The Straight Hoop

You don't have to look hard at the numbers to see Kevin Durant had a monster January; 36-6-6 tends to speak for itself and don't get me started about the percentages. Durant was so good that his greatness called into question the necessity of his sidekick, Russell Westbrook. This is not new. There will always be a pocket of people who believe the best thing for the Thunder would be to deal Westbrook. Durant being amazing without him only provides a large stage for those people to shout on. On the surface this seems like a ridiculous proposition. We all saw how the Thunder operated without Westbrook in last years playoffs. Even with a greatly improved Reggie Jackson its easy to imagine the same outcome for the Thunder sans Westbrook. There is an interesting aspect to the "trade Westbrook" narrative however. Could the Thunder possibly get more value out of the salary they are paying Westbrook? My initial reaction would be to shout from the highest mountain a resound...

Back in October, Kirk Goldsberry had an amazing piece ( Which warrants a read ) that introduced the concept of the Shotscore. By taking into account shot positions, the leagues expected output at that position and the players actual output at said positions, we may understand the great scorers in the league. By using this metric we gain an interesting perspective on the leagues best scorers. By analyzing the Shotscore with the newly installed SportsVU sports cameras we can gain a greater insight into a number of different aspects of a game. For instance, lets think about the shot selection of Russell Westbrook. Westbrook is obviously among the best players in the league and the criticisms of him has died down in recent seasons. That doesn't mean that there wont ever be some eyebrow raising when Westbrook takes more shots than Kevin Durant. And those eyebrows should be furrowing because Kevin Durant is Kevin Durant and he is, by that Shotscore metric, the second best scorer in th...

Trades are an understood part of the NBA. Player swaps and moves become second nature from some. These are mostly rotation players swapping teams and contract flotsam to balance everything out. This is the normal and see it every season. However, every once in a while the trade of a superstar happens and captures the collective basketball consciousness of everyone even remotely interested. These trades can be a drawn out nightmare or quick, unexpected thrillers. Either way, there will always be questions. Which brings me to a trade that has been discussed from multiple angles and shifted the destiny of a potentially dominant team. Yes its the Harden trade everybody; the most interestingly disappointing trade in a long time.  . Now, I have already go on record to say that OKC might have not gotten fleeced by Daryl Morey and that what they got is pretty good compensation for the budding star of Harden. Completely change my mind. Never been more wrong about anything NBA r...

Welcome to the Future indeed How good has the Thunder been as of late?  Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook have the Thunder humming offensively with the best offensive rating in the league while also sporting a top ten defense. Kevin Martin has been exactly what he has been advertised as and Hasheem Thabeet hasn't been the absolute worst backup center. Surprising, I know. While Harden is emerging as a top-15 player down in Houston, the Thunder haven't missed a beat and seems ready to, at the least, compete for the Western Conference title. The scary thing is they should be even better in the coming years. "But Kevin, everyone knows the Thunder are only going to be getting. There core players are all under 26." Yes, I know this dear reader of my blog. But what I am saying is with the assets gained from the Harden trade, the Thunder's supporting cast has a chance to become something really special. Right now, the Thunder are stacked with young prospects and co...