
Speaker 1: now you have kickout opportunities for threes. Rim pressure comes
Speaker 1: with all sorts of residual positive effects, and I think
Speaker 1: in general, on that Sun's team that's going to be
Speaker 1: one of their specific weaknesses. And so I think that's
Speaker 1: one thing i'd like to see Katie do a little
Speaker 1: bit more here in the lat of the later phase
Speaker 1: of his career is just force it in there a
Speaker 1: little bit more, and just for a couple of different reasons,
Speaker 1: not just the residual values we talked about, but also
Speaker 1: because of that simple concept of heels versus toes on defense,
Speaker 1: which is more theoretical than in the actual footwork, because
Speaker 1: most defenders are up on their toes as much as
Speaker 1: they can be. But the point is is like, as
Speaker 1: a defender either prioritizing being up on the pull up
Speaker 1: jump shot or being prepared for retreat steps to try
Speaker 1: to cut people off on the drive, demonstrate more of
Speaker 1: a willingness to drive, the defender is going to be
Speaker 1: more on their heels, so to speak, at least favoring
Speaker 1: backward steps, which is going to open up your opportunities
Speaker 1: for off the drible jump shots. And we've seen his
Speaker 1: separation on pull up jump shots hasn't been as good
Speaker 1: in the postseason because guys are sitting on it a
Speaker 1: little bit. And so again like this is this is
Speaker 1: like it's one of those things where I do think
Speaker 1: that when you're as good at making all the other
Speaker 1: shots the way that he is, that even without the
Speaker 1: rim pressure, there's still a certain amount offensive success. It's
Speaker 1: just one small area of opportunity. So here's the last
Speaker 1: thing I'll say. Katie has been the best volume scorer
Speaker 1: in the NBA since he left Golden State, as we
Speaker 1: established earlier. So you think one of two things. You
Speaker 1: either think that his last two postseasons are just outlier
Speaker 1: shot performances, or you think that's the new normal. I
Speaker 1: tend to think their outlier shot performances. Why because he
Speaker 1: shoots sixty percent on him in the regular season effective
Speaker 1: field goal percentage, And that's not fluky, that's real freaking basketball.
Speaker 1: So again, you have an option here. You can choose
Speaker 1: to write him off, or you can believe in the
Speaker 1: larger sample size of what this dude's capable of. And
Speaker 1: except the realities of that weird NETS team after James
Speaker 1: Harden had left coming off of an injury in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty two or twenty twenty three, a Son's team that
Speaker 1: traded away all of their depth for KD then lost
Speaker 1: Chris Paul and it basically was Katie and Devin Booker
Speaker 1: and like random dudes like Terrence Ross and Landrew Shaman,
Speaker 1: who were fine but end of the bench guys who
Speaker 1: are having to play significant minutes in the postseason for
Speaker 1: the Suns. And I'm not trying to make excuses, because
Speaker 1: here's the thing. This year is a no excuse here
Speaker 1: for the Sons. You brought it. You converted Chris Paul
Speaker 1: into Bradley Beal, You made a bunch of really smart
Speaker 1: role player signings. Eric Gordon's a really good player to
Speaker 1: help in that situation. You to want Nabi a really
Speaker 1: good player to help in those situations. Chimezi met to
Speaker 1: a good try hard forward, the U Banks from Portland
Speaker 1: a good try hard forward. They have loaded up on
Speaker 1: guys that are going to be able to give them
Speaker 1: more competent play around them and a much more available
Speaker 1: in higher ceiling low a higher floor two player in
Speaker 1: Bradley Beal to replace Chris Paul. So here's the thing.
Speaker 1: If we get to the postseason this year and the
Speaker 1: Suns underachieve again and Kevin Durant can't make pull up
Speaker 1: jump shots again, then I think we can have a
Speaker 1: serious conversation because that would be three postseasons in a
Speaker 1: row where he underachieved in the postseason. It would be
Speaker 1: a roster that actually should have a certain higher ceiling.
Speaker 1: I'm with you at that point, but I'm a big
Speaker 1: believer in the benefit of the doubt, and we have
Speaker 1: like a decade of Kevin Durant basketball that should give
Speaker 1: us the benefit of the doubt to overlook a couple
Speaker 1: of rough postseason series relative to what his ceiling is
Speaker 1: when he was that great during the regular season. So again,
Speaker 1: you guys are welcome to write Kevin Durant off if
Speaker 1: you want to. I'm not gonna be one of those guys.
Speaker 1: I haven't met number four this year. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: that is all I have for today. We will be
Speaker 1: back tomorrow with number three. The volume