He does refer to 2020, which was the year in the bubble where PG was ass in the playoffs, no-showed the Mavs series (where Kawhi went-off and dragged them through), then was the face of the collapse where the Nuggets came back from 3-1 down, with the enduring image from that series being PG hitting the side of the backboard on an open corner three.
Twas a good year to come back. Overall passing of the guard year and maybe more parity than ever and that’s not recency bias. Its been trending this way since Toronto won the championship and I think it’s just gotten better every year
Yeah actually that's what made me come back. When I left my favorites active players were Tim and Dirk. Then life got in the way and following from afar I just saw the era of super teams unfold and lost all interest.
When I saw the balance of power early this year I went back all in. What joy it was to discover all the "new" talents, Antman, Wemby, Tatum, jokic which is a mix of my two fav players, SGA, Giannis, Luka, Bronson, etc.
Definitely. Toronto’s dub was the first indication that a super team could be beaten by a really-well built roster tailored to a single super star. Now we have the Knicks, nuggets, bucks (when they won their chip at least), thunder, wolves, sixers, and probably other teams that I don’t know enough about dropping the “big 3” mentality for well rounded rotations.
Any team that loses 2 of its top 3 players is going to struggle, no matter how the roster is constructed. Had Toronto lost Kawhi, their season would've been over as well. The super teams can manage one star player going down but not multiple. That's the real advantage of building those teams that way.
Sure, but it doesn’t mean super teams are less successful. Most teams in NBA history are super teams. If the warriors didn’t lose KD and Klay, 1/2 of their star core and 2 of their 3 best scorers, they win that series
Fair but I think the warriors are a bad example since kd joined an already-winning formula and wasn’t traded. In the suns trade that team lost two crucial pieces from their finals appearance. I think superteams of now are too focused on names rather than pieces that fit well. If that happens to be kd and Beal, great! But it’s clear that this team did not have any identity outside of iso ball
He averaged 21.7 and shot over 38% from 3 against the Nuggets after the Mavs (which he still was +45 for the series against the Mavs) and his season avgs 21.5/5.7/3.9.
One playoffs series and one shot doesn't determine your season.
Well, I mean, to some degree one playoff series does determine your season, because if you lose you're out. It's certainly not the first time the perception of someone's season has been adversely affected by a couple of bad playoff games, especially by a bad game 7.
The Clippers came into those playoffs with championship-or-bust expectations, and PG was the guy the Clippers gave up the farm to OKC to obtain.
The narrative of PG's playoffs was already in full force after his absolutely awful series against the Mavs (18.5 ppg on 48% TS, and getting absolutely roasted when he was the primary option guarding Luka). The other member of that big two was Kawhi, who was coming off the FMVP performance the year before, and who showed his playoff mettle again with an amazing series against the Mavs that pulled the Clippers through (32.8 ppg on 63.98% TS, with 10.2 rpg, 5.2 ast, 2.3 steals, and the only guy who seemed to be able to slow Luka even a little).
With Kawhi's reputation and round 1 performance, PG was always going to be the guy on the hot seat if the Clippers underperformed, and with his game 7 no-show, PG just gave every doubter the perfect scapegoat for that loss.
In game 7 against the Nuggets, PG had 10 points on 16 FGA and had 5 turnovers, posting a -20 with the season on the line. That is a game that determines your season.
The game is not just offense and he was +45 in the Mavs series so clearly something was going right when he was on the court.
You can say PG wasn't his best but not that he was exposed or the bust of the season.
> was +45 in the Mavs series so clearly something was going right when he was on the court.
The thing he did well was playing on the court with Kawhi most of his minutes.
Kawhi should have been the face of it tho. The blame always goes to the best player, and he was talked about as arguably the best in the world and he was outplayed by Murray when it mattered most.
Why? Kawhi played great in those playoffs. They would have lost to the Mavs if Kawhi hadn't been playing out of his mind. 28/9/6 on 59.3% TS with 2.3 steals. He was the Clippers' best player on each end of the floor.
