If Paul Pierce played with prime Shaq

[Vino24]

How would his career turn out? Shaq would have transformed Pierce

[MrFonzworth]

World peace would have been achieved.

[PP34Deuce]

I'm a huge Paul pierce but hes not winning plus rings with shaq.

He wins prob 1. Depends on the year.

Kobe had game breaking athleticsm. Pierce is a swingman but more a SF than SG.

[Vino24]

I'm a huge Paul pierce but hes not winning plus rings with shaq.

He wins prob 1. Depends on the year.

Kobe had game breaking athleticsm. Pierce is a swingman but more a SF than SG.
Pierce has always been a sf. Pierce had a different game than Kobe. Very deceptive and crafty little moves that gave him room to work

[Smoke117]

Kevin Garnett basically made Pierce incredibly overrated. I have never liked his game and the impact he brought. He was a good, all star level player, but he was never close to being a superstar. (except in his own mind, apparently) When he said he had a better career than Dwyane Wade that shit was just laughable. A prime/peak Wade is about two tiers above a prime/peak Pierce.

[bladefd]

Kobe won 3 with Shaq. I say prime Pierce wins 1 with Shaq. As great as Pierce was, he is no Kobe.

[ImKobe]

Pierce could never produce on Kobe's level, he was always a tier below but still a very good player so they would have probably won a ring. Thing is Kobe started playing with Shaq at 17 so are we putting Pierce in that situation at the same age?

Pierce had a great mid-range game and could shoot 3s at a very efficient clip so they would have been contenders but he wasn't as athletic nor as good defensively and he wasn't as good of a playmaker so Lakers would have definitely done worse overall.

Obviously they could have been as successful with peak/prime Pierce next to peak Shaq but so would have Kobe had he been older.

[Real14]

Maybe 1 and that's it.

[Real Men Wear Green]

People are somewhat underrating Pierce and severely underrating Shaq. He was the MVP of all three of their finals wins and was the Lakers' best player. Meanwhile Pierce has a Finals MVP award himself, an award he won in a series where Kobe Bryant was frequently matched up with him. Pierce's career isn't better than Bryant's and he probably doesn't lead the Lakers to rings with Gasol but he would definitely be capable of taking a secondary role to Shaq to win some rings. The real question is whether or not Shaq and Pierce would be able to mesh. On that we can only guess, and the Shaq-Kobe feud wasn't all on Kobe. But we have never seen Pierce feud with a teammate anywhere near what we saw happen with Shaq and Kobe, and if Pierce didn't make a stink when Antoine Walker routinely took 20 shots and fire 8 threes making 2 or 3 of them he would go along with getting Shaq the ball inside. The year Bryant was on trial for rape that culminated with a Finals loss to Detroit when the Lakers had a stacked roster sticks out as the biggest case of Bryant trying to do too much, Shaq was still able to score at will (26ppg on 63%) but Bryant hurt them badly (22ppg on 38%). If Pierce has a mindset to defer to the big man that 4-1 might even get flipped.

[SouBeachTalents]

People are somewhat underrating Pierce and severely underrating Shaq. He was the MVP of all three of their finals wins and was the Lakers' best player. Meanwhile Pierce has a Finals MVP award himself, an award he won in a series where Kobe Bryant was frequently matched up with him. Pierce's career isn't better than Bryant's and he probably doesn't lead the Lakers to rings with Gasol but he would definitely be capable of taking a secondary role to Shaq to win some rings. The real question is whether or not Shaq and Pierce would be able to mesh. On that we can only guess, and the Shaq-Kobe feud wasn't all on Kobe. But we have never seen Pierce feud with a teammate anywhere near what we saw happen with Shaq and Kobe, and if Pierce didn't make a stink when Antoine Walker routinely took 20 shots and fire 8 threes making 2 or 3 of them he would go along with getting Shaq the ball inside. The year Bryant was on trial for rape that culminated with a Finals loss to Detroit when the Lakers had a stacked roster sticks out as the biggest case of Bryant trying to do too much, Shaq was still able to score at will (26ppg on 63%) but Bryant hurt them badly (22ppg on 38%). If Pierce has a mindset to defer to the big man that 4-1 might even get flipped.
I would LOVE to see Kobe paired up with Antoine Walker, that shit would be absolutely hilarious :oldlol:

[Vino24]

I would LOVE to see Kobe paired up with Antoine Walker, that shit would be absolutely hilarious :oldlol:
Kobe would beg to be drafted by Charlotte before that could happen :oldlol:

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

No more than 2 imo.

