I hate to say it BUT... 2017 Leonard > 2013 Duncan

[spursistan]

Stop the silliness...Kawhi hasn't yet even had a one dominant, "I-am-here" series in the playoffs as the lead dog*, let alone an entire epic run like TD's 2003 le..

I'll say this as Kawhi fan, he needs one, preferably a redemption series against the Clips where he has no business not being the best player in the series looking at who is matched-up against.

* The Thunder series was great, but his "poor" Game 2 ended up being costly for us in the big picture..

[daledondale]

OP smokes too much crack.

[TheDoctor]

Tim hasn't been gone a year, and people are already forgetting how good he was.

[NameLess Scrub]

^That said, since GS is so stupidly stacked, Kawhi probably won't even get the chance to challenge '03 Duncan. Kawhi could average 40 in the series and it probably won't be enough.

Today's NBA, shortly explained.

[Seventyniner]

Kawhi is a great defender but Tim was at least as good, and if you're going to have an elite defender it's better if he's a big.

[Ice009]

Tim hasn't been gone a year, and people are already forgetting how good he was.

The OP is a Tim Duncan hater, possibly a troll. He takes subtle digs any time he can.

[mookie2001]

Op knows bc he was 8

[Amuseddaysleeper]

No they wont because this team has Gasol and Lma 40 mullion down the drain with 2 tosbs in manu and parker with no creators in the backcourt.

2003 tim is GOAT stuff so lets just put it at that.

If this team had 2003 Duncan instead of 2017 Kawhi, they'd be better, no question for me.

[Joseph Kony]

lolwat...OP is re ed. Kawhi is a stud and arguably a top 2-3 player in the league, but in 2003 Duncan was on another level by himself in a league featuring Shaq/Kobe/KG/Dirk. his impact on offense and defense was otherworldly. I love Kawhi but to make the claim that he is better than peak Duncan who had one of the greatest individual seasons and arguably the greatest playoff run/Finals series of any player in league history, is laughable

[spursistan]

Still though, Kawhi's ceiling is literally the only thing that keeps me hopeful that this team might get a shot at another, probably last, ring to firmly establish the Spurs as the third greatest franchise in NBA history after LA/Boston..

Let's hope PATFO figure this out; they have 3 or 4 more seasons after this one to put the right pieces around him..Between the decline/breakup of the Warriors in one of those years and the emergence of the next league powerhouse the Spurs could potentially sneak one more le..

[HarlemHeat37]

Duncan is still easily better until Kawhi strings some elite playoff series' together(at the very least), but to be fair, it'll be much more difficult for Leonard to establish himself with teams like the Warriors and Cavs in the league, tbh..the 2003 Spurs played in the dark ages of the NBA, where the Nets made the Finals, and their only real challenge was a Lakers team that was burnt out from 3 consecutive runs to the Finals..

[skulls138]

Duncan is still easily better until Kawhi strings some elite playoff series' together(at the very least), but to be fair, it'll be much more difficult for Leonard to establish himself with teams like the Warriors and Cavs in the league, tbh..the 2003 Spurs played in the dark ages of the NBA, where the Nets made the Finals, and their only real challenge was a Lakers team that was burnt out from 3 consecutive runs to the Finals..

The East has Lebron so in that sense they are better than '03 but the West still was tough with Phoenix and Dallas and as you said the Lakers, which beating them I didnt think could ever happen. After that, they were NOT going to lose to the Nets.

Also this thread is downright silly. Everyone knows Duncan is who he is because of what he does in the postseason. Kawhi is my favorite player in the NBA by far but....yeah, this thread is silly.

[diego]

Duncan is still easily better until Kawhi strings some elite playoff series' together(at the very least), but to be fair, it'll be much more difficult for Leonard to establish himself with teams like the Warriors and Cavs in the league, tbh..the 2003 Spurs played in the dark ages of the NBA, where the Nets made the Finals, and their only real challenge was a Lakers team that was burnt out from 3 consecutive runs to the Finals..

The current Cavs are miles better than anyone in the eastern conference 2000-2003, but the western conference in that period was also significantly better than it is now. And if the Lakers get the burned out excuse then, the same will be true for the Cavs and dubs now

[HarlemHeat37]

The current Cavs are miles better than anyone in the eastern conference 2000-2003, but the western conference in that period was also significantly better than it is now. And if the Lakers get the burned out excuse then, the same will be true for the Cavs and dubs now

no, I completely disagree, tbh..I don't even think it's arguable..

The Mavs didn't have Dirk for half the series vs. the Spurs and Chris Webber didn't even play in the playoffs..

The other teams were the Wolves with Wally Sczerbiak as their 2nd best player, a 47-win Jazz team with 40 and 39 year olds Malone and Stockton, and the Suns with Stephon Marbury as their best player..

That Nets team was one of the worst Finals' teams in the history of the league, too..

