Let’s talk about Klay Thompson for a second

***Stats as of Friday November 17th***

Klay Thompson is 27 years old, basketball nation.

He is supremo and will be for a very long time. If you have the opportunity to trade for him in fantasy, I think you should take it. Barring injury, he’s one of the best/safest/consistent fantasy players around. He’s like Jose Altuve: good averages, scores, can win a game by himself, and they both steal. Goddamnit, Klay is good. Out of players who average at least 20 minutes per game in the 2017-18 season, Klay is ranked 16th in plus-minus, right after Joel Embiid.

Klay is shooting 51% from the field with a 63% true shooting percentage. There are currently 38 players in the NBA who average at least 15 shots per game and only 7 of those players are shooting at least 50% from the field:

• Giannis (6’11”)
• LeBron (6’8”)
• Durant (listed as 6’9”, WHICH IS A LIE, ONE DURANT HAS PUBLICLY ADMITTED TO, AND SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED AS AN ACTUAL STAT ON STATISTICS SITES LIKE NBA.COM, ESPN.COM, AND BASKETBALL-REFERENCE.COM, IF YOU LIE ABOUT SOMETHING AS OBVIOUS AS HEIGHT, THEN WHAT OTHER “REAL” STATS ARE YOU LYING ABOUT, WHY LIE, ANYWAY, WHAT DOES THAT GAIN YOU OR THE PUBLIC, WHY IS EVERYONE LYING ALL OF THE TIME, is actually 7’0”)
• Anthony Davis (6’10” BUT LOOKS 7’0” TOO)
• Klay (6’7”)
• Embiid (7’0”)
• Karl-Anthony Towns (7’0”)

Klay is the shortest dude on this list, by at least a few inches, and he is obviously (and, verifiably) the one who shoots threes as a higher percentage of his total field goal attempts (47%). Each of the Golden State Warriors (Steph, Klay, KD, Dray, and Iggy) are All Time Greats in certain aspects of their NBA game and/or career: Curry changed the entire game of basketball, Durant is possibly one of the 10 best players of all time, Draymond is a blend of elite defense and scoring ability, and Iggy is perhaps the ultimate Role Player, a real Blue Collar Guy, a starter who chose to come off the bench in order to be, not just a champion, but the Most Valuable Player on a team of All Time Champions.

And, then there’s Klay: a player who has a little bit of the others’ elite skills all rolled into one. He’s almost as good a shooter as Curry; he’s almost as perfectly rounded as KD (KD’s height wins, but imagine if Klay were 6’10”?); he’s almost as good a defender as Draymond, even though the defensive metrics don’t really show it; this, I think, has more to do with Klay always getting back to guard the other team’s best backcourt player, so he doesn’t get boards, and his smothering on-ball defense usually results in the player he’s guarding getting rid of the ball rather than shooting (when the Warriors break up, I hope Dray & Klay Stay, they are an incredible tandem); and, he’s as humble and Role Player-ey as Iggy.

Klay is the player that the other four Warriors wanted to play with their entire lives. Goddamn, he’s incredible. Remember when he scored 37 points in one quarter? That’s a 148 point pace for an entire game. In another game he scored 60 points in less than 30 minutes, something NO ONE has done since the shot clock era began during the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration.

Again, Klay Thompson is 27 years old.

One last thing about Klay, and this is mainly to irritate Warriors fans and Celtics fans: Would you trade Klay for Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and a draft pick? Which team says No? The Celtics would have Kyrie, Klay, Gordon Hayward, and Horford; and, the Warriors would have two young, cheap, good wings/assets who could help keep the team from splitting up due to luxury tax concerns. You always want the better player in a trade, but Tatum and Brown are good. I dunno. It would obviously be a gamble on Golden State’s part, but maybe not as bad a one to take if you’re trying to keep Curry and Durant longterm.