The numbers in this situation do not describe the whole story. It is quite clear that Harden is the focal point of the opposing teams defense and they double him off the picks and stack the paint, daring our wings/pf's to shoot the 3. There is no flow in our offense and we are relying too heavily on just the pick-n-roll, instead we should be running some off the ball screens and back door cuts. We do not have great ball handlers, it's tough watching Parsons and Delfino come off a screen when the defense hedges. And when these guys get to the paint they have no where to go and no one to pass too. I've been very impressed with Asik thus far, he has great awareness for the ball on both ends of the court, plays exceptional pick defense, and is everywhere. On the other hand, i'm not impressed with Lin, and I don't know what is wrong with him. He makes poor decisions, has looked sloppy dribbling the ball, and gambles too often on the defensive side. Maybe the poor decisions are because of lack of chemistry?? IDK, but as a high IQ player he should no better than to try to dump the ball off to Asik when there are 4 guys standing in the paint, stop picking up your dribble. Also, I think it would help him to develop a floater; not an Alston version. I think Harden will be fine as the season progresses, defenses are double and triple teaming him and we are doing nothing to give him the ball in different spots. He'll have up and downs.
Stop jumping to conclusions. just give him some time. how many superstars happen after just four games?
so many excuses. if harden is the max superstar that people thought he was when we got him he should be producing better than this. the season is still young but harden has to play better.
http://www.nba.com/rockets/news/growing-pains-and-long-slow-search-chemistry Geore Karl says it right there that they doubled him. Not sure what more proof you need than the opposing coach explaining how they played him. It is pretty clear to anyone watching that Harden is getting doubled now.
The youngest team in the NBA that has played together for 5 games ... has been exposed What's the point of even playing the other 77 games?
Can you not read? Go to the article and read the quotes. If you are asking for game video then good luck, many of us can barely watch this team play on our own television.
not exposed. just that the coaching is bad, our guys just running wild without any game plan. harden just became a chucker because there is no offense running
In other words, Harden is easily shut down when there is better competition. A simple double will completely take him out of his game. He does not know how to break a double team, pass and reposition, or finish strong these past 3 games.
They doubled him a lot this game too so not sure what you are talking about. The first two games spoiled the lot of you. You all expect him to score 30+ per game and do it shooting over 45% or something. When Beardsanity was in full effect I heard so many crazy things, him being compared to Lebron and other non-sense. Most knew he was going to cool down especially with the teams that were up on the schedule. The reason Harden is playing bad is because the offense is playing terrible as a whole. There is no flow to it, no movement. Even the best players can get shut down if you let a defense lock in and focus. That's why the best offenses move and move some more. The Rockets literrally dribble it up half court, all a pick...or clear out for a isolation. After that is done they do nothing else. It's pretty sad to see.
huh? i never expected much from him. all i said was his struggle wasnt due to doubling, but more like coaching. and hell yeah he wasnt struggling because of doubling. if u mean driving through two guys is doubling, idk if u know anything about basketball. when ppl say double team, they mean sending 2 guys to guard one guy, not a help defender doing their thing.
I'd say a combination of being doubled and playing too much hero ball. He needs to facilitate a bit more - get the other guys involved.
McHale has our starting SG, playing both co-starting and backup PG with his only rest coming when a 30 SF is the first man pull off the bench. This philosophy that you make your play maker the point all the time is the same idiocy they had in New York before Lin actually took over and they were giving Melo the ball to handle because they didn't trust any of their point guards. All you are doing is putting a bullseye on your best player at the top of the key so teams know where to focus their defense and Harden isn't THAT good of a distributor.
The problem is that the rest of the team is inadequate (to put it as politely as possible). - Naturally complementary guys are forced to featured roles (see: Lin, Asik, Parsons, Patterson) - Scrubs are forced into complementary roles (see: Morris, Aldrich, Douglas, Delfino) - Young talent is forced to rot on the bench (see: Jones, Motiejunas, White, Machado)
Harden needs to score first. Facilitate last. Lin is the ideal facilitator. If he can't be effective playing like that then one of them has to go. It's a bad fit. Harden should only be the bailout facilitator since he's capable. Being a money player, he should be able to play both ways.
The point is he's being doubled, it's not help defense when on the pick they are completely ignoring the other guy and going with Harden. Also of course it is the coaching too but that comes with being doubled. If Adelman was here he'd exploit that so hard with movement that teams would pay for doing it. Teams do not, they are getting away with it because when the team runs a pick and roll literally no one else moves. It's pretty ugly.
