The “Point God”: It’s Time To Give Chris Paul The Credit He Deserves

It took 16 years, but Chris Paul finally has the team he was always meant to captain. 

The career of the “point god” — as he’s come to be known — has been long and winding, with pit stops in places he never belonged, only to finally be parked in the perfect spot. 

Paul is one of the greatest point guards to ever play the game, often mentioned in the same breath as Magic Johnson, Isiah Thomas and Oscar Robertson, among others. His uncanny ability to control the flow of a basketball game has long been appreciated by true basketball fans, but there has always been the feeling that when he eventually retires, Paul won’t receive the appreciation he deserves. 

A lot of it has to do with “rings culture” — the sect of sports fans who base the careers of athletes on the number of championships they’ve won. Charles Barkley and Patrick Ewing are just two examples of players who’ve had to deal with the constant mutterings of their inability to lead their teams to a championship. 

Paul — through his first 16 seasons — currently finds himself in this boat. Both Barkley and Ewing are considered all-time greats, yet are constantly scorned for their inability to obtain a ring. Up until this season, Paul certainly seemed destined to join this infamous group, but he’s has finally found his home, and now stands eight wins away from shedding the narrative that he “can’t win the big one.” 

If you take a look at the career of Paul, it’s actually wild that he’s in this position. 

He was drafted by the New Orleans Hornets, who were at one point during his tenure there, being run by the NBA league office as they attempted to find an owner. The strange ownership situation made it impossible for the Hornets to build properly around Paul. Then, Hurricane Katrina devastated the city of New Orleans, forcing the Hornets to play the majority of their home games in Oklahoma City for the 2005 and 2006 seasons. 

Paul then went through the debacle of being traded to the LA Lakers before David Stern and the NBA shut it down. As majority owner of the Hornets franchise, Stern was within his right to veto the trade, but it goes down as one of the major stains of his 30 year run as NBA commissioner. 

CP3 was eventually traded to the LA Clippers, in a move that created the “Lob City” Clips, but it never truly clicked. Blake Griffin was just becoming a superstar after being taken number one overall in the 2009 NBA Draft, and Clippers head coach Doc Rivers clashed with Paul’s brash and sometimes bossy personality. The fit made for some fantastic basketball, but it also led to two epic playoff collapses resulting in the narrative that Paul simply couldn’t get it done come playoff time. 

There definitely seemed to be some resentment from Paul’s Clippers teammates as well. Griffin was drafted to rejuvenate the terrible franchise, and seemed reluctant to share the spotlight with Paul. The marriage came to a somewhat bitter end as Paul was shipped off to the Houston Rockets. 

The situation in Houston was even worse for Paul. 

For a traditional point guard set on ball movement and making the right play, teaming up with James Harden in an analytics driven offense must have been a nightmare. 

The strategy was no doubt successful — Houston went to the Western Conference Finals in 2018 and was one game away from an NBA Finals berth — but the style of basketball went against everything Paul stands for. 

It was an offense that focused on one of two guys – mostly Harden — dominating the ball for most of the shot clock. To make matters worse, when Harden wasn’t directly involved in a play, he generally refused to get open. Usually standing at the top of the three-point line or the corner, waiting for the ball to find him. 

That marriage also ended in a less than pleasant divorce, as neither Paul or Harden wanted to play alongside each other for another year. 

Paul spent another year in Oklahoma City, dragging the Thunder to 44-wins and the fifth seed in the Covid-shortened season. 

And then he found home. 

The rumors during the offseason centered around Paul’s fit in Milwaukee, who were coming off back-to-back early exits in the NBA playoffs. But the long-term relationship between Suns head coach Monty Williams and Paul made the most sense. Phoenix was coming off their brilliant run in the Orlando bubble, and the young duo of Devin Booker and DeAndre Ayton were ready for a veteran point guard to lead them. 

Paul has been masterful all season — deftly orchestrating the Suns offense on the floor, and leading off of it. He finally has the roster that allows him to play the way he’s always wanted to play, and a fanbase that appreciates him. 

He’s led the Suns to the Western Conference Finals after a four-game sweep of the Denver Nuggets, after finishing fifth in the 2021 MVP voting. In the series, Paul averaged 26 points, 10 assists and 5 rebounds, finishing with a ridiculous 37-7-3 stat line in the closeout game. All at the ripe age of 36.

After the sweep, Nuggets coach Michael Malone — who was an assistant in New Orleans for a year with Paul — gave him the highest praise a point guard can receive. 

“Chris Paul could arguably be the greatest point guard of all time,” Malone said post-game on Sunday night.

Even those that dislike Paul have to at least begrudgingly agree with Malone. His stats will be eye-popping when the sun finally sets on his career. The only point guards that could possibly be in front of him historically would be Johnson and Thomas, and he’s closing in on them quickly. 

But that’s a conversation for another time. For now, we simply appreciate Paul. He’s giving fans of basketball a clinic on how the point guard position should be played. He’s been doing it for 16 years, but he’s finally found the perfect fit in Phoenix. 

We’re officially throwing in the towel, Chris. You are the “point god.” 

Joe Morgan is the Sports Reporter for The Daily Wire. Most recently, Morgan covered the Clippers, Lakers and the NBA for Sporting News. Send your sports questions to [email protected].

The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

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