Perhaps someone can help me as I don't get to watch as many games as I want to these days...can someone remember a possession where Harden is posting up? The postup is what elevated Lebron/Kobe's game. Jordan/Barkley were also effective at it. It doesn't take great length to be good at it either. Here are some examples of players with similar height as James Harden (6'5"). Adrian Dantley(6'5"): For those that don't remember AD... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdO_3iW5QAA Mark Aquirre(6'5"): Shows some post up possessions as well as some interesting extras.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFwjrCXCmFc D.Wade(6'5"): I think we're all familiar with his game... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjDIxhL_t6Q Wade is not as wily at it as Aguirre&Dantley, but I believe Harden is cut of the same cloth as DA & MA and with some practice could be just as good. The Rockets though need to be willing to use him that way... Of course there are those that will say Harden is more efficient from other areas of the court but a change up every now and then would make him more lethal and thus make the team better. His vision would also serve him well on postup possessions.
For a 23 yr old wing player in today's NBA, Harden's post-game is fairly good. You can at least see a glimpse of what he can be with more offseason work. But seriously though, no young player come into the league with a developed post game. Most don't achieve it until at least 5+ years into the league, if they ever develop one.
It could be useful, but his strengths are so overwhelming up top that it may not be necessary. His strengths are his 3 pt threat coupled with the ability to penetrate with strength when people respect his shot. If there is to be a post up possession, I'd rather post up Asik or D-Mo to get our bigs more touches. We are a 1,2,3 dominated offense in terms of usage rate and taking even post plays away from our bigs is only a temporary solution not conducive to future wins.
The question is whether or not a post-up involving Harden would be more efficient than one involving Asik/Dmo. Considering Harden does have a size advantage at his position, often posts up on mismatches already, and handles the ball a lot more than our bigs (who have not shown in practice the ability to consistently score), I think Harden could be even more efficient if he did incorporate a post-game into his moveset, which is currently very limited.
Size advantage is not mandatory when it comes to postups. If you watch the Aguirre and Dantley clips it is all about timing, guile. I believe Harden has those attributes in other parts of his game and I'm sure he can apply it to the post.
I was saying very early in the season that Harden should add a post game & should also work on moving without the ball in the summer. That will help some of the redundancy with Lin, it will add another dimension to his scoring arsenal therefore he will be a lot tougher to defend. In one of our more recent plays Harden actually scored in the post. I think it was the game before Denver.
He's really a faceup player, but I'd like to see him with an alternative to his step back mid-range shot. Either a one-dribble pull-up or a post-up->turn around fallaway.
Was reading some draft reports about Harden last week, a few of them seemed to indicate that he had a good post game in college. If so, this may be the next thing he polishes.
He does post up, but not on the low block. Mainly as a method to get the ball and then face up in the midrange below the elbow. Synergy has him running 2% of his possessions from the post, or about one every other game. It's his single least efficient play, but because the post game is approximately dead in the NBA now that still makes him top 70 in the league in post efficiency. He's 9 for 25 with 5 turnovers and 8 drawn fouls. So it's certainly not a major weapon for him yet.
As has been mentioned, he has been getting a few opportunities every now and then since the beginning of the season, he has also been doing it in practice (yesterday's Q&A with the media provides an example), you can tell by that that the organization as a whole is looking at the big picture, it might not be effective today but hopefully 2 years from now it will.
He's been incorporating some post play in the recent games, and Robinson, McHale, and some other people have already said Harden's been developing that part of his game in practice.
The whole team could stand to practice some post up moves, teams built aroun jump shooting or getting free throws are not built to win in the playoffs.
