Having watched so many rockets games in my life, I gotta say, Harden iso ball is just pure garbage. Every time he decides to drive into 5 defenders just sickens my stomach, yet no other players on the team say anything to him. So here is my question, do you guys prefer to watch his ugly hero ball? Or swing the ball to an open player for an open shot? I am not a Lin only fan or a harden fan, i'm a rockets fan. So don't turn this thread into lin vs harden. (Can someone please add a poll into this thread? Harden iso ball vs team ball) Thanks guys
it's been frustrated as hell. What happened to all the movements and cuts? This team would have been awesome if we could have gotten d'antoni, but of course lakers have him now
Young teams don't close games out well. A lot of these games we lost just because we are so young. But I do prefer team ball. I would rather run a play to get Marcus or Parsons a wide open three than have Harden force things. The coaching staff needs to tell Harden to stop pressing & they need to run a smart play for end of games. Pop calls hero ball boring & I agree with him. http://probasketballtalk.nbcsports....e-between-spurs-and-lakers-last-second-shots/
Harden did so well in the first half moving the ball , he's benefited from some wide open shot when not handle the ball as well, i just can't understand why we always go back to iso ball when the game is on line near the end where we never succeed yet on that kind of play
His playmaking gets in the way of Harden isoball. They're starting to phase him out already Rockets need offense and they need good offense. Jeremy Lin is the one player out there with consistent playmaking capabilities. It befuddles me how they choose to use Harden in iso situations when throughout most of the 9 games Harden has never done well as an iso player.
I'm pretty sure McHale's playbook (if you can even call it a book at that) consists of one page with 3 characters: P&R
Harden should only go iso ball WHEN the play is looking to have no outlook, clock is draining down, and you have no where else to pass but to take the shot. That's when Harden should run and grab the ball and create a contested shot.
You forgot the play where we shoot a contested three pointer at the buzzer while leaving your teammates standing open.
Rockets team ball: <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/Z7KsuyQb-1Y" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Harden hero ball: <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/BrLjnIF6laA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Harden iso-ball is part of Houston Rockets team ball. Giving the ball to your best player is what EVERY team does. Portland is a perfect example.
Uhm, you are comparing Jeremy Lin's worst moments to one of Harden's best moments - and not even in Rockets uniform. Last few losses all ended in Harden iso, not sure if you've noticed... But anyway, looking on the bright side, these add to Harden's experiences and he will only be more clutch in the future as a franchise player. It's just going to be painful to watch before the shots start to fall... or the coaches change their mind...
Honestly, I don't see what the big deal of an air ball is. I see an airball as just a missed shot. So as a true basketball fan who understands basketball, I would choose the rockets team ball every single time, unless harden is actually on fire. Matter of fact, look at kobe in his earlier years :<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VWgfx-bXsg4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Now he's a 5 time world champion. So I don't really give s*** about air balls. On the other hand, when Harden plays hero ball, there is a higher chance of turning the ball over, leading to fast break points for the opponent team. That alone is enough to justify playing rocket ball is better.
McHale's gone but it's still his plays that are being run. I'm pretty sure Kelvin Sampson didn't go and dig out his old playbook when he heard he was going to be the interim coach in McHale's absence.
Harden is extremely talented but you can't keep going iso Harden every time. you gotta mix it up, use it sparingly when you need a quick point or you become too predictable. your main offense should go through Lin.. that is, Lin should be the one to dictate who scores at which moment. so, it's a team ball. this coaching staff is really holding our players back. hell, they can just let Lin make all the decisions on the floor and end up looking good. they don't need to do a damn thing.
It's the coaches. Harden has always been a selfless player that at times had to be told by his coach to shoot the ball. In fact when most people thought that Harden couldn't be 'The Man' it mostly came from the fact that he was too passive, even though the numbers he put up in OKC were stuff stat geeks drooled over... a lot of people felt that Harden was a passive player (I did as well.) and he didn't have that mentality. Now he suddenly has this mentality because he has the green light to go go go. Which is fine at certain times. There are times when you want your player to take over and others to move out of the way and there are times when you want to run a offense. With that said I think this is a good learning experience for him. You can see his mentality ebb and flow. The first two games he went nuts and then we started to see him just force everything the 3 games after. Then the past two or so games we have seen him settle down a lot more. I don't think his 'heroball' lost the game at all tonight. It almost won us the game. The lack of defense lost and the decision to keep the guy who almost had a triple double on the bench lost this game...along with some HORRIBLE officiating.
I think you forgot to mention that this was a series of 5 straight Harden ISO possessions the crack coaching staff (or is that coaching staff on crack) chose to end/lose the game with. These 5 Harden ISO plays ended in 4 Harden miss/TOs and 1 Lin miss. You would think that after the third straight Harden miss/TO they would go, hmm, things seems to work much better when we let Lin be Lin and take pressure off Harden, but nooooo, this is the Rockets' coaching staff, they so know better than that...
No one is criticizing Harden for harden iso-ball. It is a reference to the coaching staff's use of Harden as a player, not of his player tendencies.