2017-2018 Boston Celtics: No Irving! No Hayward! No Brooklyn Pick!

[Sir'Dom Pointer]

So Wiggins is ranked 31st ahead of Kevin Love at 39th XD
How is Wiggins ranked so high?????

 

[TyGuy]

Haha, I know, I know. I'm just trying to present their justification.


Just curious, who on that list would you have Love over? At least after #30? I really have never seen him as better than that. And I am one of the biggest Love supporters on this board, not once have I ever been in favor of trading him, but he's always been a borderline all-star, which places him between #25-#30 for me.

Totally agree with you guys on Lillard, though... But I know @godfather and I have both talked about how outstanding Lillard's 2015-16 season was. He's a damn good player. I don't think he's better than Kyrie or Paul though.

Lowry, derozan, milsap, Hayward, gianis, Horford, Drummond, d jordan , I Thomas to name a few.

 

[godfather]

You can make a legit case of having Lillard above Kyrie. I don't agree for the record, but it's not crazy.

Lillard is pretty good. He had a better year IMO than Paul.

 

[Jordan]

Lowry, derozan, milsap, Hayward, gianis, Horford to name a few.

Wow, we have way different analyses of Love's talent then. I'll just leave it at that for now because I'm watching the Tribe!

EDIT: Plus, it's the Kyrie thread!

 

[rabman_gold]

It's very simple:

Kyrie is going to be forced to prove these "rankings" wrong.

I'm looking forward to how motivated he'll be at full health. It should be noted that he looks up to Kobe, another player who fed on slights in his career.

 

[gourimoko]

Same. I wonder why Lowry is so underrated among cavs fans. He's the engine of a talented raptor team. I disagreed but never took offence to anyone that had him above Kyrie talkless of Kevin. Now Derozan I don't rate especially high

FWIW, bro, if you really wanna know; I've written numerous detailed posts about why Kyrie is clearly better than Kyle Lowry and John Wall.

Lowry had a great season last year.. For Kyle Lowry. Kyrie Irving would likely say that this past year was his best in the league.. If you dunno why, well, I suggest watching the playoffs.

Once you add in the 21 games of the playoffs, again, things rapidly change. That's not a fluke; it's happened every single year Lowry was in the playoffs.

So, these Lowry conversations generally only want to talk about an isolated season, in which Irving was injured, and then somehow discard the last 21 games of the year because they happened to be in the playoffs - as if that somehow means they don't count.

That's why Cavs fans, who just won a championship because of Irving and James, discount these kinds of conversations. I have 0% confidence we'd win the series against the Warriors if you swap Kyrie for Kyle Lowry. I the vast majority of people who have watched both players in the playoffs would agree.

 

[fan0283]

FWIW, bro, if you really wanna know; I've written numerous detailed posts about why Kyrie is clearly better than Kyle Lowry and John Wall.

Lowry had a great season last year.. For Kyle Lowry. Kyrie Irving would likely say that this past year was his best in the league.. If you dunno why, well, I suggest watching the playoffs.

Once you add in the 21 games of the playoffs, again, things rapidly change. That's not a fluke; it's happened every single year Lowry was in the playoffs.

So, these Lowry conversations generally only want to talk about an isolated season, in which Irving was injured, and then somehow discard the last 21 games of the year because they happened to be in the playoffs - as if that somehow means they don't count.

That's why Cavs fans, who just won a championship because of Irving and James, discount these kinds of conversations. I have 0% confidence we'd win the series against the Warriors if you swap Kyrie for Kyle Lowry. I the vast majority of people who have watched both players in the playoffs would agree.

My opinion is slightly different but not exactly at odds with yours. Remember I already said I'd take Kyrie but comparing what Kyrie did with LeBron on his team is incomplete unless we know for sure what Lowry would have done playing sidekick to Lebron. This is the same Lowry who dropped 41 against the Warriors and almost handed them their first loss of the season when the dubs were rolling in december. He helped his team to 56 wins and the eastern conference finals where they took two games off of us. Lowry is quality and even though I'll have Kyrie, I don't think the gap in quality is enough for anyone to get offended by dissenting opinions.

