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DALLAS — Chris Paul turned 37 on Friday, in the midst of yet another memorable playoff run and perhaps his best chance to capture the championship that has eluded him during his 17 seasons in the NBA. Paul, one of the NBA’s greatest control freaks, has never wanted to be the player that rode the coattails of another team’s success en route to a late-career title just so he could say that he retired with a ring. So it should come as no surprise that even this deep into his Hall of Fame run, he’s not had to turn back the clock to who he was once. Chris Paul has never stopped being Chris Paul.
The Suns version of Paul is nearly indistinguishable from the player we’ve seen since he entered the NBA in 2005. Aside from a dip in regular-season scoring—which seems by design more than anything else—Paul remains as good as he’s ever been. Consider: Paul’s effective field goal percentage in two seasons in Phoenix is the second-best mark of any of his five career stops. His 53.6% EFG in ’22 was the sixth-best of his 17 years. His 10.8 assists per game this season were his third-best. In 2016, Paul ran a pick-and-roll on 51.9% of his possessions and averaged 0.94 points per possession. Six years later, he ran them 57.2% and averaged 0.99 points per possession. Meanwhile, in the postseason, Paul is putting up the fifth-best scoring and assist averages of his playoff career.