Pierce could replicate what Kobe did in 2000. Doubt LA wins in 2002 though.

The 2001 team was ATG...but that verz of Kobe = better than Pierce ever was.

[SouBeachTalents]

No more than 2 imo.

ierce could replicate what Kobe did in 2000.

Maybe 2002 as well. 2001 Kobe was better than Pierce ever was though.
I actually would swap '01 & '02. While Pierce wouldn't be able to replicate Kobe's play, their margin of error was significantly larger than '02, where they needed several lucky breaks and infamous reffing to get by Sacramento

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

I actually would swap '01 & '02. While Pierce wouldn't be able to replicate Kobe's play, their margin of error was significantly larger than '02, where they needed several lucky breaks and infamous reffing to get by Sacramento

Yup.

You just missed my ninja edit lol

[Vino24]

Pierce wouldn

[Doranku]

They win in 2000 I think. That's probably it.

[Smoke117]

No more than 2 imo.

Pierce could replicate what Kobe did in 2000. Doubt LA wins in 2002 though.

The 2001 team was ATG...but that verz of Kobe = better than Pierce ever was.

That 2001 Laker team was hardly ATG. The league was just All time weak and the Lakers had the best player in the world in Shaq and a top 10 player in Kobe. The rest of their line up was piss weak and they got away with that because the league was pretty much at its lowest point because of 90s stars aging out and expansion thinning the talent.

[ImKobe]

People are somewhat underrating Pierce and severely underrating Shaq. He was the MVP of all three of their finals wins and was the Lakers' best player. Meanwhile Pierce has a Finals MVP award himself, an award he won in a series where Kobe Bryant was frequently matched up with him. Pierce's career isn't better than Bryant's and he probably doesn't lead the Lakers to rings with Gasol but he would definitely be capable of taking a secondary role to Shaq to win some rings. The real question is whether or not Shaq and Pierce would be able to mesh. On that we can only guess, and the Shaq-Kobe feud wasn't all on Kobe. But we have never seen Pierce feud with a teammate anywhere near what we saw happen with Shaq and Kobe, and if Pierce didn't make a stink when Antoine Walker routinely took 20 shots and fire 8 threes making 2 or 3 of them he would go along with getting Shaq the ball inside. The year Bryant was on trial for rape that culminated with a Finals loss to Detroit when the Lakers had a stacked roster sticks out as the biggest case of Bryant trying to do too much, Shaq was still able to score at will (26ppg on 63%) but Bryant hurt them badly (22ppg on 38%). If Pierce has a mindset to defer to the big man that 4-1 might even get flipped.

This is still something people are getting wrong and it speaks of ignorance if you're saying that Kobe shot the ball too much and Shaq too little or that the team was "stacked".

Shaq throughout the year was taking 14 shots a game (13 in the first 3 rounds) and was essentially a 22/12 guy who struggled defending the P&R due to his weight gain. He took ~17 shots a game in the Finals and had his usual number of Free Throws, the big issue to me is that he had as many blocks as Kobe(3) and looked gassed on defense. People need to understand that 2004 Shaq was not on par with his 3-peat self, which is why Detroit loaded up on Kobe and played Shaq single coverage. It didn't help that Malone got injured and Gary Payton couldn't play in the triangle at all. That team was far from stacked and shot a combined 33.8%FG for the series outside of Shaq and Kobe.

You can look at the 8-man rotation of Kobe, Shaq, Fisher, George, Payton, Malone, Medvedenko and compare it to Billups, Rip, Prince, Sheed, Wallace, Williamson, Hunter & Campbell and tell me that the Lakers had the better all-around team. Shaq & Kobe had a bunch of journeymen and two way past-prime stars who gave them nothing on offense while going up against a team that had 4 current/future all-stars in their primes with one of the greatest coaches ever playing arguably the best defense of that decade while exploiting Shaq in the P&R.

Let's not also forget that 2004 Kobe was coming off knee surgery, injured his shoulder in the WCF and was dealing with the court case during the Playoffs, all that and Shaq's antics led to a toxic environment.

