Not to me, i don't care much about ringzzzz when evaluating players. If murray got injured again before last seasons playoffs i wouldn't look at jokic any differently
Man, oh man…. If James is in Clifford Robinson territory, that’s something. That poor guy completely blocked once the playoffs came. It was a sad sight…
No, he had the unmitigated gall of leading a woeful Rockets supporting cast to some of our best years ever without toppling the Warriors dynasty.
I still can't believe Cliff Robinson lost the ball on that fast break in Game 6 vs the Lakers in 1991. Cost them the series.
If the Rockets (or whatever team he ends up playing for) manage to get in the playoffs enough, Jalen Green could DEFINITELY break this record. He has that kind of upside.
Dude is a excellent player. He just that opposite drive that Jordan and Kobe had. He literally disappears deep in the playoffs. Not some times but all the time. I'll never forget that time Josh Smith and Dwight Howard had to save us while Harden was sitting.
Not for Hakeem it wasn’t. He had a pretty nice regular season career but every year he stepped it up for the playoffs. No one could touch playoff Hakeem.
This is great example of people memory holing things like I mentioned here last week Harden had an excellent game 1 to start those averages - as you say He also - quite literally dragged the Clippers to victory down the stretch - by having an excellent Game 4, something you forgot - this game happened all the way back on ...Sunday? The 5 straight floaters to win the game? Ring a bell? The shelf life of a Harden win is like 24 hours, just like last year. I don't know who needs to hear this, but at age 34, reasonably expecting James Harden to physically drag you to more than 2-3 wins in 7 is just..not going to happen. That's just the way it is for him (and honestly 99% of other players in the NBA).
Absolutely, all of his stuff went up across the board. There are a handful of guys who did that, hakeem, jokic, lebron, but it's rare. The tier 2 superstars like durant, kobe, curry, they all drop off in the playoffs, it's really only tier 1 guys (so basically top 8-10 guys)
well man... we ALL thought the Ty Lawson trade was stealing candy from a baby (at the time).... so we're all susceptible to bad take every now n again...
This debate is going around circles. Is Harden a bad playoffs performer? No if you look at his playoffs stats as a whole. Does he have bad games in crucial games more than the vast majority of superstar players? Yes. Example: Player X generally plays well in the first three quarters. If you look at his overall stats, you conclude that he is a great player. But he often disappear in crunch time and let his team down. You can say that Player X is a great player when the game is not on the line but he is a choker in crucial moment. Harden still has time to redeem himself if he carries the Clippers past the Mavs in Games 6 and 7 and continues to do it throughout this year's playoffs. That will finally exorcise the demon that has been following his whole career. His time is running out. I don't know how many more seasons he has left where he can perform like "the system" and win playoffs series for his team.
To me this version of Harden is even more inconsistent than the slightly younger Houston version. The Houston version would 87% show up in the first 2 rounds and play 3-4 games out of 7 very well.
Absolutely!!! Then you have the extreme NBA anomaly — though not a Big Star — that is Robert Horry…Rondo is another example in the same Non-star category. I’d say, paradoxically since he never had success, but if you watched the games you could say that T-Mac also elevated in the playoffs.
see the key here is... superstars draw double teams - even triple teams on occasions - esp in the playoffs... is the star an egomaniac forcing low % shots amid coverage - or is he willing to give the ball up to his open teammate? So all about the efficiencies rather than the totals... Plus in the playoffs the d is more intense - as opposed to lackluster d against a lottery team in the reg season, for example.... so i would anticipate #s dipping - i put that on circumstance - not the player....
The NBA and the refs made sure the Rockets were but a road bump for the Splash bros. It was independently verified by a third party firm that the NBA foul calls overwhelmingly favored the Warriors. That was no accident, that the Rockets could not get a foul called in their favor. I still remember Jason Whitlock arguing with Cuttino Mobley on a sports show (mysteriously the clip always disappears from YouTube, as if someone is trying to erase history), about how the Rockets were bad for TV and it was justifiable to make sure the Rockets didn’t advance. How the NBA is a product there to generate viewership and audience, and how the NBA did the right thing to do everything in their power so that the James Harden led team did not advance. James Harden and Morey hacked the NBA rules and should have won, but the NBA made sure to nip the Rockets chances.
Well Stern made sure the 1986 Rockets would never beat Showtime ever again despite just as much drug use and other vices.
