Monta Ellis is the best guard to pair with James Harden

I don't get this. All along, I thought the consensus among those who wanted Lin replaced was that James Harden needed a role-playing PG who could hit his 3s and play smothering defense.

Yeah, I can't think of a better role-playing PG than Chris Paul.

 

If the only publication that has floated your proposal is The Onion, then your idea probably sucks.

 

Oh my goodness. I needed a good laugh. Thanks a lot. :lol:

 

Here's the thing. The way you've continually phrased Ellis, the way you've continually described him .... is as a role player. And I still don't know what he does. You keep comparing him with Parker, but Parker does EVERYTHING better than Ellis. Everything.

He can hit the open mid-range? Great. Fantastic. So can 90% of the shooting guards in this league. He can create his own shot? No, not really, or he wouldn't even such a horrific scorer. He can slash. So can Trevor Ariza. And this is completely ignoring some of the horrible tendencies he has, such as the fact that if you are shooting 23% from 3, and STILL haven't figured out "don't take multiple 3's a game" in his 8th season in the league, I'm not sure why you think he'll learn now.

At best, I'll say that if Ellis was willing to come here for the MLE, AND was willing to figure out things about his shot selection, than maybe I'll take him on. But he's not going to do either. He will seek double digit dollars. So, congrats, you're paying a guy who's the third-string after Lin and Harden double digit dollars to hit mid range jumpers and drive to the rim. What a great allocation of resources.

 

A lot of people have already brought up his horrible inefficiency. You can make all the excuses you want, but facts are facts. This year, he's shooting 40% from the field and 23.5% from the 3pt line. Horrible.

 

Both Ellis and Harden dominate the ball, and Ellis is a worse 3 pt shooter than Lin. I'd take Ellis on an affordable contract as a 6th man role like JR Smith is doing for the Knicks. But for the money he will be looking for in a starting role? No thanks.

I'm sure they win some games with that line up, after all the Bucks are slotted to be a play off team with Jennings and Ellis. But it isn't likely to make you a contender because Ellis is just as likely to shoot you out of a game as he is to shoot you in it. He is an undersized ball dominatating shooting guard who is a poor defender and will command more money than he is worth.

The Rocket's game was not your typical Monta Ellis game, considering he averages less than 5 free throws a game and got 11 attempts last game. 27 points sounds great til you realize that it took 24 shots to get there, and that's of course not counting the attempts that lead to 11 free throws being shot. As a 6th man on an affordable contract I'd be fine with it, but if you are going to pay him to be your 2nd "star" then you have a pretty low ceiling for your team.

 

Yeah, its not like Love's fg% dropped b/c of his broken hand....

What about a bad stretch of 8 years? Ellis' career 3pt% is 31.3%, and his career fg% is 45.6%. Underwhelming at best.

 

CP3 is better than Harden hence he will handle the ball and Harden will play off the ball. Its not that hard to understand.

 

The rockets as a team shoot the least amount of mid range shots than any team in the league. This is not coincidence. This is the game plan. You keep bringing up his mid range game as if the team would even want him shooting them, which I have to believe would not be the case.

 

Ive long believed the best fit next to Harden was BY FAR Steph curry, but his recent performances are making me reconsider, maybe he should be the main man in the backcourt on his court.

And as someone mentioned, literally the worst possible guard to put next to Harden is Monta Ellis. Couldnt believe when I saw this title. Someone asked why? Dead last in PG 3pt%:

http://espn.go.com/nba/statistics/p.../threePointFieldGoalPct/position/point-guards

23%!!!

Also ball dominant.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PR_rzF8ofw

 

This is completely stupid. Did you not see the issues he had with Curry and now with Jennings? He cannot play with ballhogs. Have you ever seen him play??????????????

 

Sounds nice in theory, but Harden without the ball in his hands is a hamstrung shooting guard.

 

If your statement is true, then why hasn't the spacing of the Bucks worked. Milwaukee won because they KILLED us on jumpers while we were utterly terrible at it during that game. Furthermore, slashing ability is worthless if you can't finish at the rim ( see Williams, Terrence and that was his biggest weakness, not jumpers like most people said). Ellis is actually a worse finisher than Lin - and it should be noted that that is one area where Lin has noticeably, as he is actually BETTER at the rim compared to Linsanity. And the idea that a player entering his 9th season next year is somehow going to improve shooting or anything like that is extremely hopeful - Ellis is what he is at this point.

You keep comparing Ellis with Tony Parker even though the two have nothing in common - one shoots lots of 3's which miss, the other doesn't. One has a history of playing within a team, the other doesn't. One is a fantastic finisher, the other isn't. So why instead, don't you compare Ellis with a more average shooting guard like say, Courtney Lee, and tell me what Ellis does that Courtney Lee couldn't do if Lee got to chuck the ball 17 times a game?

 

It all boils down to this - every time Ellis touches the ball Harden does not. And who would you rather have touching the ball?

 

Absolutly right. Harden and Ellis have usage percentages tha are sky high.

 

As great as having a guy like Monta to pair with Harden, he isn't a good fit with Harden. Monta is more of a SG in a PG body. He's an explosive scorer who's incredibly streaky but Lin is a better option next to Harden.

With Lin and Harden right now, they both young and are growing together. They are not trying to win today but they are building for the future. The Rockets are better off with a strong scorer and a pass first PG in Lin. With Monta, he will most likely take most of the shots away from Harden which we don't need because he's not that efficient.