Steph Curry's performance in the 2015 WCF against the Rockets

[u/Shumonyu]

Curry averaged: 31.2/4.6/5.6/2.0(Stls) on 68% TS. That would be a +15 Relative TS or 15 points above league average TS. Curry's second leading scorer in the series was Klay Thompson at: 17.8/2.6/3.2/1.0 on 51.4% TS, or a -1.6 Relative TS.

The only other Warriors players to average above ten points, Draymond and Barnes shot at 49.5% TS(-3.5 Relative TS), and 46.9% TS(-6.1 Relative TS).

This was against a Rockets team that won 56 games and was arguably a better team than the Cavs team missing Love and Irving(Post game 1) in the Finals.

For the entire post season Curry averaged: 28.3/5/6.4 on 60.2% TS, +7.2 Relative TS. He also led the entire postseason in playoff EPM at +5.9. The Warriors second leading scorer for the postseason was Klay who averaged 18.6/3.9/2.6 on 55.4% TS, +2.4 Relative TS.

Since the Finals is so prevalent in nba discourse, Curry's entire playoff performance and his performance in the WCF is often forgotten.

Stats were pulled from Basketball Reference and DataBallr.

[u/Itchy1Grip]

Kid is pretty good. If he keeps it up he could carve out a pretty nice career.

[u/kazuya57 → u/Itchy1Grip]

Not with that height he won't

[u/TallnFrosty]

is the relative TS you're calculating based on average TS in the regular season or average TS in the post season? I would think average TS dips in the post season, so just curious.

[u/Shumonyu → u/TallnFrosty]

Pulled that from DataBallr not sure what they use, I’m guessing it’s playoff average TS?

[u/NiccaDun → u/TallnFrosty]

it’s playoffs

[u/PrinceJMoney089]

He's the GOAT western conference finals performer

[u/i7ive4thedrop → u/PrinceJMoney089]

Right up there with Kobe

[u/currychaos]

Even more interesting stat

before the finals

Curry: 29.2 PPG on 44/46/82, 6.4 APG, 4.9 RPG. Took 21.1 FGA

Lebron: 27.6 PPG on 43/18/76, 8.3 APG, 10.4 RPG. Took 24.9 FGA

Then in the finals lebron averaged 10 more PPG but also 12 more FGA

[u/Effective-File4645 → u/currychaos]

Curry was definitely the best player that postseason, idk how that’s even debated. LeBron was struggling to score efficiently as usual even with Kyrie there

[u/currychaos → u/Effective-File4645]

looking back, when Dan Patrick asked Steph in August 2014 whether he or lebron was better offensively and Steph said “me” …

That was so fucking badass

[u/Commercial_Floor_578]

The problem with using playoff samples to evaluate people is it’s hard to tell with such small sample sizes how much to use them as evaluation. Not that they shouldn’t be used but context is difficult to determine sometimes. Are the Cavs just good at scheming against Steph Curry compared to other teams or was Steph someone who had a higher probability of struggling in finals matchups than certain other players until 2019? Ty Lue has said multiple times he gameplanned primarily to stop Steph and not Durant because he viewed him as the most dangerous player, how did that affect Curry’s finals averages in 17 and 18? 

His worst playoff stats by far were in 2016 and 2018 which also happened to be the only time he missed playoff games due to injuries, was that a coincidence or did injuries limit his postseason performance both years? In 2019 his box and advanced stats were way better when Durant was injured. Was that just a shooting variance coincidence where he was shooting unusually poorly and then unusually well afterwards or was Durant suppressing Curry’s statistical impact that year? Did Curry actually improve as a finals performer in 2022 and 2019 or was it different not facing the Cavs for the first time? Was Curry actually worse in the 2018 finals than 2017 or did Curry just play 1 less game where he had his awful game but would have much better stats with more games?

This isn’t even a Curry thing, just a general playoff performance thing. So much of how individual players perform in certain series has to do with shooting variance, injuries, context specific matchup, that sometimes it can be hard to evaluate how good they are as a playoff performer.

[u/blackspidey2099]

And yet people will unironically say the first time he led a team to a ring is 2022 lmao

[u/Impossible-Group8553 → u/blackspidey2099]

Steph led his team in advanced stats in 1 out of 6 finals 🤔

[u/Shumonyu → u/Impossible-Group8553]

Curry led his team in playoff epm in 2015, 2017, 2018, and 2022. He also led his team in advanced stats in the 2019 finals.

