Kevin Durant Longhorn Legend

[closetohumping 17433]

37 minutes ago, ztejas said:

I don't think he's the best player in the league but he's been very good to elite on D this playoffs. He's been better on D than O in this Nuggets series so far. 

Unlike peak LeBron he can't be the best player on both ends of the floor for 40+ minutes a night every game in the playoffs (anymore at least) - but outside of Curry and Jokic he's still consistently as good as anyone right now. 

Series ain't over - he may have some stuff in the bag still. 

I love Steph.  He impacts the game immeasurably.  Kind of a one way player though, so I'm not sure I can ever call him the greatest.  I'll take KD at his best over Steph. 

[closetohumping 17433]

Maybe this belongs in really dumbass shit I see on Facebook:

 

[ztejas 43411]

This just came across my youtube feed. What a great person he is. Texas is lucky to continue to enjoy his support. 

 

[ztejas 43411]

Great read.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/36305442/kevin-durant-high-school-year?platform=amp

 

[ztejas 43411]

Players with more points in their playoff careers than Kevin Durant:

 

LeBron James

Michael Jordan

Kareem Abdul-Jabaar

Kobe Bryant

Shaquille O'Neal

Tim Duncan

[Hornius Emeritus 12450]

I hope what KD does at the end of this video answers the question of whether he's "one of our own"  for the last and final time.
 

 

[HookEm 2463]

Once again, this is the stupidest thread title in the history of Surly.  

[LTtxfan 49142]

KD in burnt orange late in this video...   🤘

THE JOURNEY” H.E.R. NBA playoff ESPN commercial 2023

[shadow_operative 15932]

On 5/8/2023 at 12:43 PM, HookEm said:

Once again, this is the stupidest thread title in the history of Surly.  

not even fucking close. the people here earned that title, and it should stand as a reminder of the stupidity and treason which took place on this board.

[ztejas 43411]

Durant has such a weird legacy. He reminds me more and more of Wilt. 

[shadow_operative 15932]

before yesterday i had never heard the term "twitter space". i've heard it four times since then, just casually dropped like everyone knows what that is. am i old now??

[tx 3 putt 76868]

On 4/28/2023 at 11:13 AM, Pancho said:

Alright, let’s make the KD brand our “jump man” brand

 

 

thats pretty damn cool 

 

[LTtxfan 49142]

 

[LTtxfan 49142]

Love the old clips of KD at UT  🤘

 

[HookEm 2463]

Oh look it's the thread with the stupidest title in the history of Surly back at the top of the basketball board.

[Patrick Bateman 3910]

[Pam Cummings 9639]

On 9/14/2023 at 8:47 AM, LTtxfan said:

Love the old clips of KD at UT  🤘

 

Those shorts are just.....holy shit.

 

Always thought the baggy look was just bad strategy. Seems like you would want to minimize the chances of the ball brushing the fabric of your shorts as you dribble between your legs. But then again i was always shit at ball handling......

Edited September 15, 2023 by Pam Cummings

[Keef 764]

I'd forgotten how many good players were on that team with KD.  Man we underachieved. 

[LTtxfan 49142]

 

Damn this makes me feel old...  😬

[LTtxfan 49142]

 

[statsman 5450]

On 10/3/2023 at 2:01 PM, LTtxfan said:

 

Greatest FIBA player of all time. 

[hobbes2702 13029]

On 9/15/2023 at 2:16 PM, Keef said:

I'd forgotten how many good players were on that team with KD.  Man we underachieved. 

They were all freshman lol

[ztejas 43411]

This is the new KD thread. 

 

Durant passed Hakeem Olajuwon for 12th all time in NBA scoring tonight. 

Durant is of course already 7th all-time in NBA playoff scoring.

Durant hung 39 and 11 on the Lakers in LA on 13/26 shooting tonight despite missing his two best teammates in Booker and Beal.

 

He's 35 years old. 

 

By acclimation Durant is one of the 20 greatest players to ever touch a basketball. 

Durant has done more for Texas basketball than any other player in the history of the program.

Durant has arguably done more for Texas athletics than any other player in the history of the university. 

 

Give him his due. Players like Kevin Durant come along once in a lifetime. 

 

Hook 'em. 

 

[Vic Mackey 47006]

Durant absolutely has not done more for UT athletics than any other player in history. Not even close. Unless you mean something different than results while he played there.

[shadow_operative 15932]

he’s on the short list. DeLoss, DKR, KD, VY, off the top of my head.

[SilasCoade 2622]

26 points on 11 shots in 29 minutes in a game where Eric Gordon might have been the second best player on the team. That's very impressive.

