Kevin Durant is already one of the best NBA players ever

The NBA has never seen a player quite like Kevin Durant. He hammered home that point for good in delivering an MVP performance in the 2017 NBA Finals.

Durant used the Finals to showcase a skill set that has no historical comparison. Larry Bird wasn’t this quick, Magic Johnson couldn’t shoot with this much range, and Michael Jordan wasn’t 7-feet tall. Durant isn’t just one of the most unique players in NBA history. He should already be on the shortlist of the very best, too.

Durant is the evolution of the sport personified. He scores and passes like a guard and helped lock up Cleveland by playing center on defense. He’s equally deadly in the pick-and-roll as either the ball handler or roll man, and he has no problem ripping your heart out 35-feet away from the basket.

KD’s game feels like an amalgamation of all the past greats that came before him. No one has ever put it all together like he has. Just ask the Cavs.

When Durant showed up at the draft combine in 2007, he infamously failed to do a single bench press rep of 185 pounds. Back then, KD was a scrawny 18-year-old who looked a traditional shooting guard with Stretch Armstrong limbs.

For whatever Durant lacked in strength, he made up for it with length. He measured at only 215 pounds. at combine but checked in with a wingspan of nearly 7’5. His body has filled out after 10 years in the league, to the point where he’s now bigger than a lot of centers.

Durant, now listed at 240 pounds, finally got an opportunity to play center in these Finals. His moment came during Game 2 when Draymond Green ran into foul trouble. In one sequence, he showed how far he’s come since he entered the league.

Durant wouldn’t have had the weight or the strength stymie a Kevin Love post-up 10 years ago. Now it’s no problem. During a time when everyone wants to go smaller to put more skill on the floor, Durant is able to slide up a position or two without sacrificing any size.

Durant just wrapped up a five-game series win in the NBA Finals by averaging 35.2 points on 55 percent shooting from the floor and 47 percent shooting from three-point range. This is one of the most efficient scoring performances ever in the Finals and a direct reflection of the gifts that make him a singular talent within NBA history.

The play everyone is going to remember is his ruthless pull-up three with 45 seconds remaining to put Golden State up for good in Game 3:

There’s only one player in league history who has ever had Durant’s combination of size and shooting. That’s Dirk Nowitzki. On his way to the Mavs’ 2011 championship, Dirk canned 23 three-pointers over 21 games in the playoffs. Consider that Durant just drained 40 threes in 16 games in these playoffs.

It isn’t just shooting range that makes Durant so deadly as a scorer. He handles the ball like someone a foot shorter, cooking small defenders who can’t match his quicks, let alone contest his shot. Poor Richard Jefferson might as well have slid right into retirement after this one:

There’s never been anyone that big who can handle and shoot like that. How do you stop this?

The answer: there is no stopping that.

If adding strength has been Durant’s biggest physical improvement since entering the league, the most noticeable addition to his skill set is his development as a passer and creator.

During his one season of college basketball at Texas, Durant finished with 46 assists and 99 turnovers in 35 games. In these Finals, Durant showed how gifted he now is as a passer by averaging 5.4 assists per game over the series.

That’s a 7-footer handling the ball in the pick-and-roll, freezing the defense and putting a pass where only JaVale McGee could get it. His size lets him see over any defender, his tight handle lets him to shake his man, and his feel for the game allows him to make the right read.

This looks like a pass LeBron James would throw:

There are no holes in his skill set.

Durant’s combination of size and skill would make him unfair in any system. That’s evident by his career scoring average of 27.2 points per game which ranks fourth all-time in NBA history. But in this Warriors system with these teammates, there is truly no answer for KD.

Cover his teammates and KD is dunking on you. Run to stop Durant’s drive and he’s kicking out one of the greatest shooters ever. These two plays from Game 1 illustrate how incredibly difficult it is to stop this Golden State attack now that it includes Durant:

The most striking thing about Durant’s Finals performance was how easy he made it seem. It’s no wonder he chose to come to the Warriors: this is the perfect situation for his talent to shine. Playing in Golden State has essentially made Durant unstoppable.

Durant handles the ball like Allen Iverson, shoots like Dirk Nowitzki, and has the scoring instincts of Kobe Bryant. He does it in a body that’s about as big as Hakeem Olajuwon.

It’s my contention that Durant is already one of the best players in NBA history. I don’t mean top 50 or top 20, I mean top five. He might not have the resume for it yet, but he’s still only 28 years old. The Warriors are going to stay together for a long time and they are going to keep stockpiling championships. This is simply the first of many rings for KD.

It’s hard to even imagine how a player in the future could be better than Durant. This hypothetical star would have to be 7’5 or a 60 percent three-point shooter or somehow significantly more athletic than KD is. It’s not going to happen.

I’ve covered the last five McDonald’s All-American Games in person. I’ve been to AAU weekends and USA Basketball events at the junior level. I can tell you all about the best young players coming through the pipeline, from Markelle Fultz to Michael Porter Jr. to Marvin Bagley III to Bol Bol to DeAndre Ayton. Each of them is an amazing talent in their own right, but it just isn’t fair to compare them to Durant. They would have to reach 250 percent of their ceiling to get there.

Now that Durant has a ring and a Finals MVP, we can start thinking about his place in the history of the game. You might not realize it yet, but we’re watching one of the very best to ever do it.