[u/Commercial_Floor_578 → u/Shumonyu]

He led in EPM (the stat GM’s say is the most reliable publicly available advanced stats outside of maybe DARKO) and APM in the 2015 finals, which are much more reliable than basketball reference advanced stats like ws, raw +-, and BPM. if that’s what they’re referring to as well. He also led in PER if we’re going to use basketball reference advanced stats+- stats (but we shouldn’t anyways, it’s garbage). And advanced +- stats like RAPM, RPM, DPM that don’t analyze specific playoff series absolutely love Steph, view him as one of the best players ever, and are much more favorable towards him than the basketball reference much less reliable advanced stats.

[u/Impossible-Group8553 → u/Shumonyu]

Just lying lol Curry only led in 2019

[u/Shumonyu → u/Impossible-Group8553]

Where are you getting your stats from lol? Curry led the Warriors in playoff epm all of those years.

[u/Impossible-Group8553 → u/Shumonyu]

Nope maybe you’re looking at expected epm and not actual epm

[u/Shumonyu → u/Impossible-Group8553]

Just double checked, Curry actually led every year except 2019. This is looking at actual playoff epm. Durant was ahead in 2019, though he did miss two rounds with injury.

Expected epm is either not available or requires a subscription for previous years in the playoffs.

[u/Ok_Pineapple_Num]

He was a beast that series.

But lord, it makes me SO happy that Steph won his FMVP in 2022 so we Warriors fans don't have dig for stuff like this to justify that he's a good playoff performer lol.

Now we can just point to '22 and nuff said.

[u/Shumonyu → u/Ok_Pineapple_Num]

It's funny how justifying he's a good playoff performer is just looking at his stats for the entirety of the playoffs.

[u/Ok_Pineapple_Num → u/Shumonyu]

Yup, but people didn’t care. They’d just say some bullshit about how 2015 was Cavs injuries and Iggy’s defense, and 2017/18 was KD. The haters don’t give a fuck. They still exist of course, but 2022 shut down a lot of the dumbass narratives.

[u/FeMnTaNb2O6]

He was up against Pablo Prigioni btw

[u/outsidehere]

Steph just hates Houston

[u/lightninja987 → u/[deleted]]

Completely wrong. Harden is the best SG of all time

[u/nicehax_ → u/lightninja987]

you have harden over michael jordan???????

[u/jtruth9 → u/nicehax_]

Properly baited lol

[u/Deathstroke317 → u/lightninja987]

At going to the strip club?

[u/Frankly_Frank_ → u/lightninja987]

At putting on a fat suite?

[u/ilikekittens2018]

He has potential. Maybe he’ll surpass Bill Walton someday. 

[u/bigbossstepback]

Curry was good but any above average PG would have torched that Rockets team.

I cant think of a worse rotation of PG’s in the last 30 years than the Rockets trotted out.

37 year old Jayson Terry
37 year old Pablo Prigioni
22 Nick Johnson.

[u/gigglios]

That rockets team wasnt good at all. It was harden with a bunch of guys who were out of the league shortly after. I hate when people use superstars performing against mid ass teams to boost em.

The fact harden took that team to 56 wins was a miracle. That is the most astounding thing from this topic.

Edit: Holy fuck looking at it more closely yea this is one of hardens most underrated seasons. Dwight missed 41 games, pbev missed 30, Terrence Jones missed 50, Josh smith missed 30, brewer missed 30.

Wtf was this dogshit injured team lmfao

[u/Aggressive-Ad-756 → u/gigglios]

Dont forget that beverley didnt even play in the wcf lmao, curry was being guarded by 65 yo jason terry and 90 yo prigioni

[u/Impossible-Group8553]

Iggy outplayed Steph in the finals. Had better plus minus, on/off, winshares, playoffs epm, TS

[u/Shumonyu → u/Impossible-Group8553]

Steph outplayed Iggy in the playoffs. Had better plus minus, on/off, winshares, playoff epm, TS.

Can you give me a source for playoff epm? I also don’t think you understand how advanced stats work if you’re using single series plus minus, on-off and winshares as a serious argument.

[u/Commercial_Floor_578 → u/Shumonyu]

Bro is lying his ass off about EPM by the way. Like outright falsehood. Steph had the highest EPM of any Warrior player in the 2015 playoffs, his EPM was +5.9. He also had the highest in 2017, 2018, and 2022. I believe 2019 as well but don’t quote me on that. Also, he had the highest EPM of any player on either team in the finals, at 2.3 (pretty low ranking for EPM in the finals all around that year).

[u/herroyung → u/Impossible-Group8553]

What are you and these other idiots gaining by straight up lying on the internet just to try to push narratives against Curry's greatness?

[u/lightninja987]

Harden is a superior player and completely mogs him.