Legacy Check, Part 2

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FRANCIS TIOPIANCO 


If you missed Part 1 featuring Giannis & Bud, CLICK HERE. Here's Part 2.

 

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3. Khris Middleton: During the playoffs, Middleton averaged 23.6 points, 7.6 rebounds, 5.1 assists, and 1.5 steals. These stats are worthy of being the best player in a playoff team. Just to understand how impressive Middleton's statline is, Jimmy Butler averaged 22.2/7.5/7/1.3 when Miami made the bubble finals* last year.

 

More importantly though, Middleton embraced the closer role for the Bucks to alleviate the pressure on Giannis, given the Finals MVP’s well-known struggles from the line. How good was Middleton this postseason? He had a 40-point game in the must-win Game 4 against the Suns, including 10 in the final 2:07. He scored 7 of the Bucks’ last 9 points in the pivotal Game 5 on the road. He had 38 points in a season-saving performance in Game 6 against Brooklyn. He scored 8 of the Bucks’ last 10 points in a 35-point outing in Game 3 of the Brooklyn series to avoid going down 0-3. Against Atlanta, he had 38 in a crucial Game 3 road win, had 26/13/8 in the Giannis-less Game 5, and dropped 23 in the 3rd quarter of Game 6 to put away Atlanta. In the first round against Miami, he hit the game-winner in Game 1 to exorcise last year’s demons and set the Bucks on the way to a sweep. According to ESPN Stats and Info, Middleton made 15 game-tying or go-ahead shots in the fourth quarter or overtime this postseason, which is tied for most in the last 25 years. Middleton’s breakthrough as a closer was crucial in helping the Bucks avoid another early playoff exit, since their inability to close games was a big reason why they haven’t been able to translate regular season success to the postseason.

 

In our Sympósio, I said Middleton just put his name in the list of the best sidekicks of all-time. I guess I need to clarify a bit: the list of the best sidekicks of all-time in a championship run.

 

So where does he rank in the all-time Robin list? He’s probably just outside the top 10, but only if you remove co-/ex-/pre- superstars (Steph, Wade, Kobe, David Robinson, Drexler, Dr. J, Kareem, Oscar, Wilt, Havlicek, Frazier, Sam Jones) from the list. These guys are clearly overqualified and would’ve been HOF-bound even without being a sidekick at some point of their careers. That leaves you with Pippen, McHale, Worthy, Dumars, Gasol, Parker, Ginobili, Klay, and Kyrie. Right now, Middleton is behind all these names in terms of career achievements, but when we talk about a single championship run, then it gets interesting.

 

Taking their best performance in a championship season:

 

• McHale, 1986: 24.9 points, 8.6 rebounds, 2.7 assists, 2.4 blocks, 21.1 PER, 3.2 win shares

• Worthy, 1988: 21.1 points, 5.8 rebounds, 4.4 assists, 1.4 steals, 20.3 PER, 2.8 win shares, Finals MVP

• Dumars, 1989: 17.6 points, 2.6 rebounds, 5.6 assists, 17.0 PER, 2.1 win shares, Finals MVP

• Pippen, 1991: 21.6 points, 8.9 rebounds, 5.8 assists, 2.5 steals, 22.0 PER, 2.9 win shares

• Ginobili, 2005: 20.8 points, 5.8 rebounds, 4.2 assists, 1.2 steals, 24.8 PER, 4.2 win shares

• Parker, 2007: 20.8 points, 3.4 rebounds, 5.8 assists, 1.1 steals, 18.7 PER, 1.6 win shares, Finals MVP

• Gasol, 2010: 19.6 points, 11.1 rebounds, 3.5 assists, 2.1 blocks, 24.0 PER, 4.3 win shares

• Thompson, 2015: 18.6 points, 3.9 rebounds, 2.6 assists, 14.8 PER, 1.9 win shares (Klay was more productive in 2018, but he was the third banana in that championship run.)

• Irving, 2016: 25.2 points, 3.0 rebounds, 4.7 assists, 1.7 steals, 24.4 PER, 3.4 win shares

• Middleton, 2021: 23.6 points, 7.6 rebounds, 5.1 assists, 1.5 steals, 16.5 PER, 2.2 win shares


McHale led the Celtics in scoring in the 1986 Finals against Sampson and Olajuwon. Pippen’s 1991 doesn’t stand out statistically, but his Doberman defense kept Magic in check and had 32/13/7 in the closeout. Gasol had 19 points and 18 boards in Game 7 against the Celtics on the night Kobe went 6-for-24. Kyrie hit The Shot for Cleveland in 2016.

