Quote:
Originally Posted by vinivici9586
3rd in the west is a convenient way to phrase things when they have the hardest schedule in the league ROS.
truth is they have a worse record than victor "not enough help" oladipo's pacers and russ has been their third best player and has a long history of totally melting down in the playoffs trying to hero ball on offense and sometimes even on defense if someone with a man bun dares score 20 points on him.
Obviously the Pacers have had a dreadful schedule up till now.
Saying russ has a long history of meltdown looks more like a case of confirmation bias. OKC has a history of doing pretty well in the playoffs and he used to spearhead those teams along with KD. They couldn't get passed the not-exactly-great-Grizzlies the year he went down and he was one of the main reasons they were up 3-1 in the first place against GSW in 2016.
Sure they didn't make it out of the first round the last two seasons, but it wasn't exactly like they were powerhouses on the verge of winning it all. They barely got in the first year (almost entirely thanks to westbrook) and had to drag along the corpse of melo in the second year.
I'm not saying he's never at fault and obviously he's the most frustrating player on the team at times, but acting like he's a detriment to the team or even a negative player is ridicuruss.