![]() ![]() Tucker, who drew the main Paul assignment in Game 1 and is still a pretty nasty on-ball defender/screen navigator in his own right, has guarded Paul for 35 possessions, and only created one turnover. Since that time, Holiday has been the primary defender on Paul for 78 possessions, per NBA.com matchup data, and Paul has turned it over on seven of those possessions. This series changed when Mike Budenholzer unleashed Holiday on Paul in Game 2. The second reason is Jrue Holiday, who is catching his own form of hell for his offensive struggles but has been such a defensive beast on Paul and Devin Booker that if I were voting, I would have him as Milwaukee's second-most valuable player in this series despite Khris Middleton's 40-piece in Game 4. If you thought otherwise, consider this an official welcoming to the real world. The first one is simple: Great players have bad games. The truth is there are, potentially, three reasons for Paul's recent struggles. The shock jocks will tell you he's choking again. Phoenix shot 50 percent to the Bucks' 40 percent, yet the Suns lost because their 17 turnovers turned into 24 Milwaukee points, while Milwaukee's five turnovers only netted Phoenix five points. He was the best player on the floor in Game 1 of these Finals with 32 points and nine assists, and his six turnovers in Game 2 went largely unnoticed because the Suns won to take a 2-0 lead.īut now the turnovers are piling up - 15 over the last three games, the most Paul has racked up over a three-game playoff stretch since 2012 - and the Suns are suddenly losing, in large part, because of them. This was, and still is, Paul's chance to finally do the same. Had Ray Allen not bailed him out with the most famous corner 3 in history, the Heat would've lost that series and LeBron's legacy might read a lot differently.īut those guys, because of the superteams on which they've played, got multiple cracks at championships and eventually faded out the memory of their failures. In the 2013 Finals, LeBron bricked two 3s and committed a turnover in the final minute of Game 6. Meanwhile, LeBron went into hiding against the Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 Finals, when the Miami Heat blew a 15-point lead in Game 2 and he had just eight points in Game 4. Curry had one of the most boneheaded turnovers in history when he floated a behind-the-back pass out of bounds with five minutes to play in Game 7 of that aforementioned 3-1 collapse vs. Durant, who is probably the best current player in the world and will likely go down as a top 10 player of all time, has been bashed as a guy who can't win without hitching his wagon to superteam. Not just to Paul, but to the likes of Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry and LeBron James. There was no shame in losing to the 2014 Thunder, who were a homegrown superteam and still went on to blow their own 3-1 lead a year later against the 73-win Golden State Warriors, who then blew their 3-1 lead against the Cleveland Cavaliers in the Finals. ![]() In 2016, the 53-win Clippers went up 2-0 on the Portland Trail Blazers before Paul (broken hand) and Griffin (quad) were lost for the remainder of the series in Game 4. In 2017 with the Clippers, Paul averaged 25 points, 10 assists and five rebounds on 50 percent shooting against the Jazz, but Blake Griffin was lost for the series in Game 3. Paul might've won a championship with Houston in 2018 had he not torn his hamstring in Game 5 of the Western Conference finals. ![]()
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