 

Worthy, Dumars, and Parker each won the Finals MVP in their respective runs, but not without footnotes. Worthy had a spectacular 36/16/10 Game 7 against the Pistons, which earned him the nickname “Big Game James,” but his 22.0/7.4/4.4 series average is not decisively better than Magic’s 21.1/5.7/13.0. Dumars (27.3 points) and Parker (24.5) were their team’s leading scorers in Finals series where defense won the championships and which both ended in sweeps.

 

I’d put Middleton’s 2021 run in the middle of the list, which couldn’t be any more appropriate. I have 1986 McHale and 1991 Pippen in tier-1; 1988 Worthy, 2016 Irving, 2010 Gasol, 2005 Ginobili, and 2021 Middleton in tier-2; 1988 Dumars, 2007 Parker, and 2015 Klay in tier-3. I think Worthy may be the best comp, as Middleton has shown up in big games this year. Big Game Khash.

 

Is Middleton an all-time great right now? Perhaps not. He’s only made 2 All-Star teams and has zero All-NBA selections. But playing in a championship team has its benefits: Klay and Draymond have 8 All-Star selections between them, all but one came after the Dubs won in 2015. Being a champion gets you first dibs in the All-Star reserve spot. And if the Bucks keep making deep playoff runs in the next 5 years, he might be one of the guys who make historical jumps for playing in really good teams like Worthy, Pippen, and Draymond.


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CP3's legacy run ends in another blown 2-0 lead




4. Chris Paul:  Just three weeks ago, Chris Paul was on the verge of a legacy-defining run. He closed out the Clippers in the WCF with a 41-point (31 in the second half), 8-assist, zero-turnover Point God masterpiece. He followed that up with a brilliant 31-point, 9-assist Finals debut, picking apart a Bucks defense that seemingly had no answer.

 

The rest, as they, is history. The wrong side. He had 10 points and 5 turnovers in Game 4, none more costly than the last one in the final 35 seconds with the Suns trailing by 2. He followed that up with a bizarre Game 5 in which he was deferring to Cam Payne in the first half as the Bucks quickly erased a double-digit deficit. After going up 2-0, the Suns never won another game.

 

CP3 apologists will say that great players have bad games and Paul was just unfortunate to have two in the Finals. There were other reasons why the Suns lost: Booker’s off nights in Games 3 and 6; over-reliance on Booker in Games 4 and 5; Ayton’s foul trouble in Games 3 and 6; and Giannis playing transcendent basketball. Paul has never been a big-time scorer, and apart from Game 4, his output was what you’d expect. They will point to the bigger picture—that the Suns haven’t made the playoffs since 2010 and the Finals since 1993. He took a bunch of diaper dandies who have never been to the playoffs to the second-best record in the league and ultimately the Finals. He was magnificent in the closeout games against the Clippers and Nuggets. His impact on winning is unparalleled, as summed up by this graphic:

 

 

Critics, on the other hand, will say that the stage was too big. Great players come through in the biggest moments, and CP3 fell short—again. This is not the first time a CP3-led team had a commanding lead in a playoff series only to squander it. They’ll point to the 2015 West semis against the Rockets, when the Clippers were up 3-1 in the series and had a double-digit lead going into the 4th of Game 6. Then there’s the Game 5 choke job versus the Thunder in 2014, when, with the series tied 2-2, he coughed up 2 turnovers in the final 17 seconds and blew a 7-point lead in the last minute. The only graphic that matters:

 

 

In these types of debates, the truth usually lies somewhere in the middle. The praises tend to be exaggerated—Monty deserves as much credit for the Suns’ turnaround and the team wasn’t exactly as bad as other lottery teams after going 8-0 in the Orlando summer league aka the bubble. Sam Presti gave CP3 a free hand to choose his trade destination and there’s no way he would have chosen to go to Phoenix if he didn’t think they can compete. But the criticisms are overblown as well—he had Doc as coach in LA and he suffered untimely injuries in what would have been his best chances to win the chip in 2015 (game- and series-winner over the defending champion Spurs in round 1) and 2018 (up 3-2 against the Warriors).

 

Game 6 was a microcosm of the two Chris Paul narratives. He stank in the first 20 minutes, uncharacteristically passing up clean looks in the lane. JVG just stopped short of saying he was playing like Ben Simmons. He engaged Point God mode before the end of the first half, hitting his patented midrangers and finding teammates for good looks. He kept the Suns close at the start of the 4th but couldn’t get anything going in the last 5 minutes. He finished with 26 points and only 5 assists. You can’t fault him for his teammates’ missed shots—each of the Suns starters except Paul shot below 43%. But why he had zero meaningful shot attempts when the Suns needed points in the last 5 minutes, knowing that his teammates are struggling offensively, is simply mindboggling.

