00:00In the 2022 playoffs, future Hall of Famer and known irritant, Chris Paul, faced off against reserve point guard and
00:07less known irritant, Jose Alvarado.
00:09And Paul soon found that his own medicine tasted like beef.
00:19Jose Alvarado is very similar to Chris Paul.
00:22I mean, yes, there is that one big difference that Chris Paul is a superstar and Jose Alvarado is a
00:28backup who went undrafted.
00:30But OK, now that that disparity in talent has been addressed, let's move on to their similarities.
00:35They're both listed at six foot, yet managed to survive and even thrive, yes, yes, on a sliding scale, among
00:43giants.
00:43They're both unflinchingly competitive.
00:46They're both hustle, effort players.
00:49And they're also, well, let's just say they've both been compared to Patrick Beverley.
00:55Look, they're both kind of annoying is what I'm getting at.
01:00Starting with Chris Paul.
01:01He hit opponents in the groin.
01:04He told a ref when an opponent's shirt was untucked.
01:08He liked to act, which we know from his state farm commercials, but also from his on-court performances.
01:16And he played pestering, suffocating, in-your-face-all-the-time defense.
01:21It's those last two examples that we see in Jose Alvarado.
01:25He also flops.
01:26And he also plays pestering, aggressive, get-away-from-me-D.
01:32Now, there is a positive to that style of defense.
01:35Both guys rack up steals.
01:37Chris Paul led the NBA in steals six times, which is a record for steal titles.
01:41And he's second to John Stockton for all-time total steals.
01:45Alvarado isn't going to be near CP's name on those lists, but consider this.
01:49In his rookie year, he finished fourth in total steals among rookies.
01:53And he did that without playing that many minutes.
01:57Both guys get their steals and interceptions in a similar way.
02:01Sort of baiting the offense, lulling them into a false sense of security, and springing into action out of nowhere.
02:08Jose loves to do it in the backcourt, hiding in the corner and then pouncing on the unsuspecting ball handler.
02:13But it's annoying, it's effective, and it's become his signature move, nicknamed the Grand Theft Alvarado.
02:20Paul does it all over the place, you're safe nowhere.
02:23And these two irritating guys met in a playoff series that was supposed to be one-sided.
02:29The 2022 Western opening round.
02:32Paul was on the number one seeded Suns, coming off a finals appearance the previous season and a franchise record
02:3864 wins that season.
02:41Alvarado was on the eighth-seeded Pelicans, who started off with a record of 1-12.
02:49These playoffs held a lot of importance to Paul because this Suns team was regarded as perhaps his best and
02:55last chance to win a ring.
02:57They were a very, very good team, and he was 36 years old.
03:04So, let's get through this dumb first round and on to fulfilling the destiny that's been out of reach Paul's
03:09whole career.
03:10Huh.
03:11With a Game 4 win, the Pelicans tied the series 2-2.
03:16This round might not be such a cakewalk after all.
03:19Devin Booker got hurt, and that was the main reason for the tied series.
03:23But not for nothing, the Pelicans also played well.
03:26They out-rebounded the Suns, plain and simple.
03:29It didn't always lead to a win, but it certainly did sometimes.
03:33And the Pels' first-year coach, Willie Green, was a top assistant with the Suns the previous season.
03:39Meaning he knew his opponent well enough to know how to mess him up a little.
03:43For example, he put Jose Alvarado on Paul for brief stretches to fluster the point got.
03:48Which, to be fair, didn't seem like it was going to work at first.
03:52In Game 2, when Jose tried his Grand Theft Alvarado move,
03:57Paul waved him off as you would a fly buzzing around your drink in summertime.
04:03Humiliating, humbling, in the category of worst things that can happen to you during a basketball game.
04:09But, uh, flies are resilient.
04:12Game 4, when Alvarado was on the court, he was buzzing up in Chris Paul's face,
04:17whether or not Paul had the ball.
04:20And it was effective.
04:21Paul did not look like himself in Game 4.
04:24He had no breathing room, he couldn't think, he couldn't score, he couldn't even draw fouls.
04:30He lost his cool a little.
04:32He got chippy.
04:33Pretty sure those are sarcastic pats of encouragement.
04:36The irritant had become the irritated.
04:40And, in contrast, Jose was cool, calm, and not thrown off his game at all.
04:44With under 9 minutes left, New Orleans up 6, he put pressure on Paul, nearly got the steal,
04:50and did get an 8-second violation on a superstar.
04:54It's a violation on Paul!
04:56Which the crowd absolutely loved.
04:59It was a huge momentum boost at a critical moment.
05:01And then, under 3 minutes left, Pell's up 107-91.
05:07Grand Theft Alvarado!
05:11How embarrassing for Chris Paul.
05:13Insult to injury of his terrible performance.
05:16An undrafted rookie showed him up.
05:19Completing the Grand Theft Alvarado reversed the humiliation of Game 2.
05:23Now Paul looked cocky and foolish for waving him off.
05:27It was such a triumph for Jose and the Pells and their fans and anyone who had ever considered
05:33themselves an underdog, or maybe I'm just desperate to feel good.
05:36It was a big moment.
05:38Alvarado had Chris Paul on his list of dream people to Grand Thieve.
05:42His own teammate had told him,
05:44It was too big a dream.
05:45Never gonna happen.
05:47But here he was.
05:48Game 1.
