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The overrated Chris Paul got lit up by Klay Thompson in Game 1 of the WCF, and only guarded him for a few isolated instances afterwards. Klay took advantage of Paul's usual poor off-ball defense and occasionally backed him down in the post.
Chris Paul averaged his least assists (5.8) in any playoff run and least assists in any playoff series (4.6) during the 2018 WCF, proving that the only way for him to be successful on the team level is by having someone like Harden do most of the work for him. He also shot his 2nd-lowest FG% in any series during the 2018 WCF, second only to his horrendous performance against the 2012 Spurs.
Fortunately for Chris Paul, Andre Iguodala was injured during his clutch performances in Games 4 and 5 or else his numbers would have been even less impressive and the Rockets would have been eliminated earlier (According to ESPN, Iguodala held Harden and CP3 to 1/41 FG from Games 1-3, though I feel these numbers may be exaggerated).
James Harden and Clint Capela led all players or tied all leading players on both teams in PPG, RPG, APG, SPG, and BPG for the 1st and 2nd Rounds of the 2018 Playoffs to carry the overrated Chris Paul to his first WCF, since he was clearly never good enough to do this as the leader on his own team.
This is now the 4th time in 6 career playoff series wins that Chris Paul's teammates had to lead all players on both teams in PPG, RPG, and BPG (Blake/Deandre in 2014 and 2015, Harden/Capela in 2018)