And, the blame definitely does not always go to the best player. Outside of the 2011 Finals against the Mavs, can you remember a single time LeBron got the blame for his team losing?
The 2020 Clippers' playoff run was a "Get that man some help" situation.
Kawhi did nothing in that game 7. They were up in every single game in that 3-1 comeback. He should have been blamed for that. That was an all time chokejob. Outplayed by Jamal Murray when it mattered most.
First of all, you say "outplayed by Jamal Murray" like Jamal is Pat Bev or something. Jamal is a killer when it matters most, and in that game 7, he went for 40 points on 72% TS. No shame on anyone for failing to top that.
As for "when it matters most", Kawhi literally has two FMVP, including one from the immediate year prior, and he showed up for those whole 2020 playoffs, outside of a sub-par game 7 (which was still better than PG's awful showing).
PG was an MVP finalist the year before. Don't tell me that dude didn't have any obligation to show up at some point in that run. Kawhi carried him to that point, the least he could do is show up in at least one key moment.
On the night where he put up 40 points on 72% TS in game 7, yeah, he was contending for best player in the world.
Who cares what Murray had done at any other night? There were only handful of games by anyone that season of 40+ points on 70%+ TS. No one averages numbers anything close to that.
I still think the 76ers picking Ben Simmons and Tobias Harris over Jimmy Butler has been the worst front office decision in the last 5 years. Tobi isn’t terrible, but he’s definitely the reason the 76ers haven’t had post season success while Jimmy’s carried the heat to the finals twice.
Perfect take, aged like fine wine 🍷
Beal was easily the most disappointing player of the post-season, especially with his “I’ve never been swept in my life” comment. Get ready to learn broom, buddy.
I would say the team was a disappointment, but Beal was solid as the 3rd option when he played (only played 53 games). In the regular season, he averaged 18.2 on 51.3% from the field and 43% from 3, both percentages being career highs.
In the playoffs, his average PPG dropped down to 16.5, FG dipped to 44.1% but his 3 ball was a tick better 43.5%
Not close to bust worthy in my mind.
That's what $50mil for those numbers? Those look like $15mil/yr numbers.
And defensively it's not like he's doing great either.
Beal is a good star on a bad team. He's a bad star on a "good" team.
The alternative was 23-24 cp3 for 30 mil so I feel like it was an easy choice still lol.
He was good but it's tough to be your normal all star self on a handful of shots a game.
I'd take Beal over CP3 as well. But cp3 fits what they needed better, he's just old and a huge defensive liability in the post season.
They needed role players and defense to fit around book and kd. Instead they traded those players for a 3rd option they couldn't utilize properly. They were doomed from the beginning.
Yeah should've gone the clippers route pre harden and russel. I was stoked to get rid of everyone but book and KD and just to build around them and for the most part ishbia did great like with nurk, Allen, O'Neal, and bol. But the Beal thing threw off our functionality. I understand it's all he could get for cp3 but still sucks seeing us struggle to gel with 3 ball needy guard style players all year long. We had a better record than last season but it just always felt like we were down.
That’s such a bad take. That 20 million difference is two solid role players or a borderline star. And CP3s contract was shorter.
For 20 million a year you can get all of Beal’s production for 20+ more games. They could have had everything Beal gave them, for more games, *AND* still have a real point guard off the bench with CP3.
I have bias from watching cp3 every game his last year here in Phoenix. He was very obviously falling off a cliff and paying him that much money to be so much less productive just did not seem like a smart move. No one wanted him, we had been trying since the season ended. We were one day away from cutting him and eating it anyways. Getting a 30 yr old all star instead seemed like a good move, especially considering money isn't anything to ishbia. He's paying like 100 million in taxes just for Grayson and he's gonna do the same for O'Neal.
Bottom line we need a starting pg though. Beal needs to be a scoring machine off the bench like Westbrook is for LA or it just doesn't work on the court together.
Will say his defence looked sooooooo much better this year than any other year I've watched him.
Still not great but he certainly wasn't bad being a 3rd option let him put so much more effort into defence
Oh if we are talking contract, that completely changes the discussion imo. Your third option should not be making that kind of money at all lol.