[shadow_operative 15932]

i’ve felt for along time now that if you switched KD and LeBron’s teams for their careers that it would be KD who is considered the GOAT of his generation, and that LD would have more titles and MVPs than LeBron. while LBJ might be the “greater” of the two, i’m not convinced that he’s actually better than KD. LeBron was a much better defender than KD for most of his career, but KD is by far the better shooter, from everywhere on the court, and especially in crunch time. you give LBJ nine years in the west with harden and westbrook and you give KD 10+ years in the east with d wade, bosh, allen, riley, spo, etc, and yeah- KD wins just as many titles as Bron did, and probably one more (2011).

[statsman 5450]

Best FIBA player of all time. 

[HookEm 2463]

I applaud this thread.

[shadow_operative 15932]

i applaud the board ceasing to absolutely trash KD left and right, including but not limited to disavowing his status as Longhorn and/or a representative of the University of Texas. this board has come a long way.

[shadow_operative 15932]

KD with the gorgeous fade away over Wemby in a 1 v 1 to end the 1Q.

 

Edited November 1, 2023 by shadow_operative

[shadow_operative 15932]

[Braff Zacklin 13552]

KD would be a great role model for Wemby in terms of work ethic and always striving to improve his game on both sides of the floor.

 

Get the impression Wemby has a similar drive.

[F250 28764]

1 hour ago, shadow_operative said:

 

[hobbes2702 13029]

On 10/29/2023 at 12:18 PM, shadow_operative said:

i’ve felt for along time now that if you switched KD and LeBron’s teams for their careers that it would be KD who is considered the GOAT of his generation, and that LD would have more titles and MVPs than LeBron. while LBJ might be the “greater” of the two, i’m not convinced that he’s actually better than KD. LeBron was a much better defender than KD for most of his career, but KD is by far the better shooter, from everywhere on the court, and especially in crunch time. you give LBJ nine years in the west with harden and westbrook and you give KD 10+ years in the east with d wade, bosh, allen, riley, spo, etc, and yeah- KD wins just as many titles as Bron did, and probably one more (2011).

KD had a run from about 2014-2019 where anyone paying attention could see that he was the best player in the league.

[Pam Cummings 9639]

Wemby defended that so well until he tried to block the shot with his right hand. He was in way better position to contest with his left.

 

Gorgeous as always from KD though.

[Chult86 335]

57 minutes ago, hobbes2702 said:

KD had a run from about 2014-2019 where anyone paying attention could see that he was the best player in the league.

Strong disagree. There's almost not a single metric during those years that would support that claim either.

Was KD arguably the best scorer in the league for that stretch? Highly debatable... these years were prime Steph years

Was KD the best rebounder? Passer? Defender? All-around player? No, no, no and no

Did KD have the smoothest shooting stroke of potentially anyone that's ever picked up a basketball? Likely so

As much as it hurts to say, take any team KD has been on, insert Lebron on the team instead, and that team's ceiling is higher. It may not be fashionable on this board to admit that, but we all know it's true. That's what happens when you're compared to either the 1A or 1B GOAT of your sport, and let's not pretend like anyone else in the modern NBA has come even close to Jordan or Lebron level of dominance.

[shadow_operative 15932]

9 minutes ago, Chult86 said:

As much as it hurts to say, take any team KD has been on, insert Lebron on the team instead, and that team's ceiling is higher.

put KD on miami in 2011 and they don’t come close to losing to Dallas. 

[shadow_operative 15932]

15 minutes ago, Chult86 said:

let's not pretend like anyone else in the modern NBA has come even close to Jordan or Lebron level of dominance.

for his entire career and to this day lebron sucks at shooting in the clutch. if i needed a jump shot to save my life and i could choose anyone from the last 20 years to shoot it he’d be outside my top 25 picks. if i needed two FTs he’d be outside my top 100.

and then there’s the fact that he owes two of his titles to ray allen and then draymond + kyrie respectively. also the fact that the east has never been worse than it was during lebron’s time there. lebron’s dominance is overblown. he’s had a lot of things go in his favor vs what LD was working with/against in their respective primes.

Edited November 1, 2023 by shadow_operative

[Chult86 335]

1 minute ago, shadow_operative said:

for his entire career and to this day lebron sucks at shooting in the clutch. if i needed a jump shot to save my life and i could choose anyone from the last 20 years to shoot it he’d be outside my top 20. and then there’s the fact that he owes two of his titles to ray allen and then draymond + kyrie respectively. lebron’s dominance is overblown. 

Sure, overblown. A guy who went to like 90% of the Finals over a decade, was a much better defender than KD during those years, and scored at a similar efficiency. I know we all have recency bias watching Lebron slow down the last few years, but to act like he wasn't far and away the best player in the league for a decade is disingenuous to the level of basketball that was being played.

 

[SilasCoade 2622]

Lebron's greatness is real, but his "dominance" is not. I've never seen Lebron single-handedly take over and win a game the way MJ did on the regular. I don't think KD takes that Cavs team to the finals, but he might have won more in Miami than Lebron did.