2003 was one of the weaker le runs of that generation IMO..the 2005 Spurs had one of the toughest runs, but both the 2003 and 2007 teams had easy compe ion outside of 2 series'..

[diego]

I was talking about the period 2000-03 period in general, but if you want to parallel specifically 2003 with last year, injury depleted Memphis + OKC aren't better than 03 suns and mavs and that's without even mentioning shaqs lakers

[spurraider21]

Duncan is still easily better until Kawhi strings some elite playoff series' together(at the very least), but to be fair, it'll be much more difficult for Leonard to establish himself with teams like the Warriors and Cavs in the league, tbh..the 2003 Spurs played in the dark ages of the NBA, where the Nets made the Finals, and their only real challenge was a Lakers team that was burnt out from 3 consecutive runs to the Finals..

The nba was overall weaker but they had to unseat Shaq/Kobe to win it... You can call them burnt out but that didn't stop them from beating the spurs and getting back to the finals in 04 despite kobe missing first quarters of games to go to rape hearings

[UNT Eagles 2016]

Switch that Duncan with this Kawhi and the Spurs don't ring in 2003, but I absolutely think the Spurs would be better than they are now if 2003 Duncan replaced 2017 Kawhi.

Kawhi has been wonderful this year, but Duncan nearly single handedly carried that team to a le.

Green part: Correct, because the Spurs had Bruce Bowen and Kawhi would render Bowen fairly useless as he would make him a backup while leaving a giant hole at the PF position, leaving Malik Rose the starter and Danny Ferry the backup... YIKES!

Red part: Incorrect, because the current Spurs would have no decent small forward on the team and would have both Duncan and Aldridge playing essentially the same position which would be good at times but very redundant and negating at other times.

[HarlemHeat37]

The nba was overall weaker but they had to unseat Shaq/Kobe to win it... You can call them burnt out but that didn't stop them from beating the spurs and getting back to the finals in 04 despite kobe missing first quarters of games to go to rape hearings

They replaced role players with Karl Malone(who played some of the best defense I've ever seen vs. Tim during the 2004 series) and Gary Payton, who were still All-Stars, at that time

[UNT Eagles 2016]

Not even close.

You can even cite era differences and won't be able to have a argument, since Duncan in 2014 was actually still the Spurs best player in the post-season. Now imagine a prime '03 Duncan on that 2014 team or even last season's team when he went out with a 19 point game at 40 years old on no knees. He was also the best player in the 2015 Clippers series when Kawhi kind of folded down the stretch in that series as Duncan was making Blake and DeMonkey his es.

Now if Kawhi goes Hakeem on the league and runs the Harden, Durant, Lebron perimeter player gauntlet, outplaying each of them, enroute to a le, yeah, I'll crown his season as the greatest ever by a Spur.

Duncan was NOT the best player in the 2014 post season. He's around #3 or #4 between himself and Manu. Leonard and Parker were the clear #1 and #2.

[siraulo23]

Tim hasn't been gone a year, and people are already forgetting how good he was.

[UNT Eagles 2016]

Love Kawhi, but 2003 Tim was an absolute monster, and not only that, we ran almost every play exclusively through him (4-down).

In hindsight, that was a very good team, but Manu was a rook, we started the season with Steve Smith, Tony wasn't necessarily stellar yet, and we had bad-back DRob.

Kawhi would certainly approach that level of greatness if he had a signature series in the playoffs like Tim vs the defending three-peat champs Lakers that year.

The 2003 team is arguably my favorite team of all time, for their perseverance and what they overcame that year, between David announcing his last year the previous summer, the crappy 19-13 start, the Suns having our number that year and the Lakers hurdle... BUT, but they weren't the most talented team nor a particularly high-scoring or efficient offense, and part of that was calling too many 4-downs for Duncan instead of motions and screens and Parker/Manu dribble drives. Manu was a rookie, of course, and Parker committed too many turnovers back then, but 4-down is an inefficient way to get offense...

[HarlemHeat37]

Manu and Kawhi were probably the best players during the 2014 run, but it's tough to rank the players, since everybody was fairly inconsistent from series to series(deepest team of all-time negated the lack of stars)..

I don't know how to rank Duncan(was more of a super role player, at that point) and Parker(put up usage numbers, but had by far the worst on/off metrics on the team, they were better whenever he left the floor)..

[UNT Eagles 2016]

2016 UNT > 2017 UNT

One year he had a job the next year he didn't.

I just closed on a house in Ohio.. I'm gonna get $50k in profit (I just coughed up $25.7k + 45k & ~5k in hard money cost) after I sell it for $160k in April

[SASdynasty!]

Maybe 2003 McGrady tbh.

[UNT Eagles 2016]

Maybe 2003 McGrady tbh.

Chucker. And trading away prime Mike Miller for Drew Gooden halfway thru the season was ing re ed.