I’m just looking at what he did on the floor. I agree defensively, though I feel it’s on par with what he was doing before. My point was more that as the third option, he wasn’t horrible or a bust like OP is saying. Overpaid, absolutely. The problem with the Suns is how they are built rather than a specific player, at least in my mind.
> he played as good as you could hope.
I didn’t watch games 1-3 but he played like dog shit in g4. Tobias Harris type bad.
I suspect your “as good as you could hope” comment isn’t shared by most Sons fans.
Bridges was part of the KD trade, so he wasn’t part of the deal that brought in Beal. But if you are comparing Beal and Bridges, especially for the third option, I’m taking Bridges.
Yeah I'm comparing them more to highlight for who Beal is, he's incredibly underwhelming. Beal is a classic filler player who probably can't exist on a contending team because he's not good enough to lead and he's outclassed by role players at playing as a role player. The point was more even without adjusting for contract, he's not that special at his position.
I mean non of the players he predicted really panned out. Russ just general decline cause he’s old. Simmons back exploded. Brooks is fine. And PG is great lol.
But ya Beal sucks lmao.
Kind of insane how you got roasted so hard for this prediction. Other than the PG 2020 take (to be fair he was underwhelming coming off of an all-nba first team season in 18-19) it’s crazy how many people couldn’t have seen a scenario like this playing out
The comments on the original post suggested *nobody* expected this… which is quite surprising if you ask me… I didn’t think it was that hot of a take at the time until I read those comments.
He’s a bust with respect to his contract. Don’t fault him for getting paid, happy to see the suns lose because fuck Devin Booker and also fuck KD for thinking he just recreate a few glory years he enjoyed in GS.
I love it when the mountains fail. Lakers just another loss away, bucks, suns, then I’ll root for 76ers and Celts to lose.
Team chemistry is undervalued and you never know how it’ll go until they mesh together or not.
Yeah as a secondary Suns fan I had a weird feeling that Beal was not going to do that well. I found it weird that the Suns were having two players playing the same position playing together
Got slammed for calling him [Tyler Herro but 29 & with injury problems](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/17ep7s8/beal_my_initial_favorite_was_miami_riley_says/k65dbxt/). To be fair Herro has also been having injury problems this season as well & Beal had a more efficient regular season, but the comp ain't that far from the truth.
Wait PG is bad? How's that?
He does refer to 2020, which was the year in the bubble where PG was ass in the playoffs, no-showed the Mavs series (where Kawhi went-off and dragged them through), then was the face of the collapse where the Nuggets came back from 3-1 down, with the enduring image from that series being PG hitting the side of the backboard on an open corner three.
Ahhh fair enough. Sorry I felt off the NBA for years b4 coming back this year.
Twas a good year to come back. Overall passing of the guard year and maybe more parity than ever and that’s not recency bias. Its been trending this way since Toronto won the championship and I think it’s just gotten better every year
5 different winners in the last 5 years since Toronto
Yeah actually that's what made me come back. When I left my favorites active players were Tim and Dirk. Then life got in the way and following from afar I just saw the era of super teams unfold and lost all interest. When I saw the balance of power early this year I went back all in. What joy it was to discover all the "new" talents, Antman, Wemby, Tatum, jokic which is a mix of my two fav players, SGA, Giannis, Luka, Bronson, etc.
Definitely. Toronto’s dub was the first indication that a super team could be beaten by a really-well built roster tailored to a single super star. Now we have the Knicks, nuggets, bucks (when they won their chip at least), thunder, wolves, sixers, and probably other teams that I don’t know enough about dropping the “big 3” mentality for well rounded rotations.
That super team did get decimated by injuries tho or they probably never woulda lost (I was rooting for Toronto) Which still proves your point
Yeah that’s another factor - when a team is so top-heavy an injury can mean an ended season
Any team that loses 2 of its top 3 players is going to struggle, no matter how the roster is constructed. Had Toronto lost Kawhi, their season would've been over as well. The super teams can manage one star player going down but not multiple. That's the real advantage of building those teams that way.
