Good, you brought another name into equation, Andre Igoudala (in his prime). You have to look at the production of a player, like Harden compared to these other players. Because giving him such a deal will handicap other moves you can make. If you are going to give a player, such money he's got to be averaging in low to mid 20s, easily and a very reliable playmaker, especially if a team is trying to build a contender.
Consider this. Is Harden better than Westbrook? After these playoffs, I suspect the winds of change will be wafting their way through OKC after Westbrook folds yet again under playoff pressure. I suspect Presti will see that Harden is superior to Westbrook and gives him a max deal while trading Westbrook and possibly either Ibaka or Perkins for an upgrade at center and a point guard distributor.
Trade Westbrook and Perk to Orlando for Dwight plus filler, and sign Steve Nash with the partial MLE.... ****
Yeah, when did I compare Martin to Ray Allen? Why does eveyrone try to create these stickmans all the time? I said Joe Johnson is a shooter, when his shot is off he then becomes a liability to his team. That is why he never was worth the max contract. As for the comparison, Harden is a better player now then Joe was. Someone said that Joe in his prime is better than Harden was. I simply disagree. Harden right now does more for a team and is more dynamic than Joe ever was. Harden is 22. Name the top SGs right now and you have Kobe, Wade, Manu and I'm betting most people are putting Harden above Joe Johnson and as a top 5 SG...at 22 years old. Harden was a #2 overall pick, this says a lot about the type of talent that NBA GMs thought he could develop into, and he has really not disappointed in fact a lot are surprised because the one knock on him coming into the NBA was that he doesn't have the athleticism...and he has proven to be a lot more athletic than people thought. With all of that said, the Hawks are still in a better place than before they got Joe Johnson. If it wasn't for poor coaching they would be seen as a much better team.
Yes I think Harden is better than Westbrook and I always thought that. For OKC it would be the smart thing to do because they have Kevin Durant in place as a bonafide #1 and they can probably get better value in return for WB. For us it would be stupid to give Harden a max contract and have him be our best player.
Harden is not averaging 20 ppg because he's the 3rd wheel behind Westbrook and Durant. Also if you are not willing to take this risk then you are never going to get these type of players. Because if he DOES average at least 20ppg then the chances of getting him go from probable to never.
OKC should have shipped WB to NO for CP3 when they had the chance. There wouldn't be this issue of who should or shouldn't be replaced.
People forget the year before JJ became restricted, he and the Suns were only $5 million away from a 5 year deal. He wanted $50 million and Sarver dug in at $45 million. The rest is history. Presti & OKC won't make that kind of idiotic mistake.
This. People say the Rockets have to take a chance. But you have to know the risk. If he doesn't develop into a franchise player (which is 50/50 at best), you are looking at another 4 years of mediocrity with no hope of getting out until his contract is up. (Unless you want to pray that he gets a career ending injury so we can get out of it.)
#3 pick, and that really only says how the Thunder felt about him. Heck the Grizz liked Haseem Thabeet more than James Harden.
The problem isn't whether or not they will pay him. The problem is that they won't have the cap space to pay him. Somebody has to walk.
What they are saying doesn't have much to do with it. Players coming off rookie contracts usually grab their first mega-deal when it presents itself. Other teams can't talk to Harden until next summer and even then he will be restricted. OKC has until January next year to get it done. They will. When Harden's max or near-max deal expires in 2018, then let's compare him to D-Will.
James Harden is not Joe Johnson. Advanced stats and efficiency stats love James Harden. You can run an offense through James Harden. It isn't all iso ball. Even with the superstars around him, he can run the offense. In Phoenix Nash ran the offense. James Harden is Manu Ginobili
I honestly think he might be. He puts up crazy numbers as a bench player. Combine that with his ability to play the 1, 2, or 3 and you have a guy you can build around. I'd probably hesitate to give him the MAX DEAL, but I wouldn't be shocked/against it either if it happened.
We'll see. I'm just not taking any GM's words at face value. Years of NBA has shown that words are just words and until he resigns he's a RFA in 2013. There are a lot of things in play here rather than just if Presti wants to resign him or not and a lot of variables pop up.
No, not true. Read the whole thread. As has been pointed out, Harden won't be eligible for the kind of max deals people in this thread seem to be thinking about. If Ricksmith is to be believe, Harden's max deal will start at somewhere between $12 and just over $14 million a year. A lot of money? Of course. A crippling contract no. Let's just assume $14 million per year, with 7.5% raises for 5 years, as would be allowed. That's a 5 year, $81 million contract. Again, a whole boatload of money, but not crippling. Which means this is maybe EXACTLY the type of player the Rockets should be going after. It's a risk, but a very measured risk. If Harden doesn't ever become a lick better than he is today, the team is still in a MUCH better position than it currently is. He's an extremely efficient scorer that excels in ALL areas of the game. He's so much better of an overall player than a Kevin Martin it's not even funny. I think he's a no brainer max, for him. I think given the Rockets situation, they'd be fools not to try and obtain him. Sure, some have argued what happens when he's the number one guy. Will his ridiculously amazing, otherworldly TS% and eFG% go down? Probably. But he'd also be taking a ton more shots. And a less efficient but higher volume Harden is a top scorer in this league. The guy only took 10 shots per game. Durant and Westbrook take almost twice that. Kobe take more than twice that. Lebron takes almost twice that. Can he lead the league in scoring? Maybe, maybe not. But he can definitely put up 25+ ppg while still being efficient. There's no way in the world the Thunder trade him, which would be the only way to acquire him, really. But if they do, for what? An aging Luis Scola. Dalembert, Martin and some draft picks? Seems very unlikely.
OKC got a lot of options, Presti has done terrific job and I don't see why OKC could not get out of this as a winner. If Harden and Ibaka both want to stay, become dinasty with potential to be bigger than Spurs and Lakers and don't see a problem that they both would not settle for 10M a year. So Durant, Westbrook, Perkins, Ibaka and Harden would earn about 60M/year. Then you add Collison(3M/year), Maynor(2M/year) and Sefolosha(3M/year) and that's your playoff roster, plus you would have 3 or 4 guys who would earn about 1M and would play some minutes in regular season. That would be 71M/year. San Antonio spend 73M this year, Atlanta 73M, Boston 88M, New York 75M, Miami 80M, Lakers 86M,... Presti already said he will go over cap, if needed to build championship caliber team. Now if neither of them want to stay you got several options. You can trade Perkins, Harden and Ibaka for Howard+one player who could score off the bench from some third team probably(like Beasley).
So be it. Harden will re-sign with OKC. His extension won't kick in until 2013 which will give Presti time to re-arrange the deck chairs and try to reduce their luxury penalty.
