While the notion of pairing superstars together in order to win an NBA championship isn’t an especially new one, its increasing prevalence within the league certainly is.  

Shaquille O’Neal joining Kobe Bryant and the LA Lakers twenty years ago returned basketball supremacy to Los Angeles, ushering in the NBA’s most recent three-peat.

The man-mountain called 'Shaq' then joined a blossoming Dwyane Wade at the Miami Heat to help deliver the young Heat franchise its first NBA title.

The 'pairing superstars' phenomenon went a step further just a couple of short years later, when the Boston Celtics brought together Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen and Paul Pierce to win the 2008 NBA title, breaking the storied franchise's 22-year championship drought.

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LeBron James’ famous decision in 2010 to "take his talents to South Beach" - along with Chris Bosh to join the aforementioned Wade in Miami - resulted in four straight trips to the NBA Finals, including the franchise’s second and third championships.

At the time, LeBron was not only proving himself as the world’s very best player, but was also showing the league that the best way to achieve NBA hardware was through building rosters loaded with elite, established NBA pedigree.

While the Golden State Warriors won the 2015 NBA title, largely off the back of their home grown stars such as Steph Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson, it’s arguable their second and third championships wouldn’t have been possible without the addition of ten-time All-Star, Kevin Durant.

The NBA’s increasing obsession with coupling superstars thoroughly hijacked the most recent NBA off-season, with both the Lakers and city rival LA Clippers prepared to mortgage their future draft capital in order to have pairings such as James and Anthony Davis (Lakers), and Kawhi Leonard and Paul George (Clippers) to rule over their franchises, hence pushing themselves into Championship contention. 

While those were the most high profile efforts to pair established stars, the Dallas Mavericks did similar - though on a smaller scale - when they traded for Kristaps Porzingis to pair with their young Slovenian sensation, Luka Doncic, while the Houston Rockets are forever seeking to provide an elite running mate to their NBA MVP, scoring- machine, James Harden, this season bringing in Russell Westbrookto replace Chris Paul.

While Championship aspirants such as the Milwaukee Bucks and Denver Nuggets haven’t yet bought in a superstar sidekick to pair with Giannis Antetokounmpo or Nikola Jokic, respectively, their stance could be a test case insofar as how future franchises go about winning a title.

So, without any further ado, let’s check in on the league’s six most high-profiled elite pairings and assess how each is fairing at the quarter-mark of this NBA season.

LeBron James / Anthony Davis, Los Angeles Lakers

A 24-3 start and a better than five-game lead in the always competitive west says it all when it comes to assessing the impact of the James-Davis union in Los Angeles.

After a six-season, franchise-record playoff drought, pairing these ascendant superstars together has proven a masterstroke by the Lakers front office, with the famous franchise appearing a serious threat to add a 17^th NBA Championship to their trophy cabinet.

The James-Davis tandem has spent 618 minutes on the court together to produce a startling +12.5 net rating, which is the league’s best mark for a pair sharing that amount of court time together.

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While it’s natural to think having these two generational talents together would constitute a feast of scoring, which it largely has, their most devastating impact has come on the defensive end, with the combo conceding just 101.4 points per 100 possessions, which is almost a full two points better than the Lakers' 103.1 team total, which already stands as the third best mark in the league. 

Jayson Tatum / Jaylen Brown, Boston Celtics

The NBA's youngest phenom duo didn’t require a high-profiled trade arrangement to pit the talents of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown together. Instead, Boston’s excellent decade of wheeling and dealing meant they were successfully able to draft these two players with consecutive #3 picks at the 2016 and 2017 NBA drafts, while it just so happens their games are perfectly suited to one another.

While many thought the Celtics would struggle in the aftermath of Kyrie Irving’s exodus to the Brooklyn Nets, Boston has instead thrived, out to a 17-7 start while boasting the league’s 6^th best offense and 7^th best defense.

It is the Tatum-Brown combination that has been at the heart of the Celtic's surge, and why they are clicking on both ends. While their 468 minutes of shared court time isn’t massive, when they are together they’ve been downright dominant, producing a +13.3 net rating which is underpinned by a stingy 101.1 points conceded per 100 minutes.