Pierce definitely could have won a ring or two with Shaq if he was in his prime but he's not winning it in 2004. Kobe shot terribly yes, but it's not like everyone else played great and he tanked it like Lebron in 2011.

[StrongLurk]

Rookie Pierce to year 8 Pierce in place of Kobe 96-04?

Pierce wins maybe 2 rings...But Kobe was ALWAYS better than Pierce.

[Real Men Wear Green]

This is still something people are getting wrong and it speaks of ignorance if you're saying that Kobe shot the ball too much and Shaq too little or that the team was "stacked".

Shaq throughout the year was taking 14 shots a game (13 in the first 3 rounds) and was essentially a 22/12 guy who struggled defending the P&R due to his weight gain. He took ~17 shots a game in the Finals and had his usual number of Free Throws, the big issue to me is that he had as many blocks as Kobe(3) and looked gassed on defense. People need to understand that 2004 Shaq was not on par with his 3-peat self, which is why Detroit loaded up on Kobe and played Shaq single coverage. It didn't help that Malone got injured and Gary Payton couldn't play in the triangle at all. That team was far from stacked and shot a combined 33.8%FG for the series outside of Shaq and Kobe.

You can look at the 8-man rotation of Kobe, Shaq, Fisher, George, Payton, Malone, Medvedenko and compare it to Billups, Rip, Prince, Sheed, Wallace, Williamson, Hunter & Campbell and tell me that the Lakers had the better all-around team. Shaq & Kobe had a bunch of journeymen and two way past-prime stars who gave them nothing on offense while going up against a team that had 4 current/future all-stars in their primes with one of the greatest coaches ever playing arguably the best defense of that decade while exploiting Shaq in the P&R.

Let's not also forget that 2004 Kobe was coming off knee surgery, injured his shoulder in the WCF and was dealing with the court case during the Playoffs, all that and Shaq's antics led to a toxic environment.

Pierce definitely could have won a ring or two with Shaq if he was in his prime but he's not winning it in 2004. Kobe shot terribly yes, but it's not like everyone else played great and he tanked it like Lebron in 2011.Bryant being less than his normal self is just one more reason why Pierce would have done better in 2004. You can't absolve Bryant of blame in a series where he shoots 38%. That was probably thr first playoff series of non-rookie Bryant's career. He was bad.

[Doranku]

People are somewhat underrating Pierce and severely underrating Shaq. He was the MVP of all three of their finals wins and was the Lakers' best player. Meanwhile Pierce has a Finals MVP award himself, an award he won in a series where Kobe Bryant was frequently matched up with him. Pierce's career isn't better than Bryant's and he probably doesn't lead the Lakers to rings with Gasol but he would definitely be capable of taking a secondary role to Shaq to win some rings. The real question is whether or not Shaq and Pierce would be able to mesh. On that we can only guess, and the Shaq-Kobe feud wasn't all on Kobe. But we have never seen Pierce feud with a teammate anywhere near what we saw happen with Shaq and Kobe, and if Pierce didn't make a stink when Antoine Walker routinely took 20 shots and fire 8 threes making 2 or 3 of them he would go along with getting Shaq the ball inside. The year Bryant was on trial for rape that culminated with a Finals loss to Detroit when the Lakers had a stacked roster sticks out as the biggest case of Bryant trying to do too much, Shaq was still able to score at will (26ppg on 63%) but Bryant hurt them badly (22ppg on 38%). If Pierce has a mindset to defer to the big man that 4-1 might even get flipped.

That's assuming the Lakers make it out of the West in '04 with Pierce instead of Kobe. The Lakers didn't have HCA in the 2nd or 3rd round that year, and while Kobe wasn't very good against Minnesota, he was great against the Spurs. Had 42 in game 4 at home to avoid going down 3-1 in the series.

Would Pierce be capable of a performance like that in a series that essentially stopped the Spurs from 3-peating? Not so sure.

[kuniva_dAMiGhTy]

That 2001 Laker team was hardly ATG. The league was just All time weak and the Lakers had the best player in the world in Shaq and a top 10 player in Kobe. The rest of their line up was piss weak and they got away with that because the league was pretty much at its lowest point because of 90s stars aging out and expansion thinning the talent.

Wrong.

The Lakers had 2 Top 10 players in their primes. One playing @ his peak and argued as GOAT.

The "rest of their lineup" was littered with GOAT role players. All clutch. Overall LA ranked both #1 in ORTG and DRTG during the playoffs.

