A vet PG who knows when to give him the ball & where & when and when not to. He should hit the 3 pointer and probably be a pest on defense so Durant man does not get easy access to the ball in good spots. And instructs / encourages and / or yells at Durant to play defense. They have Watson but that wasn’t near enough on any criteria.

A volume 3 pt shooting SG. Ideally who can take the tougher wing on defense. They have none of the former, especially in combination with the latter.

An inside scoring big that defenders can’t leave to respond to Durant’s penetration into the lane without getting hurt bad. Don’t got it unless White with health restored and weight room work gets back there.

A 7 foot center with quick feet who plays like a veteran (probably will have to be one). Krstic isn’t bad but isn’t great either.

He is the 6th highest on scoring and it holds up gets good teams where he is 5th best.

His raw +/- is very low. Against good teams he isn’t the very bottom but he was 9th worst. (John Salmons, who Presti went after??? does he really understand player impact? was dead last on this.)

His adjusted for last season was 13th lowest too.http://basketballvalue.com/topplayers.php?year=2008-2009&mode=summary&sortnumber=94&sortorder=ASC

Either Durant at this time is a big drag (on defense and close to neutral on team impact on offense as his great stats seem to coincide with others doing a lot less) or his surrounding cast is completely wrong for him. The adjusted is intended to remove the impact of his cast and isolate h9is effect but it is far from solid and certain.

Look at Roland Ratings at 82 games (a combination of individual production against counterpart and team +/-) and Durant is a bit better than 0 and near average for main rotation guys.

Which is right? Maybe none by themselves but I’ll take the story provided by the combination over any one part.

I don’t think Durant is as good overall both sides of the ball ( the way you have to play andf get rated fairly) as his big supporters think / expect. But I don’t think he is as bad as his worst numbers now either. I do think his cast is significantly off, sub-optimal for him. Nothing in the numbers so far say that Green was the right Robin. Westbrook is not as bad but it isn’t good with Durant either. Thabo is awful in player pairs with Durant. Krstic was quite weak too.

Either Durant is a very difficult teammate or Presti is not a good lineup designer or Brooks is not a good coach or some combination. They probably get better with time but how much, how quick? And does one weak link doom them or gets changed out eventually? Time will tell.

@Vega
Absolutely, but you definitely can’t blame people for asking the question, “If they can do this without KD, why aren’t they doing it when he’s on the floor?”

He’s got to become a much more committed defender. Rather than no longer being the worst defender on the team he needs to bust his butt to become the best. Lead by example. In order to do this he has to get physically stronger. He knows this. It will be interesting to see if he comes this fall with more muscle.

And it’s true the ball stops at Durant when he’s on the floor. But I’m way less worried about that. How far they’ve come is remarkable. New coach, new players & so much youth. They’ll benefit from training camp a ton and Durant won’t have to shoulder so much of the offense.

Love this quote about KD:

“During a road trip their AAU team took to Charlotte, Durant had to write “Hard Work Beats Talent When Talent Fails To Work Hard” on the front and back of four pages of paper before he could play.”

Well, somebody sure schooled him right. He’s got the hard work ethic down to his core.