The Ringer ranks OKC Thunder’s Paul George third and Russell Westbrook in top-25 players to this point of the season.
OKC Thunder fans have a love-hate relationship with The Ringer. Bill Simmons and the rest of his team have been critical of the Thunder at times, and Russell Westbrook in particular, but have shown credit to where credit is due at the end of the day.
And nowhere is that more apparent than in their latest iteration of the top-25 players, as Paul George is ranked third and Russell Westbrook is ranked 20th.
These are the top 25 #NBA players of the first 60ish games https://t.co/okFp9dyvXp
— The Ringer (@ringer) February 18, 2019
PG is Batman, Russ is Robin right now
Love or hate Oklahoma City, there’s no denying how great Paul George has been this season. Even the typically-skeptical Ringer said, “Right now, the Thunder wing is the best basketball player on the planet.”
In the blog’s first ranking after the first 25 games, George placed 19th with the “disadvantage” of playing with Russell Westbrook. But the Thunder duo proved them wrong to this point, as George has taken full control of the team with Westbrook on and off the floor.
Get yourself a friend that looks out for you like Russell looks out for Paul! #NBAAllStar pic.twitter.com/aENa6OWWeR
— OKC THUNDER (@okcthunder) February 18, 2019
As for Westbrook himself, The Ringer ranked him 11th overall after 25 games, but didn’t take it easy on him. The writer claimed the Thunder’s early-season woes were largely his fault and his stats don’t matter.
Despite a clear turnaround, Westbrook slipped to 20th in their opinion. But judging by the comments of the writer, his demotion was more of a result of everybody else getting better as opposed to Westbrook regressing. The writer noted the Thunder’s stellar play and Westbrook changing his game.
At the same time, they didn’t let him completely off the hook, citing his underwhelming shooting.
Paul George has a PER of 24.7 and a STL% of 3.0 this season. He's the first non-point guard to do that in a season since D-Wade in 08-09 https://t.co/gy0xQLZLyZ pic.twitter.com/8sKxmYuaAf
— Basketball Reference (@bball_ref) February 4, 2019
The Ringer isn’t the first to hate on Westbrook, and it certainly won’t be the last. Between Bill
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Simmons’ team, Colin Cowherd and many other media members, Westbrook has his fair share of criticism. But he’s been proving them wrong for the most part throughout his career, doing everything he can to carry the team.
Regardless of what anyone thinks, the only thing Westbrook cares about is winning. Bringing home a title is the only way to silence the critics and even though many of them would continue to poke holes in Westbrook’s game, their opinions would mean less if Westbrook is hoisting the Larry O’Brien trophy.
That’s the end goal and make no mistake – the Thunder are coming.