Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook - NBA's best two punch duo?

LeBron James #6 and Dwyane Wade #3 of the Miami Heat

Now, coming to the Heat, Wade is an explosive scorer. His scoring average, before LeBron joined forces with him, was at 25.7 PPG. After their coalition, it has dropped to 22.9 PPG. Not a huge drop when you have the best player in the planet as your teammate. Somehow, the Wade-LeBron duo has managed to coexist more peacefully than Durant and Westbrook. Last season, the duo of James and Wade scored 48 PPG together – 3.4 PPG less than the former duo.

Alright, enough with offense. Anybody who follows basketball would say that Wade and LeBron form the better defensive unit. It definitely looks so. Both rack up steals, blocks and rebounds.

Neither Durant nor Westbrook is known for a formidable defensive presence. They are both primarily scorers and tend to rely on their incredible offensive talent to pull their team through. Or do they?

The league average for PER (Player Efficiency Rating) has always been 15. Durant holds his opponents to a PER of just 10.5 per 48 minutes. Westbrook hold his match-ups to 14.5 PER per 48 minutes. This is a total of PER 25 for the two Thunder.

Now, let’s take a look at the Heat duo’s ratings. LeBron holds his opponents to 12.7 PER per 48 minutes while Wade holds his opponents to 16.2 PER per 48 minutes. Sum them up, and you get a total of 28.9 which is 3.9 PER - worse when compared to the KD-Westbrook pair!

Unbelievable.

Another difference is age. Durant and Westbrook are both 24-year-olds which means that they’re still moving towards their respective primes. Whereas, Wade is 31 years old and James is 28 years old. Both the players are in their prime but Wade’s quality of play seems to be slowly going down.

This is a major point to be noted: At a much younger age, Durant and Westbrook are playing at a slightly better class than Wade and James.

Of course, being a Heat fan, I would start quoting the accomplishments of James and Wade their titles, their individual accolades etc. The stars of Miami have 2 championships together and they’re the strongest favourites heading into the 2013-14 season. However, stats don’t lie.

The Verdict

Durant and Westbrook form a more lethal attack and as the stats have shown, they’re a better defensive unit as well (if you consider JUST both of them and not their team as a whole). If one of them is in form, the other assists the enforcer. If both are firing on all cylinders, well good luck to the opponents, you’re doomed.

If you consider their accomplishments, Wade and LeBron have found much greater success than Durant and Westbrook. Maybe, even greater success than what these two can achieve in the future. However, that’s not the point at discussion here. If you are willing to look beyond rings, titles and individual accolades and accept that true greatness lies else where too, then the Durant Westbrook duo have the edge.

(All statistics are courtesy of 82games.com)