Kyrie Irving Is The Best One-On-One Player In the League, So What?

Ever since Kyrie Irving asked to be traded away from the Cavs, there has been a lot of talk about what he can bring to another team. The consensus seems to be that he is an amazing one-on-one player. He may even be the best one-on-one guy in the NBA right now.  And, I see no reason to debate that.

Irving has cemented his legacy in Cleveland with that skill. It’s in a banner in the rafters. It’s also in the minds of thousands of Cavs fans who can still remember him rising up over Stephen Curry to score a contested 3-pointer in game seven of the NBA Finals, which ultimately won the Cavs the title.

That shot came after the Cavs had bounced back from being down 3-1 in the series. That shot came after neither team had been able to score for three minutes and 56 seconds. That shot came after arguably the best block in NBA history.

And, when I tell my someday kids about that finishing blow, I will mention all of the above to them and show them the clip of it. It will be a quick clip, probably just five second long, the amount of time Irving took to size up Curry and launch after Klay Thompson switched off of him. I will conclude my remarks saying, “that’s ‘The Shot’ that replaced Michael Jordan’s soul crushing ‘The Shot,’ (which sent a Finals bound Cavs team home early in 1989).”

I’m a Cavs fan though. I’m not a general manager in the NBA. GMs saw all the same things as me in June of 2016, but they remember a tiny bit more about that shot.

Here’s the thing about Irving’s shot in that game seven: it was actually anything but a one-on-one play in the most literal sense. What came before The Shot matters and who was on the floor is what really matters. After J.R. Smith inbounded the ball to Irving out of a timeout, he set a screen for him on Klay Thompson. The Warriors were forced to switch Curry onto Ky.

They were forced to switch solely because of the threat of 3-point shooters the Cavs had on the floor. Richard Jefferson shot 39.3% from 3-land during the title run. Kevin Love shot 41.4%. The King hit 34.0% of his long attempts, and J.R. Smith drained 43.0% of his tosses, while Irving was shooting 44.0% from downtown. The Cavs were red hot from deep; the Warriors were scared. That shooting is ultimately what allowed Irving to square up against Curry. The Warriors couldn’t cheat and help at all with the group of Cavs that was on the floor for that shot.

Other teams know that, and that’s the biggest reason why Irving won’t get traded for the haul a lot of people think he will.

Irving is ultimately the same player he was three years ago before James returned home. He rocked a plus-minus of -3.1, -3.0, and -3.1 his first three years in the league. When James returned, he posted plus-minuses of +5.6, +3.9, and +4.6 in each the following regular seasons (playoff numbers of +4.2,+6.9,and +6.9). Those are solid numbers at first glance for sure, but those are LeBron bolstered numbers.

During the regular season last year when LeBron was off of the floor Irving had a rating of -1.3. He posted a rating of +6.1 when he shared the floor with him. And, when it really mattered in the playoffs, Irving was -1.7 with him off the floor and +8.6 with him on it.

With Kevin Love on the floor, Irving was a+6.4 and +.5 with him off of it. It’s clear Irving benefits from having the league’s best player next to him.

When Irving played without LeBron, he really struggled last season. His offensive rating went down from 117.5 to just 103.1. That non-LBJ offensive rating is what some of the bottom ten teams in the league had in the regular season.  And, that’s not some weird number that Kyrie wasn’t influencing. His usage rate was a world crushing 41.7% when James sat, up from 26.8% when he had to share the floor with him. He scored more when looking at per 36 numbers, but his make percentage went down and his turnovers went up.

If those numbers don’t make you question how effective Irving is, let’s have a gander at some of his non-LeBron lineup numbers. During the regular season, the most used lineup for Irving that didn’t feature James had RJ, Love, TT, and Shump in it. They played a total of 46 minutes and were -3 during that time, -0.2 per game. His next most featured non-King group included Love, Shump, Smith, and TT. They played for 39 total minutes and were just +4 over the year, +0.3 per game.

Those numbers are throw back numbers to the dark days of the Wine & Gold. The Cavs super lineup of the 2013-2014 season, the lineup that was supposed to propel them to the playoffs and a fifth seed if you read any of the nonsense I spouted back then, consisted of Spencer Hawes, Luol Deng, Irving, Jarrett Jack, and TT. They put up a positive rating of +0.7 per game. When Irving was teamed with C.J. Miles, Deng, Anderson Varejao, and TT, they were +1.4 per game. I don’t want to go too far and say Irving has digressed as far as carrying a unit goes since LeBron returned, but he sure hasn’t improved much.

And, that fact means a lot. Teams are noticing this stagnation. He’s not like other stars that have wanted to venture out on their own or just leave to a different situation.

When Kevin Durant left the Thunder after the 2015-2016 season ended, he was +5.2 with Russell Westbrook on the floor and +0.5 with him off of it. That’s not the same drop off Kyrie experiences when the King sits.

And, when you look at the James Harden trade to Houston, which occurred after the 2011-2012 season, Irving’s numbers are even more revealing. When the beard left the Thunder, he was posting a plus-minus of +5.9. When he shared the floor with Kevin Durant, he was +4.8, and when Durant was off he was +1.1. When he shared the floor with Russell Westrbrook, he was +4.6. He was +1.3 when Westbrook sat. Again, Irving doesn’t have that same ability to keep a team in the positive when their best player sits leaving him as the main man.  This Harden example is especially poignant; it’s the only comparative of a guy leaving a team with two other super-stars.

I don’t think anyone will ever really understand why Irving wants to leave a team that is a lock to make the Finals for the fourth straight year and go to a team he probably won’t be able to get into the playoffs, but I have a theory behind his thinking. It’s easy to think the grass is greener other places. Irving probably could be the face of a franchise elsewhere. He could score more. He could take even more shots, despite taking the most on the Cavs and having the highest usage rate on the team. The grass very well might be greener for him in a new place.

It won’t be green for his teammates though. That’s the part of leaving the Cavs that Kyrie is missing. The Shot was the result of everyone on the floor standing on some finely manicured grass. Opposing players couldn’t help but stand on that pretty landscaping and see what it was doing. When Irving leaves and gets his own team, there’s sure to be some players on it with weeds in their yards. There will be some players with dirt too, even burnt crappy straw like grass in their yards. And, no opposing players want to stand on some sub-par yard coverings. They are all going to head over to the pristine turf Kyrie has manicured for himself. When that happens, the best one-on-one player in the league isn’t going to be playing one-on-one anymore. Any team that trades for Kyrie in the coming months is asking, “can Kyrie be the best one-on-two player or even best one-on-three player in the league?”