Calling them "hardly an ATG team" is moronic.

[Real Men Wear Green]

That's assuming the Lakers make it out of the West in '04 with Pierce instead of Kobe. The Lakers didn't have HCA in the 2nd or 3rd round that year, and while Kobe wasn't very good against Minnesota, he was great against the Spurs. Had 42 in game 4 at home to avoid going down 3-1 in the series.

Would Pierce be capable of a performance like that in a series that essentially stopped the Spurs from 3-peating? Not so sure.Piercehas had his share of big playoff games and ther Lakers record could have been better with Pierce not having the frustration of a rape trial and not dealing with any significant injury.

[PP34Deuce]

Youd have to swap out Rick fox because pierce at the 2 would make the team slower with Rick fox on the wing.

Most likely youd see LA go with a 2 in that Kerry kittles style and Rick fox would be a 6th man.

Kobe 99 to 2004 flew all over the court defensively on the perimeter. Pierce defensively Is similar to younger Rick fox. Quick hands. Strong upper body smart defense.

[superduper]

[QUOTE=Vino24]Pierce wouldn

[GimmeThat]

the logic here is quite simple, if Shaq made it to the finals at age 22 with a .230 WS/48

he's going to win those 3 finals with the FMVP regardless of the roster

Kobe never got paid super star money while he was on the same team with Shaq.

for all speculation goes, Jordan could have teamed up with Shaq for rings had his team not been stacked already

[ImKobe]

Bryant being less than his normal self is just one more reason why Pierce would have done better in 2004. You can't absolve Bryant of blame in a series where he shoots 38%. That was probably thr first playoff series of non-rookie Bryant's career. He was bad.

Bryant was less than his normal self but won them a game in the series with a great game-tying shot and clutch OT win, his 4th quarter numbers are actually decent for the series with 7 points on 41.4% shooting and 90% from the line, only Rip Hamilton was slightly better at 7.8 on 44.4%. Here's the big issue - Sheed averaged 4 points on 61.5%FG and Ben Wallace averaged 3.8 on 69.2%FG - Lakers had no answer for Detroit's bigs. Shaq had 3 blocks in 5 games and was getting exploited in the P&R.

Pierce would have made them even worse defensively and Detroit would have loaded up on him as well.

For reference, Pierce in 2004 put up 20.8 points on 34.2% shooting with 6.3 turnovers per game in the first round against Indiana at age 26 and it's not like it was much worse than his 2003 and 2004 Regular Season, where he combined averaged 24.4 points on 41% shooting.

The fact is that Pierce from 02-04 Playoffs (prior to rule changes) averaged ~25 points on 39% shooting in 30 Playoff games, he shot 40.3% or worse in his first 3 Playoff runs at age 24-26. Kobe played below his standards in 2004 Finals but those numbers are on par with what Pierce put up at the time and the Lakers are not winning if Detroit play Paul the same way. Pierce doesn't heal Karl Malone or make Shaq lose all that weight or make GP understand the triangle.

Indiana had a great defense as well and they were 61-21 that year but Detroit was even better because they were playing at a 63-win pace after the Sheed trade and looked unstoppable on defense, that starting 5 was just brutal.

[brutalBBQ]

[QUOTE=Vino24]How would his career turn out? Shaq would have transformed Pierce

['Toine=MVP]

Hard to say they could have done better than 3 peat, but honestly, the two of them stick together longer and likely win more together at least during Shaq's peak and slight post-peak.

Pierce was about as underrated as Kobe was overrated. Kobe had the overall talent advantage though. But it was funny when broadcasters and commentators were saying Pierce was having one of his best seasons in 2008. He was already in his post-prime at that point. Still very good, but not nearly as dynamic as he was in his peak.

[superduper]

Hard to say they could have done better than 3 peat, but honestly, the two of them stick together longer and likely win more together at least during Shaq's peak and slight post-peak.

Pierce was about as underrated as Kobe was overrated. Kobe had the overall talent advantage though. But it was funny when broadcasters and commentators were saying Pierce was having one of his best seasons in 2008. He was already in his post-prime at that point. Still very good, but not nearly as dynamic as he was in his peak.

Pierce is underrated as a competitor sure, people forget that he went toe-to-toe with the absolute best talents in the league. But as a player? Pierce is not elevating anybody. He was a good scorer and a great competitor. That's about where the Paul Pierce analysis ends. He wasn't anywhere near Kobe as an overall player.