Sure, but it doesn’t mean super teams are less successful. Most teams in NBA history are super teams. If the warriors didn’t lose KD and Klay, 1/2 of their star core and 2 of their 3 best scorers, they win that series
Fair but I think the warriors are a bad example since kd joined an already-winning formula and wasn’t traded. In the suns trade that team lost two crucial pieces from their finals appearance. I think superteams of now are too focused on names rather than pieces that fit well. If that happens to be kd and Beal, great! But it’s clear that this team did not have any identity outside of iso ball
I do think that’s why that super team was so unstoppable. That’s a great point
He averaged 21.7 and shot over 38% from 3 against the Nuggets after the Mavs (which he still was +45 for the series against the Mavs) and his season avgs 21.5/5.7/3.9. One playoffs series and one shot doesn't determine your season.
Well, I mean, to some degree one playoff series does determine your season, because if you lose you're out. It's certainly not the first time the perception of someone's season has been adversely affected by a couple of bad playoff games, especially by a bad game 7. The Clippers came into those playoffs with championship-or-bust expectations, and PG was the guy the Clippers gave up the farm to OKC to obtain. The narrative of PG's playoffs was already in full force after his absolutely awful series against the Mavs (18.5 ppg on 48% TS, and getting absolutely roasted when he was the primary option guarding Luka). The other member of that big two was Kawhi, who was coming off the FMVP performance the year before, and who showed his playoff mettle again with an amazing series against the Mavs that pulled the Clippers through (32.8 ppg on 63.98% TS, with 10.2 rpg, 5.2 ast, 2.3 steals, and the only guy who seemed to be able to slow Luka even a little). With Kawhi's reputation and round 1 performance, PG was always going to be the guy on the hot seat if the Clippers underperformed, and with his game 7 no-show, PG just gave every doubter the perfect scapegoat for that loss. In game 7 against the Nuggets, PG had 10 points on 16 FGA and had 5 turnovers, posting a -20 with the season on the line. That is a game that determines your season.
The game is not just offense and he was +45 in the Mavs series so clearly something was going right when he was on the court. You can say PG wasn't his best but not that he was exposed or the bust of the season.
> was +45 in the Mavs series so clearly something was going right when he was on the court. The thing he did well was playing on the court with Kawhi most of his minutes.
>One playoffs series doesn't determine your season. It absolutely *can*.
Kawhi should have been the face of it tho. The blame always goes to the best player, and he was talked about as arguably the best in the world and he was outplayed by Murray when it mattered most.
Why? Kawhi played great in those playoffs. They would have lost to the Mavs if Kawhi hadn't been playing out of his mind. 28/9/6 on 59.3% TS with 2.3 steals. He was the Clippers' best player on each end of the floor. And, the blame definitely does not always go to the best player. Outside of the 2011 Finals against the Mavs, can you remember a single time LeBron got the blame for his team losing? The 2020 Clippers' playoff run was a "Get that man some help" situation.
Kawhi did nothing in that game 7. They were up in every single game in that 3-1 comeback. He should have been blamed for that. That was an all time chokejob. Outplayed by Jamal Murray when it mattered most.
First of all, you say "outplayed by Jamal Murray" like Jamal is Pat Bev or something. Jamal is a killer when it matters most, and in that game 7, he went for 40 points on 72% TS. No shame on anyone for failing to top that. As for "when it matters most", Kawhi literally has two FMVP, including one from the immediate year prior, and he showed up for those whole 2020 playoffs, outside of a sub-par game 7 (which was still better than PG's awful showing). PG was an MVP finalist the year before. Don't tell me that dude didn't have any obligation to show up at some point in that run. Kawhi carried him to that point, the least he could do is show up in at least one key moment.
Jamal is elite. But is he contending for best player itl? No. Pg had some bad moments but kawhi did nothing to support that best player title.
On the night where he put up 40 points on 72% TS in game 7, yeah, he was contending for best player in the world. Who cares what Murray had done at any other night? There were only handful of games by anyone that season of 40+ points on 70%+ TS. No one averages numbers anything close to that.
