As someone who’s been a fan of the NBA for a while I’ve noticed how flawed people’s evaluation of players and their overall impact can be.
Just as an example Giannis got so much criticism for his performances against the Raptors in 2019 and the Heat in 2020. Just a year later after winning a championship while being essentially the same player suddenly everybody flips their opinion on him. Sure he made improvements from the previous year but he’s still the same player with his same strengths & weaknesses.
Giannis actually played against that same heat team that he struggled against in 2020 and ended up being less efficient compared to the previous year, while having his worst series by far in that 2021 playoff run. The main difference in that series from the previous year was that the Heat and Jimmy Butler had a very poor offensive series.
My point here is that when players struggle and fail their value as a player are judged by their flaws, when they succeed they are judged by their strengths. 2020 and 2019 Giannis had some amazing playoff series, and he was more than capable of putting up monster performances against a team like the 2021 Suns but people acted like he was a much better offensive player in 2021.
A lot of performance in the NBA playoffs is matchup dependent, certain players matchup better against certain defenses or schemes in the playoffs. Kevin Durant having an amazing series against the Bucks in 2021 doesn’t mean that certain defenses and schemes don’t give him trouble, proven by his series against Boston the next year. Steph got so much criticism for his finals performances against the Cavs where he played either average or subpar relative to his standards, yet his two best finals performances where he played great, were against two of the most statistically dominant defenses over the past ten or so years.
TLDR: Players have strengths & weaknesses whether they lose or win these don’t change. The playoffs can be matchup dependent judging a player off one poor, or average series against one team doesn’t mean they aren’t capable of putting up great performances against elite teams in later rounds.
Keep cooking. Players should be evaluated using how well they play, not how much success their team has. This is evident in how the regular season is often regarded as meaningless, when it has a far larger sample size than the playoffs and isn’t as heavily influenced by matchups. A lot of people here don’t watch games or care about technicalities so meaningless noise like game 7 stats, elimination game stats, clutch etc are viewed as more significant than multiple regular seasons’ worth of games.
I thought Giannis was underrated when people were saying that AD>Giannis and that he wasn’t top 10, but the glazing after his team won a ring due to injuries to the Nets was insane. Like this dude is the same player and he could’ve won in previous years if the 2 or 3 teams better than the Bucks were hurt too. Hell, he could’ve won series like the Heat in 2020 or the Raptors in 2019 if his team got hot enough like last year’s Heat team.
IMO it’s just people wanting to make every win ‘deserved’ instead of acknowledging the importance of luck. Just look at how generational talents like Harden and Barkley are disrespected despite being better than most FMVPs. Media/fan narratives also play a big part. Giannis and Jokic being the best of their generation doesn’t mean that they’re necessarily comparable to the best of previous generations or better than anyone who wasn’t the best in their own generation. No matter what they achieve, Steph is better, not because his team dominated the past few years, but because barring any massive leaps from Giannis or Jokic, Steph will have peaked much higher. If Steph retired after 2016 he would still be better and if he got injured and bounced in the first round every year he would still be better.