The Side Part: They used to be the darlings

USATI

I. Russell Westbrook is playing the best basketball of his career. The triple doubles he’s getting now are triple doubles nobody has seen before because of just how full they are. They aren’t the thin kind Jason Kidd was racking up in the early 2000’s. Those were 11, 11, 10 type lines. Westbrook is just doing more. He’s not eking these out. He’s getting there in three quarters sometimes. Last night he was two rebounds away from having one at half.

People talk about Draymond Green’s having had ten of them so far (the talk is deserved, he’s been incredible) but Westbrook’s take on a different feel. They have spikes attached to them. Kidd’s old ones meddled forever in the round numbers and the low teens. Westbrook’s are 30+ point mid teens everywhere else jagged shards of glass falling from the skies lines.

The guy who nobody could put into a box, the guy who defies the very way the traditional point guard position is supposedly supposed to be played, the guy who everybody said needed to be reigned in because he couldn’t involve his teammates the way a true point needs to, that guy now has chemistry with everybody. His PnR’s with Adams, the flat screen at the top of the key and the short rolls down close to the block, they’re making music. It’s the old Harden-Collison two man game but above the rim with both guys playing down a mountainside. If you had to come up with a silhouetted logo of Adams at this point you would draw him hanging on the rim, bent at the elbows, his legs splayed out well beyond the back of the backboard.

Westbrook has this chemistry with Kanter, too, Westbrook undoubtedly thankful he has a big with some hands. You wonder if his assist numbers would have leaped sooner had Brooks not been so insistent on extended minutes for Perkins and his frying pans. When Donovan puts Durant at the top of the key and makes him the screener, Westbrook barreling into the lane, Durant’s man forced to stay, and Adams waiting on the lob with shooters in the corners, it’s as devastating a look as the Thunder have ever been able to give other teams.

II. John Wall is a very good basketball player, but he’s not Westbrook. It’s not even really all that close.

For the year, Wall, a deserved All-Star, is putting up a 19.9, 4.3, and 9.8 on 43% shooting from the field and 78% from the line. He’s also averaging 2.1 steals per game and has a PER of 20.0. Those are really good numbers.

Westbrook’s just operating in another section of the galaxy right now, though. He’s putting up a 24, 7.6, and 10 line on 46% shooting from the field and 81% on free throws. He’s also leading the league in steals per game at 2.4 and has a PER of 28.7. It is still so funny to think about the people who said he would never be a good passer. He’s not like anything that has existed in this league before. He’s nonsensical.

In two games against the Thunder these have been John Wall’s numbers:

9, 5, and 2 on 31% shooting and 17, 8, and 4 on 41% shooting.

Westbrook’s numbers in both those games:

22, 11, and 11 on 41% shooting and 17, 13, and 11 on 62% shooting.

I say all that to say this: John Wall went for 41 and 10 and 3 against the Dubs last night in Washington. Curry went for 51 and was all in your feed last night, but Wall gave the Warriors all they wanted. The Warriors are probably going to score a lot of points on the Thunder. But it would be surprising if the Thunder didn’t also do the same to them.

III. Westbrook can hurt the Warriors. He has that ability. They’ve not seen a guard like him. Both he and Durant really outclass anyone the Warriors have seen thus far short of LeBron and maybe Kawhi. And the Thunder has had to hear for a year and a half about how their window is on the verge of being shut, how it may already be, how they missed their time in the sun because of a trade and three injuries and that juggernaut out in Oakland. You have to believe it has not set well with them. You have to believe they’ll bring all their bullets.

Course the Warriors could establish a version of the same narrative. They’ve spent this first half of the season quieting doubters claiming they lucked into rings because of all the injuries to the rest of the NBA’s elite. The Thunder are the one team of that bunch that was being mentioned that they haven’t gotten an opportunity to prove themselves against. They’ll be ready to go. They’ve had to be every night this year. And the Thunder defense, while not breaking sometimes, is still hardly Fort Knox. Curry might go for a forty piece again. The Dubs might come out and hang 160 on them. But then maybe the Thunder score 161? The Thunder are the one team in the league that roll out two that, depending on the night, could potentially relegate Curry to being the third best player on the floor. That might be wishful thinking, but I don’t think it is. Either way, the matchup more closely resembles a string of exploding fireworks stands than a basketball game.

The league hasn’t seen a fully healthy Thunder when it mattered for an extended period of time since 2012. They’ve already become a what if and generally it seems, if you believe the quotes, they feel like they’ve been forgotten. They were once the darlings. Now the attention is elsewhere. A team with two of the top five players in the league is flying under the radar.

It’ll be fun to see how they stack up against the crowned jewel on Saturday. Regardless, whatever happens, it’s one game, and the Thunder have a lot of improving to do between now and the playoffs. The Dubs could lay waste to the Thunder, and have the whole defense on skates for the better part of three quarters until their starters take a breather for the rest of the game. Or the Thunder could come out and ask that the world stop sleeping on them. I don’t know. I’m just going to watch and be happy the Thunder are healthy enough to be interesting again, healthy enough to play in games like this and get people excited. We get to see Durant and Westbrook fly against a monster again. Hurry up, Saturday.