Paul George has been infamously criticized for failing in the playoffs, going from his self dubbed ‘Playoff P’ to ‘Pandemic P.’
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In fact, when you look at George’s performances, he’s had some historically bad performances in the playoffs. His field goal percentage is terrible and he’s been more streaky than ever.
This streakiness was on full display against the Phoenix Suns in game four. George had a fairly decent 23 points, but he shot only 5/20 from the field and 1/9 from three. On top of all that, he was also 12/18 from from the charity stripe.
Tonight’s Paul George’s 11th career playoff game shooting 25% or worse pic.twitter.com/O3sXk0st4t
— pickuphoop (@pickuphoop) June 27, 2021
The Clippers would lose a tightly contested game and now face an insurmountable 3-1 deficit. The ‘Playoff P’ nickname isn’t looking too hot right now.
Paul George And Russell Westbrook Are Historically Awful In The Playoffs
Although it’s now mostly forgettable, Paul George once played with an equally bad co-star in the playoffs for a couple of years. Russell Westbrook has also seen his fair share of struggles in the NBA playoffs, shooting as poorly as PG13 in many games.
Out of Paul George’s 106 playoff games, he’s shot worse than 40% in 56 of those games. Adding on to that, out of those 56 games, there have been 48 such instances where ‘Playoff P’ has shot the ball more than 10 times. The only other player who’s been worse than him? Russell Westbrook.
Paul George has flashed shades of being a dominant star in the playoffs. His game three performance where he put up saw him put up a very efficient 27 points to go along with 15 rebounds. It was a game the Clippers absolutely needed, and without Kawhi Leonard, Paul George stepped up.
The only problem is that he’s wildly inconsistent. Jack Renshaw-Lewis of Nylon Calculus looked into measuring a player’s consistency in 2019 and found that Paul George popped up as the 10th least consistent player out of people who maintained a scoring average of above 20 ppg per 36 minutes.
For someone who wants to escape his miscues in the postseason, Paul George hasn’t done a lot to change the narrative around him. He’ll have a chance to push the Suns to at least 6 games tonight in a pivotal game five on the road.
If he shows up once more, it could be a career defining moment for the all-star.