 

Maybe it was too much to ask a 36-year-old point guard, with all the wear-and-tear and cumulative injuries, to carry an inexperienced Suns team against an elite Bucks defense. He has a Jordan-like competitive edge but at a generous 6 feet, maybe it was too tall of a task for him to impose his will and snatch the title away from the 7-foot-4 wingspan of the Greek Freak. But it’s also fair to say we got blue balled (sorry, I just had to) after his spectacular closeouts of the two previous series. You can never convince me that he left nothing on the table, precisely because we’ve seen what he can do at age-36. Saying otherwise is selling him short.

 

And this is where apologists and critics alike are both wrong. They’re selling CP3 short. He’s the Point God. He controls the tempo of every game, gets to any spot he wants and makes split-second decisions to either pull-up for a mid-range jumper, throw a lob pass, bank a floater, or swing a 20-foot pass to one of his shooters. He is the best game manager I’ve ever seen; someone who knows the ebbs and flows, when and who to pass to, always with a keen sense when his team needs him to carry the scoring load. Contrary to what his critics say, he is one of the most clutch players in the league. Since his rookie year, his clutch shooting percentage in combined regular season and playoff games ranks 7th (44.1%), behind the likes of Duncan (48.1%), Parker (46.9%), and LeBron (46.1%), among others; and ahead of Wade (42.6%), Nowitzki (42.3%), Curry (42.1%), Durant (41.0%), Lillard (40.5%), and Kobe (40.1%). The Suns’ formula for success this season has been simple: get Booker going early and give the ball to Paul in the 4th. When he doesn’t do these Point God things, he deserves some blame.

 

My verdict on the Chris Paul legacy question? Two steps forward, one step back.

 

He is already an all-time great and a surefire first-ballot Hall-of-Famer. Anyone who says otherwise is a dumbass. He has made 11 All-Star teams, 10 All-NBA teams and 9 NBA All-Defensive teams; was a six-time NBA steals leader and four-time assists leader; won Rookie of the Year; should’ve won the 2008 MVP; and ranks fifth on the league’s all-time assists list. Leading a franchise that has not been to the playoffs in a decade all the way to the Finals only cements his legacy.

 

In case there was any doubt before, I’d take CP3 over:

 

• Kidd because shooting is still the most important skill in basketball and Kidd shot only 40% for his career. Those 2 Finals appearances with the Nets look good on paper, but after this year’s run, it’s easy to argue that you can plug CP3 in those Nets teams and get similar results. Kidd won a title in Dallas, but he was the 4th or 5th best player on that title team.

• Nash because of better numbers (CP3’s 18.3/9.4/24.9 PER/0.241 WS/48 vs Nash’s 14.3/8.5/20.0 PER/0.164 WS/48), superior defense, and the Finals appearance.

•  Stockton because CP3 brought more to the table—Stockton never had Paul’s takeover ability. Stockton made 2 trips to the Finals but he wasn’t Utah's best player in either. Stockton’s main advantage is longevity, playing 19 seasons, but Paul isn’t far off having completed his 16th. My rule on longevity: as long as someone plays a minimum of 12 All-Star-quality seasons, the per game stats and playoff runs matter more.

 

But losing in the Finals after being up 2-0 and underperforming in Games 4 and 5 hinders Paul from moving further up the all-time PG list. Because the next-level question is: can you win with him as your best player? As we just found out, the answer was a melancholic ‘no.’

 

CP3 has similar numbers to Isiah (19.2/9.3) with better longevity (16 seasons to 13) and advanced metrics (24.9 PER & 0.241 WS/48 vs Zeke’s 18.1 PER & 0.109 WS/48), but it’s tough to justify taking Paul over someone who was the best player in 2 championship teams—should’ve been 3 but Pistons were robbed by the refs at the end of Isiah’s heroic one-legged performance–that competed and won against peak Bird, Magic, and Jordan. 


Would a Suns win have swung it? I don't know, but it would have certainly made it closer. Steph, Oscar, and Magic would have still been out of reach, but it might've been worth writing about. 

 

The Finals define legacies. You can be a great player without a ring, but the greatest ones get theirs. Chris Paul is a legend bordering on transcendent†. But it's Point god, emphasis on the small 'g'. 



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† So how does the ranking work?

Here's a simple illustration:

Elite ⇨ Legend ⇨ Transcendent ⇨ Pantheon



Giannis was elite before the Finals. He is now in the transcendent tier after the Homer.

CP3 was already in the legends tier even before the Suns' run. He is now either the first name among the legends or the last name among the transcendents.

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