Suns-Nuggets: Chris Paul, Devin Booker rewriting false narratives as Phoenix moves one step from NBA Finals

Paul was supposed to be done, and Booker, so they said, was a good-stats/bad-team guy

When Chris Paul ripped his hamstring in Game 5 of the 2018 Western Conference finals, and had to sit helplessly and watch as the Houston Rockets coughed up a 3-2 lead to the Golden State Warriors, it felt like the beginning of the end.  When the Rockets flamed out the next season to those same Warriors, without Kevin Durant, in the second round, that felt like the actual end. Paul, who laid a 3-for-14 egg in Game 5 with the series tied 2-2, would never be the same player. His best and last shot at an NBA Finals berth had passed him by.  The Rockets traded him to Oklahoma City. Everyone wrote him off. I remember walking into the CBS newsroom the morning after that trade and suggesting to Raja Bell that the Thunder actually got the better end of it, that Paul, though a diminished version of himself, was still better than Russell Westbrook.