Daily Thunder.com

Matt Moore of CBSSports.com on an imaginary Offensive Player of the Year award: “Durant is unquestionably the best scorer in the league. He’s averaging 29.6 points per game while shooting 52 percent from the field, 41 percent from three and 90 percent from the free throw line, putting him on track to be the first scoring leader in history to average 50-40-90 in a season. If we examine some of the scorer-defining play sets through Synergy, though, there are some interesting results. Durant is actually a better post scorer than you’d expect, as he has transformed his game this season. He’s second among all post scorers with 100 possessions behind Kobe Bryant.”

Tom Ziller of SB Nation on assets and when to deal them: “So perhaps the lesson here isn’t that you should not trade your cheap blue chippers, but that you should leverage their cost-effective production for 1-3 years, let the hype build as everyone realizes what a good deal they are and then flip them … unless, of course, they have that star potential. Bradley and Bledsoe might. Parsons, Sullinger, Seraphin and Vasquez likely do not. Faried is so ridiculously productive that trading him would be too risky. In the end, the decisions need to be weighed like any other, and good front offices will do this better. But the lesson of Parsons is to use those non-lottery picks instead of selling them off, and to look for players who can be productive early, and to keep a reasonable mind about their long-term potential and trade value.” Keep Reading…

Ben Golliver of SI.com: “Perhaps Gay could have held Durant in check, opened up the floor a bit and surely his teammates would have played harder and better if they weren’t so upset that he had been traded, right? Please, please allow some context to override that line of thinking. Three important reminders. One: Oklahoma City is an offensive juggernaut, ranking No. 1 in the league in offensive efficiency. Two: Oklahoma City is very difficult to beat at home, holding a 20-3 home record this season after posting a 26-7 home record last season and a 30-11 home record in 2010-11. That’s a 72 percent home winning percentage over the last two-plus seasons. Three: Oklahoma City is in the midst of one of the most dominant seasons in recent memory, blowing out teams with remarkable frequency. Get this: 24 of Oklahoma City’s 35 wins this season have come by double-digits and eight have come by 20+ points. The Thunder pounded the Grizzlies by 17 points on Thursday, but that represented just their tenth largest margin of victory this season.”

Darnell Mayberry: “Westbrook lost his head midway through the third quarter and nearly sparked a chain reaction that caused the Thunder to lose a 26-point lead. I didn’t see all of what happened. All I know is he was whistled for a rare five-second call while backing down his man and then blew up. Apparently, he wanted Thabo Sefolosha to cut. Westbrook then let Sefolosha no about it in a not-so-kind way. Westbrook then called his own number on the next play and took a terrible shot. On the next dead ball, Scotty Brooks yanked him. And that was that.” Keep Reading…