I'm saying they won't leave Gordon open. When you double Harden you get to choose who you leave open, and right now that player is Westbrook. If they double Harden they are not going to leave Gordon open the same way. So then the question becomes, if Harden is doubled, and Gordon gets the ball but someone rotates to him to stop his 3, can he find the open shooter, or can he take advantage of the 4 on 3. I think the answer is no, which is why I've said he's not a good enough playmaker.
Harden was still one of the most double teamed players last year, even with CP3. Also, this is my point with videos about why it really doesn't work any ways. I know your argument is strictly about if they would or wouldn't with CP3 but I also think it really doesn't matter because they are still getting great shots out of it. https://www.sbnation.com/nba/2019/11/25/20981887/james-harden-houston-rockets-double-team-defense What happens is...Capela goes up soft or fails to finish or someone misses a shot. Russ is still capitalizing off the double team, he attacks the open lane given him like I said and creates an open shot. So we are still getting open shots from the double, teams don't care though because...well..they think it is more likely that Capela or the Rockets big will mess up the play or can be stopped or that the shooter will miss. The key really is Capela...the shooters will be hot or cold, whatever, but Capela has to get better with Russ chemistry wise and feast off the attention his guards get.
The Rockets are past regular season results as a standard of measurement. They are purely judged on their playoff results, and as it stands, Westbrook is not nearly good enough as a 2nd piece to win 16 games come April against the best teams.
Then how are you judging them if Russ and Harden hasn't played a playoff game yet but are giving CP3 an A+ grade for not winning 16 games as the 2nd piece?
Because Westbrook has been one of the least efficient players in the NBA for multiple seasons running now, and that trend has continued in Houston. Not giving CP3 an A+ grade. Just trust him more to provide the things that are valuable to us in a playoff setting (3’s, defense, spacing, basketball IQ). That seems pretty obvious, no? But it’s done. The trade happened. Maybe Westbrook goes on a hot streak, but there’s simply no remotely recent evidence that he’s capable of doing that in the playoffs.
I honestly just don't understand the narrative around CP3 as a playoff performer, his history in the playoffs has been worse than Westbrook who has actually led the Thunder in several big games and helped taken his team to multiple WCF while CP3s only one has been with Harden. And people really want to get into playoff efficiency...Russ has been better in the playoffs than Harden (on this +/- stat I've been hammered with)...yet we have this running narrative around here that he's a playoff choker. Seriously, all these stats thrown at me, Box +/-, PER, ..Russ's historically is higher than Harden's...but maybe these stats don't mean anything since they are good for Russ... Maybe we can go back to judging players by results first instead of stats.
Great question. I don’t get it either. We will be well positioned for another playoff run this year. Harden took Dwight and CP3 to the WCF. I believe he will bring Westbrook to the finals this year.
Again this isn’t reality. Chris Paul has clearly been a better playoff performer than Russ. Harden leads Westbrook in every stat you just mentioned. In what world is Westbrook historically higher? You are just stating lies. Harden is better across the board. Career high, career long. All Harden. And if you put any emphasis into those stats you would see that Westbrook is at near career lows in all of those stats and when compared to the rest of the league are really crappy.
Interesting. 1- 4 seed 2- 2 seed 3- Who cares 4- 1 seed Wins and losses are what matters people. Stats obsession is out of control.
Nope. Russ has a higher Playoff Per and Box +/- than Harden These are PLAYOFF stats. So, we may have to stop with this "RUSS IS A PLAYOFF CHOKER" narrative. Going to go against your stats now?
I know this is confusing because these stats have some stupid names, but BPM is not the same thing as +/-
let’s be real, efficiency matters...it matters a lot very high usage combined with very low efficiency is a problem...u can still win with these players tho Russ takes 53% of his shots from beyond 10 ft, and shoots 33% on these shots which is atrocious...last game against Philly, he was 4-12 from outside the paint, but he did hit 2 big jumpers, and if he had made his easy dunks, he still would’ve finished 11-22 from the field he does put pressure on the defense...he does force the defense to bend and have to make extra rotations...CP does none of that because he can’t consistently get by his man u could say that teams wouldn’t be doubling Harden so heavily if we had CP instead of Russ since Paul can shoot, but we consistently get great shots out of these double teams...it’s not like CP was making Harden’s life so easy last year...he was either on the sideline in a suit or putting up meh numbers as Harden carried his ass the Rockets have the 2nd highest win percentage against teams over .500 behind the Bucks...the starting lineup is the best lineup in the NBA when looking at net rating...it excels on both ends of the floor...this is all with Russ playing big minutes and having big usage...Russ only lineups might improve now that EG is healthy...it’s not all doom and gloom
I agree with all of this post and I feel I need to correct what I mean when I say "I don't care about efficiency" or "It doesn't matter." I'm always saying this in regards to TEAM success. I don't care about efficient players on bad teams like Booker or KAT, it's why I keep bringing up that some players have great advanced stats like KAT but it is obviously not doing much for his team winning wise and no one would put him over Jokic despite advanced stats putting him in top 5 in many categories. Like many of these stats say KAT is better than Jokic...I just don't think many people would agree with that because Jokic's teams are usually far better than KAT's teams despite KAT's advanced stats painting him as an elite player...no one really believes that because the team success isn't there.
Still an amazing accomplishment. I don't see Durant/Westbrook, Lebron/Davis, Lebron/Wade, Lebron/Irving, Giannis/Middleton, Kawhi/George, Jordan/Pippen, Malone/Stockton, Kobe/Gasol or Durant/Steph anywhere in top 5. Let's appreciate the history and effort here.
I feel u...there are certainly players that are advanced stats darlings, but are still losers he was garbage quite often to start the year coming off offseason rehab from surgery and dealing with fcked up fingers while acclimating himself to a new team, but Russ in December... 27, 8, and 7 +4.3 +/- team had a +5.2 net rating when he was on the floor...in our 10 wins, the team had a +8.8 net rating with him on the court things are trending up with Russ
Stats at out of control? Stats are just numbers used to measure success. It helps ppl to be process oriented and not results oriented. Which you clearly are and which is a logical fallacy. Kind of correlation equals causation argument you just made.