The Celtics would be filled with enthusiasm that they have these two young stars locked in together for the foreseeable future, while also having the trade assets (unlike the Clippers or Lakers) to potentially add another star into the mix to further solidify their championship credentials.

Joel Embiid / Ben Simmons, Philadelphia 76ers

Like the Celtics with Tatum and Brown, the Embiid-Simmons tandem figures to keep the 76er's championship window wide open for as long as they remain together in the 'City of Brotherly Love'.

While the young duo has only spent 407 on-court minutes together, the combo has produced a +7.7 net rating which, though encouraging, only scratches the surface of the kind of music these two are capable of composing. In the 2017-18 season, for instance, the NBA was treated to a demonstration of how lethal the combo could be when they produced a massive +15.3 net rating in the 1,300 minutes they shared together, and which ushered in a 52-game winning season for the 76ers, putting an end to their five-season 'process' nightmare of being the league’s whipping boy.

While the Embiid-Simmons combo is a frightening defensive experience for opposition teams and is responsible for a miserly 97.7 defensive net rating, the concern with these two is on offense where they produce just 105.7 points per 100 possessions, and where the assist-turnover ratio is a very concerning 1.37. 

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The Tatum-Brown assist to turnover number for context’s sake sits at a lofty 2.21.

James Harden / Russell Westbrook, Houston Rockets

Houston GM Darryl Morey is one of US sports' most high-profiled tinkermen, forever working the margins to deliver the Rockets their third NBA championship.

In James Harden, he knows he has a legitimate NBA superstar, however finding a partner to compliment his unique, ball-dominant approach hasn’t always been easy.

While the Harden-Chris Paul duo won the Rockets a heap of regular-season games, it was a combination which didn't take them anywhere come play-off time, partly owing to the one-man Harden show, and, in part because of Paul's knack for picking up injuries at the most inopportune of times.

This off-season Morey traded for the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Russell Westbrook, who, while not being a passive shooter himself, provides a much more up-tempo approach in comparison to Paul, while drawing some of the defensive attention away from Harden.

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Through 20 games the tandem has worked excellently, with Harden averaging a staggering 39.3 points per night while producing a +8.2 net rating when paired with Westbrook from the 587 minutes they've shared together.

And, for those whose minds wouldn’t ordinarily gravitate towards defense when they think of a Harden-Westbrook pairing, they have been responsible for an also excellent 102.9 net rating when together on the court, which is more noteworthy considering the Rockets have a middling 109.6 defensive net rating overall.

Luka Doncic / Kristaps Porzingis, Dallas Mavericks

The 17-8 Mavericks are perhaps the league’s biggest surprise this season. Not only has Dallas a budding NBA megastar on its hands in Luka Doncic, but with partner-in-crime, Kristaps Porzingis, might have the kind of recipe which keeps them in championship contention for years to come. 

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To this point, the young European duo has produced a respectable +6.8 net rating from the 606 minutes they’ve shared together, which, though encouraging, is only the 11^th most fruitful combination on this strong Mavericks team.

At just 20 and 24 years of age respectively, the Doncic-Porzingis pairing is still a work in progress, particularly with Porzingis only this season returning from a 20-month injury absence. 

When the Latvian's health and game do return to full working order, his combination with Doncic could prove devastating. 

Kawhi Leonard / Paul George, Los Angeles Clippers

The Clippers moved heaven and earth this off-season to ensure Kawhi Leonard and Paul George could be pitted together on one of the league’s very best rosters, even if it meant parting ways with the emerging Shai Gilgeous-Alexanderand no less than five first-round picks.

The combo thrust the Clippers into direct title favouritism and has indeed helped the Clippers morph into a legitimately strong on-court team, which is ranked in the top ten on both offense and defense.

As for the Leonard-George combo, off-season shoulder surgery has meant George has only played in 17 of the Clipper's 28 games to date, while the minutes he’s shared with Leonard so far have been confined to just 274. 

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The moments they have shared, however, have sent a collective shudder across the NBA, with the prestigious combo responsible for a massive +13.4 net rating while their paltry 98.0 defensive rating is a testament to how menacing the presence of these two is on the wings.

As the season progresses, the Leonard-George combo will continue to grow, as too will their post-season credentials. 

The big question is whether health will get in the way of a partnership which has the potential to deliver the Clippers their first-ever franchise NBA championship.

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