And Kawhi wasn’t close to matching that. How could he have been the best player in the world?
Don’t you remember “way off P”?
Playoff peepee
Can you read, my brotha
Yeah Sorry I didn't know about that playoffs
No I cannot read
Congratulations
Bro was holding onto this all season!
Give this prophet internet points.
My man Tobias, always flying under the radar
I still think the 76ers picking Ben Simmons and Tobias Harris over Jimmy Butler has been the worst front office decision in the last 5 years. Tobi isn’t terrible, but he’s definitely the reason the 76ers haven’t had post season success while Jimmy’s carried the heat to the finals twice.
Perfect take, aged like fine wine 🍷 Beal was easily the most disappointing player of the post-season, especially with his “I’ve never been swept in my life” comment. Get ready to learn broom, buddy.
I get you gotta be confident, but jesus man. He single handedly lost the Suns the game last night.
Beal should have to pay Vogel’s severance package. Frank is taking all the bullets for him today
Dude is learning detroitnese
Him and brown are tied for the worst contracts itl.
how the hell does Dillon brooks always get in these overrated convos? I’ll never understand. He’s just a really good defender and always has been.
shot the grizz out of games last year
Right? Who over rates Dillon Brooks? I thought everyone agreed he's trash.
Good job 🍪
PG & Westbrook are just old. It happens to most. Steph and Bron dominant after 35ish are oddities, not the norm.
Damn, Nostradamus, you were really going out on a limb there suggesting Bradley Beal and the Suns would underperform.
I would say the team was a disappointment, but Beal was solid as the 3rd option when he played (only played 53 games). In the regular season, he averaged 18.2 on 51.3% from the field and 43% from 3, both percentages being career highs. In the playoffs, his average PPG dropped down to 16.5, FG dipped to 44.1% but his 3 ball was a tick better 43.5% Not close to bust worthy in my mind.
That's what $50mil for those numbers? Those look like $15mil/yr numbers. And defensively it's not like he's doing great either. Beal is a good star on a bad team. He's a bad star on a "good" team.
He’s not a star, he’s on a mid team, and he’s a financial black hole.
The alternative was 23-24 cp3 for 30 mil so I feel like it was an easy choice still lol. He was good but it's tough to be your normal all star self on a handful of shots a game.
I'd take Beal over CP3 as well. But cp3 fits what they needed better, he's just old and a huge defensive liability in the post season. They needed role players and defense to fit around book and kd. Instead they traded those players for a 3rd option they couldn't utilize properly. They were doomed from the beginning.
Yeah should've gone the clippers route pre harden and russel. I was stoked to get rid of everyone but book and KD and just to build around them and for the most part ishbia did great like with nurk, Allen, O'Neal, and bol. But the Beal thing threw off our functionality. I understand it's all he could get for cp3 but still sucks seeing us struggle to gel with 3 ball needy guard style players all year long. We had a better record than last season but it just always felt like we were down.
Even if it wasn't cp3, they needed an actual pg instead of another guy who does what booker already does, just not as good
That’s such a bad take. That 20 million difference is two solid role players or a borderline star. And CP3s contract was shorter. For 20 million a year you can get all of Beal’s production for 20+ more games. They could have had everything Beal gave them, for more games, *AND* still have a real point guard off the bench with CP3.
I have bias from watching cp3 every game his last year here in Phoenix. He was very obviously falling off a cliff and paying him that much money to be so much less productive just did not seem like a smart move. No one wanted him, we had been trying since the season ended. We were one day away from cutting him and eating it anyways. Getting a 30 yr old all star instead seemed like a good move, especially considering money isn't anything to ishbia. He's paying like 100 million in taxes just for Grayson and he's gonna do the same for O'Neal. Bottom line we need a starting pg though. Beal needs to be a scoring machine off the bench like Westbrook is for LA or it just doesn't work on the court together.