A lot of people have the wrong idea because they only see these players when they play against us

If people realised how good Lowry was, no way they would take offence to that comparison.

Edit: changed 'worthless' to 'incomplete'. Certainly isn't worthless

 

[Jscc]

but comparing what Kyrie did with LeBron on his team is incomplete unless we know for sure what Lowry would have done playing sidekick to Lebron.

Why? Without LeBron Kyrie is still a career 20+ ppg scorer. He also has never had a genuine #2 prior to LeBron. Lowry has had DeRozan from day 1 in Toronto. He's a different player without a genuine #2 like DeRozan. imo it's why he struggled getting off the bench in Memphis and Houston.

So I think it's more fair to compare Lowry without DeRozan to Kyrie without LeBron. I'd take Kyrie.

Kyrie with a genuine #2 option? I'd definitely take Kyrie. The fact that Kyrie's first genuine #2 option is also possibly the GOAT is just icing on the cake.

 

[Jordan]

Same. I wonder why Lowry is so underrated among cavs fans. He's the engine of a talented raptor team. I disagreed but never took offence to anyone that had him above Kyrie talkless of Kevin. Now Derozan I don't rate especially high

I think Kyrie is absolutely, 100% better than Lowry. I don't feel that way about Kevin Love. Love is just significantly better than Lowry, for this team, but I don't feel that way in general. Lowry is a damn good player.

But again, Kyrie Irving thread. Just trying to finish my prior conversation. If anyone wants to talk to me about my rating on Love you can tag me in a post in the Kevin Love thread or send me a PM. But don't reply in this thread.

 

[Sir'Dom Pointer]

Why? Without LeBron Kyrie is still a career 20+ ppg scorer. He also has never had a genuine #2 prior to LeBron. Lowry has had DeRozan from day 1 in Toronto. He's a different player without a genuine #2 like DeRozan. imo it's why he struggled getting off the bench in Memphis and Houston.

So I think it's more fair to compare Lowry without DeRozan to Kyrie without LeBron. I'd take Kyrie.

Kyrie with a genuine #2 option? I'd definitely take Kyrie. The fact that Kyrie's first genuine #2 option is also possibly the GOAT is just icing on the cake.

How does DeRozan make Lowry better? it makes no sense.. DeRozan does nothing to make Lowry better.
He isn't a 3pt shooter so he doesn't provide spacing for him or boost his assist numbers since DeRozan is amostly an iso mid range volume shooter.
He isn't much of a distributer either.
Lebron in theory should boost Kyrie's game and stats just because of his passing and off ball skills, cuts and PnR ability but in reality Kyrie is the same player with and without Lebron because he is such a gifted scorer and he can make anything out of nothing and he generates most of his points from Iso or by attacking the PnR defense but he most of the time never uses the role player as an advantage or passes to the open 3.
To sum it up, Lebron doesn't affect Kyrie's game unfortunately, not yet anyways.

 

[fan0283]

Why? Without LeBron Kyrie is still a career 20+ ppg scorer. He also has never had a genuine #2 prior to LeBron. Lowry has had DeRozan from day 1 in Toronto. He's a different player without a genuine #2 like DeRozan. imo it's why he struggled getting off the bench in Memphis and Houston.

So I think it's more fair to compare Lowry without DeRozan to Kyrie without LeBron. I'd take Kyrie.

Kyrie with a genuine #2 option? I'd definitely take Kyrie. The fact that Kyrie's first genuine #2 option is also possibly the GOAT is just icing on the cake.

1. Lowry didn't get a starting gig for a number of reasons including not having pulled together his talent yet and those teams having a log jam at point guard position. In any case, the player he is today is different from what he was back then. We are comparing 2016 Lowry to Kyrie. Who he was in houston is now irrelevant to present day comparisons. Not every player has the same development curve.

