If You Had To Choose One For The Next Three Years, Would You Go Kevin Durant Or Giannis Antetokounmpo?

There I was last night, minding my own business watching the Bucks close out another close game, a game in which Giannis was his normal freak self, and this thought popped into my head

I wanted to choose 3 years because anything more than that, I think the answer is pretty clearly Giannis. He’s the future. But 3 years is entirely different in my opinion, because it compares the rest of KD’s prime in which you could argue he’s in the Top 2 or Top 3 Player In The NBA conversation. To say the least, the results have been SHOCKING to me. As of writing this blog, there have been 4,128 votes and the percentages are staggering

57% – Giannis 43% Durant

Now, I can concede that tweeting this right as Giannis was playing, and factoring in recency bias probably had an impact, but even still, that difference is wild to me. I also think it’s possible that a lot of people are holding Durant’s off the court stuff, and his decision to join GS against him here. Think what you want about him as a person, or his decision, but looking at this from strictly a basketball perspective, it shouldn’t be this much of a gap. Remember, we’re just talking about the next 3 years.

The advantage for Durant is clearly offensively, or at least when it comes to shooting, but Giannis is showing us that may not even matter. Nobody can stop him from getting to the paint, and he’s so long that scoring isn’t necessarily hard for him. Even if you want to give him a cushion, one dribble and one step later, next thing you know he’s at the rim.

Defensively, they are both intriguing. Durant showed during the playoffs that his defense can legit make an impact in a game, and there are times you’ll see him play the four with a good amount of success. With Giannis, you see a lot of the same things. The game saving block the other night was a prime example. That was on a 7 ft center who usually dunks everything. In looking at their Defensive ratings, it’s actually Giannis who’s better (102 vs 107), and that’s crazy considering Durant plays on the better defensive team.

Initially I was leaning towards Durant, but the more I think about it maybe I lean more towards Giannis? I don’t think you can ignore his all around game. I still think if I needed one guy to take the final shot in a big playoff game, I go with Durant, but if Giannis keeps developing like what we’ve seen so far this year, over the next three years, it really is a toss up.

So, what say you?