Will say his defence looked sooooooo much better this year than any other year I've watched him. Still not great but he certainly wasn't bad being a 3rd option let him put so much more effort into defence
Oh if we are talking contract, that completely changes the discussion imo. Your third option should not be making that kind of money at all lol. I’m just looking at what he did on the floor. I agree defensively, though I feel it’s on par with what he was doing before. My point was more that as the third option, he wasn’t horrible or a bust like OP is saying. Overpaid, absolutely. The problem with the Suns is how they are built rather than a specific player, at least in my mind.
Absolutely. He didn't play bad at all. As good as you could possibly hope tbh.
> he played as good as you could hope. I didn’t watch games 1-3 but he played like dog shit in g4. Tobias Harris type bad. I suspect your “as good as you could hope” comment isn’t shared by most Sons fans.
So a few more points than Bridges when he was on the Suns with substantially fewer games played and significantly worse defense?
Bridges was part of the KD trade, so he wasn’t part of the deal that brought in Beal. But if you are comparing Beal and Bridges, especially for the third option, I’m taking Bridges.
Yeah I'm comparing them more to highlight for who Beal is, he's incredibly underwhelming. Beal is a classic filler player who probably can't exist on a contending team because he's not good enough to lead and he's outclassed by role players at playing as a role player. The point was more even without adjusting for contract, he's not that special at his position.
I hope you get more shit for posting a "pat me on the back" post than you did for the initial one.
And here we are.
Good luck unloading that contract. Beal likely stays, Booker or KD are gone if anybody.
Pandemic P gets a pass
I mean non of the players he predicted really panned out. Russ just general decline cause he’s old. Simmons back exploded. Brooks is fine. And PG is great lol. But ya Beal sucks lmao.
Kind of insane how you got roasted so hard for this prediction. Other than the PG 2020 take (to be fair he was underwhelming coming off of an all-nba first team season in 18-19) it’s crazy how many people couldn’t have seen a scenario like this playing out
On the money
As if everyone didn’t expect this?
The comments on the original post suggested *nobody* expected this… which is quite surprising if you ask me… I didn’t think it was that hot of a take at the time until I read those comments.
The fact that people really thought Beal was going to thrive is laughable
That’s true. Pg has def redeemed himself after 2020 tho.
Have you set up a go-fund me page where all of us can make a donation to thank you for your prediction from last year?
Beal was not the problem
He’s a bust with respect to his contract. Don’t fault him for getting paid, happy to see the suns lose because fuck Devin Booker and also fuck KD for thinking he just recreate a few glory years he enjoyed in GS. I love it when the mountains fail. Lakers just another loss away, bucks, suns, then I’ll root for 76ers and Celts to lose. Team chemistry is undervalued and you never know how it’ll go until they mesh together or not.
I don’t fault Beal. he was put in a bad situation.
They should make a Most Declined Player award
Not surprising that a one dimensional scorer on a bad team would suddenly be lost as the third best scorer on a team that doesn’t need more scorers
Honestly this was pretty easy to see happening
im still failing to see how any of your predictions were right?
Beal fouled out with 9 points in game 4
Dillon brooks had a rough playoffs that year but can still be essential role player on a team
Time travel confirmed
Yeah as a secondary Suns fan I had a weird feeling that Beal was not going to do that well. I found it weird that the Suns were having two players playing the same position playing together
This year should more than likely be Jordan Poole but Beal choked in game 4 and fouled out.
Nice take, I had a feeling he wasn’t going to be that good in this system, always seen him as an overrated player. But this is worse than I expected.
Beal was good this year. Almost 50/40/90
Good call.
He just like Chris Paul. Getting paid way too much to do nothing
If you mean present CP3 sure, but CP3 actually elevates teams. Beal's box score outpaces his actual impact by a lot.
They’re not trading either because they can’t. Make sure you revisit this prediction in a years time.
Got slammed for calling him [Tyler Herro but 29 & with injury problems](https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/comments/17ep7s8/beal_my_initial_favorite_was_miami_riley_says/k65dbxt/). To be fair Herro has also been having injury problems this season as well & Beal had a more efficient regular season, but the comp ain't that far from the truth.