[Pam Cummings 9639]

6 minutes ago, SilasCoade said:

Lebron's greatness is real, but his "dominance" is not. I've never seen Lebron single-handedly take over and win a game the way MJ did on the regular. I don't think KD takes that Cavs team to the finals, but he might have won more in Miami than Lebron did.

Boston game 6 and beyond destroyed any attempt at that narrative. Stop it.

[Chult86 335]

10 minutes ago, SilasCoade said:

Lebron's greatness is real, but his "dominance" is not. I've never seen Lebron single-handedly take over and win a game the way MJ did on the regular. I don't think KD takes that Cavs team to the finals, but he might have won more in Miami than Lebron did.

Jesus this level of revisionist history is uphauling for this forum. My typo is intended to match the level of thought that went into your post.

[Brian Fantana 6678]

On 10/29/2023 at 12:18 PM, shadow_operative said:

i’ve felt for along time now that if you switched KD and LeBron’s teams for their careers that it would be KD who is considered the GOAT of his generation, and that LD would have more titles and MVPs than LeBron. while LBJ might be the “greater” of the two, i’m not convinced that he’s actually better than KD. LeBron was a much better defender than KD for most of his career, but KD is by far the better shooter, from everywhere on the court, and especially in crunch time. you give LBJ nine years in the west with harden and westbrook and you give KD 10+ years in the east with d wade, bosh, allen, riley, spo, etc, and yeah- KD wins just as many titles as Bron did, and probably one more (2011).

I love KD, but this is cope.

[Rimbo 25911]

17 hours ago, shadow_operative said:

i applaud the board ceasing to absolutely trash KD left and right, including but not limited to disavowing his status as Longhorn and/or a representative of the University of Texas. this board has come a long way.

I never, ever understood the people who were trashing him or why. Seemed like a lotta bitches to me.

[shadow_operative 15932]

8 minutes ago, Brian Fantana said:

I love KD, but this is cope.

like i said, KD played on iferior teams with inferior teammates in the much, much tougher conference. you put lebron in the west and force him to overcome russ (worst teammate in nba history?) and harden (turns into doj balby come playoff time), and the gauntlet that is the west, and he absolutely does not do any better than KD did. 

meanwhile, you give KD that Heatles franchise and the easy-ass east, and there’s really zero question that he has more mvps than lebron, and at least as many if not more titles.

Edited November 1, 2023 by shadow_operative

[hobbes2702 13029]

27 minutes ago, Chult86 said:

Sure, overblown. A guy who went to like 90% of the Finals over a decade, was a much better defender than KD during those years, and scored at a similar efficiency. I know we all have recency bias watching Lebron slow down the last few years, but to act like he wasn't far and away the best player in the league for a decade is disingenuous to the level of basketball that was being played.

 

I mean we watched KD outplay him on both ends in the finals. 

[hobbes2702 13029]

18 minutes ago, Brian Fantana said:

I love KD, but this is cope.

Not really. like two years ago the NBA retired player survey had KD ahead of Lebron. 44% of the voters said he was the best player in the league. 

Edited November 1, 2023 by hobbes2702

[Brian Fantana 6678]

I mean using that exact same logic, I can say that Lebron played 1/3 of his career on some of the worst teams ever dragged kicking and screaming to the playoffs in league history. He took a Cavs team on which the second best player was Zydrunas Ilgauskas, to the Finals. His best teammate overall during his first stint in Cleveland was Mo Williams, by a mile. KD also won absolutely nothing (save for his lone MVP) until he joined one of the greatest modern sports franchises ever, and he's likely to finish his career without winning anything again.

It's hilarious revisionist history to ignore those points while lambasting Lebron for basically doing the same thing, just with more success. To pretend that KD is a better all time player because he's (probably) currently a better player than old man Lebron is a joke. Seriously, you're embarrassing yourself.

[hobbes2702 13029]

1 minute ago, Brian Fantana said:

I mean using that exact same logic, I can say that Lebron played 1/3 of his career on some of the worst teams ever dragged kicking and screaming to the playoffs in league history. He took a Cavs team on which the second best player was Zydrunas Ilgauskas, to the Finals. His best teammate overall during his first stint in Cleveland was Mo Williams, by a mile. KD also won absolutely nothing (save for his lone MVP) until he joined one of the greatest modern sports franchises ever, and he's likely to finish his career without winning anything again.

It's hilarious revisionist history to ignore those points while lambasting Lebron for basically doing the same thing, just with more success. To pretend that KD is a better all time player because he's (probably) currently a better player than old man Lebron is a joke. Seriously, you're embarrassing yourself.

I don’t think KD is a better all time player. I do think there was a stretch where he was the best player in the league for a few years.