[BigShotBob]

Pierce was labeled "The Truth" in a game against the Kobe & Shaq Lakers which makes this thread a little ironic.

But with that said, I don't even think the Lakers would make it to the Finals with Pierce in place of Kobe in a couple of those years. Kobe exploded against the Spurs numerous times and Pierce was a dynamic scorer but he wasn't an explosive one. One of his best playoff games was game 5(?) I believe against Lebron in 2008 when they both dropped 40+.

[sportjames23]

That's assuming the Lakers make it out of the West in '04 with Pierce instead of Kobe. The Lakers didn't have HCA in the 2nd or 3rd round that year, and while Kobe wasn't very good against Minnesota, he was great against the Spurs. Had 42 in game 4 at home to avoid going down 3-1 in the series.

Would Pierce be capable of a performance like that in a series that essentially stopped the Spurs from 3-peating? Not so sure.

Wha--? The Spurs never even repeated, much less came close to 3-peating.

[Doranku]

Wha--? The Spurs never even repeated, much less came close to 3-peating.

They won in '03 and '05. If they don't lose to the Lakers in '04, they probably win the title. What's so hard to understand here?

[sportjames23]

They won in '03 and '05. If they don't lose to the Lakers in '04, they probably win the title. What's so hard to understand here?

I see what you're saying, but I don't see that as denying a 3-peat. That's like saying the Rockets denied the Showtime Lakers a 3-peat because they beat them in 1986 and then the Lakers went on to win in '87 and '88.

['Toine=MVP]

I see what you're saying, but I don't see that as denying a 3-peat. That's like saying the Rockets denied the Showtime Lakers a 3-peat because they beat them in 1986 and then the Lakers went on to win in '87 and '88.

Yeah. The idea that if the Spurs had won in 04 they would have definitely ended up winning in 05 is not something we can say with any confidence. Having won back to back (in this alternate reality) might have put more pressure on them or some other issue might have arose in the those finals. Etc. The following season would have been different.

[Real Men Wear Green]

Bryant was less than his normal self but won them a game in the series with a great game-tying shot and clutch OT win, his 4th quarter numbers are actually decent for the series with 7 points on 41.4% shooting and 90% from the line, only Rip Hamilton was slightly better at 7.8 on 44.4%. Here's the big issue - Sheed averaged 4 points on 61.5%FG and Ben Wallace averaged 3.8 on 69.2%FG - Lakers had no answer for Detroit's bigs. Shaq had 3 blocks in 5 games and was getting exploited in the P&R.

Pierce would have made them even worse defensively and Detroit would have loaded up on him as well.

For reference, Pierce in 2004 put up 20.8 points on 34.2% shooting with 6.3 turnovers per game in the first round against Indiana at age 26 and it's not like it was much worse than his 2003 and 2004 Regular Season, where he combined averaged 24.4 points on 41% shooting.

The fact is that Pierce from 02-04 Playoffs (prior to rule changes) averaged ~25 points on 39% shooting in 30 Playoff games, he shot 40.3% or worse in his first 3 Playoff runs at age 24-26. Kobe played below his standards in 2004 Finals but those numbers are on par with what Pierce put up at the time and the Lakers are not winning if Detroit play Paul the same way. Pierce doesn't heal Karl Malone or make Shaq lose all that weight or make GP understand the triangle.

Indiana had a great defense as well and they were 61-21 that year but Detroit was even better because they were playing at a 63-win pace after the Sheed trade and looked unstoppable on defense, that starting 5 was just brutal.
All of this ignores the massive difference Shaq makes. When Kobe Bryant is facing tough defence? Defer to Shaq. That's really the answer. Pierce definitely had a hard time with Ron Artest but the difference s that instead of having Shaq to dominate the opponent Pierce had a tweener forward whose greatest offensive skill might have been his passing ability in 'Toine. And regarding specific match-ups Pierce wasn't especially bothered by Tayshaun Prince the way Bryant was (in the 2008 ECF Pierce got 19.7 ppg on 49%). Pierce's toughest defenders were Artest and Luol Deng. In the WC neither of those guys would be an issue.

[TheMan]

PP was legit but Kobe is arguably top 10 GOAT...PP is nowhere near top 10.