05:49Series tied.
05:51And Jose's Wikipedia page edited to say he was Chris Paul's father.
05:55It was a big moment.
05:58This series was supposed to be a brief stop on Chris' long-awaited trip to Titletown.
06:03And instead, his season was in jeopardy and he was being made fun of online.
06:08Alvarado was respectful after the game, but he wasn't deferential.
06:13He doesn't run from smoke.
06:15And he gloated a little bit.
06:17Can you blame him?
06:18Sure can, said Suns fans.
06:20How much did Suns fans resent Alvarado?
06:23Well, in Game 5, they booed every time he touched the ball.
06:27For an undrafted rookie reserve, that had to be kind of surreal.
06:32How much did Paul resent Alvarado?
06:35Well, in Game 5, he kicked him in the groin.
06:38There were reasons to believe it was on purpose.
06:41Paul had a history of doing that sort of thing.
06:44Notable groin kicker Draymond Green tweeted he'd been ejected for less.
06:48And the league reviewed it and retroactively assessed Paul a flagrant.
06:52But Alvarado wasn't thrown off his game.
06:55He even pestered the point god into another 8-second violation,
06:59fighting dirty play with effort defense.
07:02That's gonna win you some fans.
07:04Cherry on top, Paul got teed up arguing the violation.
07:08Alvarado was the folk hero.
07:10Paul, the folk villain.
07:12In Game 6, Paul set a blindside backcourt pick on Alvarado.
07:16But Paul actually got called for the offensive foul here.
07:20Perhaps because Alvarado sold it well.
07:24In other words, perhaps because he Chris-pauled Chris-paul.
07:28And he was applauded for it.
07:31I imagine Paul's blood was boiling, and there's some evidence to that theory,
07:35because at the end of the game, he threw an elbow at Alvarado,
07:38which chipped the kid's tooth.
07:39But Alvarado even got called for the foul on this play.
07:42Bet Chris-paul liked that.
07:44Paul had a lot of fun in Game 6 all around,
07:47closing out the series with an absolutely incredible performance.
07:51Their talent disparity was the last line of this series.
07:55But the footnote is that the formerly unknown Jose Alvarado got under Paul's skin.
08:01At the post-game presser, Alvarado said,
08:03yeah, he's not on Chris-paul's level, and he's not pretending to be.
08:07But he's not nobody either.
08:09Chris-paul knows his name now.
08:12Then at his post-game interview, Paul mispronounced Alvarado's name.
08:16Was it on purpose?
08:21Alvarado.
08:22The internet certainly thought so.
08:24And it's not like Paul was over the beef.
08:27Winning the series was apparently not enough of a statement.
08:30I'll explain.
08:31December the following season, the Pels and Sons were set to play.
08:34But first of all, Jose was listed as questionable,
08:37but there was no question in his mind, if Chris-paul was playing, he was playing.
08:41So the stage was set for the beef to continue.
08:44In the actual game, both Paul and Alvarado played pretty well.
08:48But since Zion Williamson was healthy, the Pels were handling the Sons.
08:53With 18 seconds left and a seven-point lead, Larry Nance Jr. dunked, which was a little rude.
08:59With one second left and a nine-point lead, Zion did a 360 windmill dunk,
09:04which was considered more than a little rude.
09:07Perhaps the beef had been distributed to the whole Pelicans team.
09:10And as Zion spun through the air, Chris-paul let Jose Alvarado know he, too, still tasted beef.
09:17We've seen that elbow before.
09:19And then we got a team-wide scuffle.
09:22A few months later, Alvarado talked about Paul on J.J. Reddick's Old Man and the Three podcast.
09:27He basically said he's not a fan of CP3 on the court.
09:31Keeping it on the court is a pretty generous move after someone kicked you in the groin,
09:36chipped your tooth, and then tried to elbow your face again eight months later.
09:41Alvarado also said that Phoenix is his nemesis fanbase.
09:45And that's who kind of picked up this beef when Chris Paul set it aside and left town
09:49to focus on the increasingly rushed quest to get a ring.
09:53Fans still boo Alvarado in the desert, and tempers run high on the court, too.
09:59In 2025, Alvarado fought Sun's center Mark Williams, who is 7'1".
10:06Alvarado does not run from smoke.
10:07My God, what are you doing?
10:09Get away from that giant.
10:10Run, run, run.
10:11For Alvarado, the Chris Paul beef was huge.
10:14It helped make his career.
10:16Well, I guess the beef didn't make his career,
10:20but rather his ability to create beef with Paul through his play on the court made his career.
10:26After that series, Chris Paul knew his name, as did the rest of us.
10:31For CP3, this beef happened.
10:33It was embarrassing, but it isn't sticking to him.
10:37There are a lot of footnotes to his career, and Jose Alvarado is a small one.
10:43Paul's still a future Hall of Famer.
10:45That's going to overshadow a lot.
10:47But for a moment in time, Chris Paul got his buttons pushed in a way that he himself liked to
10:53repeatedly jab buttons.
10:55He got a taste of his own medicine, and he spat it out while swinging his elbows and kicking his
11:00legs toward Alvarado's groin.
11:02The undrafted player made the superstar look foolish.
11:07For an underdog, does it get any better than that?
11:14For a moment in time, Chris Paul has said he chose his career.
11:15He put his hands on the ground for the quarterback, and he knows what he sounded like.
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