2. You think Derozan is a legit second option comparable to lebron? You then go on to call Lebron a second option to Kyrie to validate the comparison. Now you're just stretching logic. Kyrie is the second option who feeds off of the defensive attention Lebron demands not the other way round. There's no parallel comparison here. Lowry would need to play with a KD to even make this fair

3. Even if I was to accept your argument with all its factual and logical inconsistencies, the question isn't who is better. The question is if they are close enough in talent to justify a non-Cavs fan saying he would take Lowry. I think Kyrie is better but I also think we exaggerate how much better he is because we underestimate how good a player Lowry is. This is in no way a slight to Kyrie's talents

 

[ACisKING]

Why? Without LeBron Kyrie is still a career 20+ ppg scorer. He also has never had a genuine #2 prior to LeBron. Lowry has had DeRozan from day 1 in Toronto. He's a different player without a genuine #2 like DeRozan. imo it's why he struggled getting off the bench in Memphis and Houston.

So I think it's more fair to compare Lowry without DeRozan to Kyrie without LeBron. I'd take Kyrie.

Kyrie with a genuine #2 option? I'd definitely take Kyrie. The fact that Kyrie's first genuine #2 option is also possibly the GOAT is just icing on the cake.

Wait a minute...when did LeBron become the number 2 option?

 

[Jscc]

Even if I was to accept your argument with all its factual and logical inconsistencies, the question isn't who is better. The question is if they are close enough in talent to justify a non-Cavs fan saying he would take Lowry. I think Kyrie is better but I also think we exaggerate how much better he is because we underestimate how good a player Lowry is. This is in no way a slight to Kyrie's talents

All right, i'm not comparing DeRozan to LeBron nor am I saying LeBron is a #2 option. Let's get that out of the way before it derails the discussion.

The context was me saying LeBron is Kyrie's first 20+ ppg scorer like DeRozan was to Lowry. Look what happened, particularly in the post-season. Kyrie exploded. But pre-LeBron Kyrie was already better than Lowry. So I have difficulty understanding Lowry / LeBron > Kyrie / LeBron in any situation.

These are Lowry's numbers without help:

10.4 ppg @ .545 TS%, 4.8 apg, 3.5 rpg, PER of 15.9 while starting less than 40% of his potential regular season games.

Kyle Lowry with help, joins Toronto / 20+ ppg scorer DeRozan:

17.3 ppg @ .556 TS%, 6.8 apg, 4.7 rpg, PER of 20.0 while starting over 90% of his potential regular season games.

Kyrie without help:

20.7 ppg @ .548 TS%, 5.8 apg, 3.7 rpg, PER of 20.9 while starting 100% of his potential regular season games.

Kyrie with help / 20+ ppg scorer LeBron joins him:

 

[gourimoko]

1. Lowry didn't get a starting gig for a number of reasons including not having pulled together his talent yet and those teams having a log jam at point guard position. In any case, the player he is today is different from what he was back then. We are comparing 2016 Lowry to Kyrie. Who he was in houston is now irrelevant to present day comparisons. Not every player has the same development curve.

See?

These comparisons invariably require specific time windows for Lowry that begin and end at the most opportune time for him while existing over the worst time for Irving; and of course, magically discount their last 20 games.

2. You think Derozan is a legit second option comparable to lebron? You then go on to call Lebron a second option to Kyrie to validate the comparison. Now you're just stretching logic. Kyrie is the second option who feeds off of the defensive attention Lebron demands not the other way round. There's no parallel comparison here. Lowry would need to play with a KD to even make this fair

This works both ways for Kyrie and LeBron. It's counterfactual to think James doesn't benefit from the attention Irving draws on the offense. They have the potential to make each other better.

3. Even if I was to accept your argument with all its factual and logical inconsistencies, the question isn't who is better. The question is if they are close enough in talent to justify a non-Cavs fan saying he would take Lowry. I think Kyrie is better but I also think we exaggerate how much better he is because we underestimate how good a player Lowry is. This is in no way a slight to Kyrie's talents

You assume we're all incapable of making an objective analysis.

As I said up-thread, I've gone over why Irving is better than Lowry, and why it's not close, quite a bit.

 

[godfather]

It has nothing to do with Kyrie for me. I think Lowry and Wall are grossly overrated.

Damian Lillard is way better than both of them easily. So is Kyrie.

I think it's VERY fair to compare Lillard to Kyrie. Lowry and Wall? Hell no, sorry. Not even being a homer. Both are just no where as good IMO.