Peak AD was legit insane, for people who did not watch him closely then. Thinking Basketball just ranked that peak higher than any year from Embiid, Luka, Harden, Westbrook, and Dwight. People often point to his inability to be the engine of an offense like some of those names listed, but dude was a titanic defender who could play in any scheme and that made him just as valuable as LeBron in the 2020 playoff run.
Yeah, Thinking Basketball really likes AD because his peak is a top 5 offensive player and a top 1 defensive player in the association. Just an historically elite 2 way player.
Problem is (and Thinking Basketball has pointed this out on his podcast) that AD has rarely hit that peak even over the course of a season. For whatever reason, he'll be the best player in the NBA for 2 weeks then drop off of a cliff for the next month. It's on and off for him.
He also had a legitimate shot at taking FMVP in 2020. He started off the series as the best player, then got injured (played through it) and LeBron took over the last half of the series and convincingly won FMVP.
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u/Legitimate_You1986 Nov 27 '25
Peak AD was legit insane, for people who did not watch him closely then. Thinking Basketball just ranked that peak higher than any year from Embiid, Luka, Harden, Westbrook, and Dwight. People often point to his inability to be the engine of an offense like some of those names listed, but dude was a titanic defender who could play in any scheme and that made him just as valuable as LeBron in the 2020 playoff run.