He doesn't trust his teammates like he did last season but can you really blame him? They sucked until lately and Harden was the only player other than Thornton that could hit a shot reliably if left open.
Lazy passes, movement off the ball, finishing at the rim. All can be fixed by hard work in the offseason & proper coaching. Harden used to live in the paint & transition a few years ago but is far too reliant on his jump shooting these days. 7 dunks or whatever all season says it all.
There are quite a few. From my perspective, one of Harden's greatest detriments is his inability to use a pick effectively. When you have a guy like Dwight setting you a pick, you have to take advantage of hit. That's something that many on Clutchfans seem to overlook. Dwight sets AWESOME picks, but if you don't use them correctly, it doesn't matter. The reason Dwight gets called for all of those offensive fouls from setting an "illegal pick," whether you like him or not, is because James doesn't wait for the pick before he starts his penetration to the rim. James starts to accelerate before Dwight has time to get there and use his frame to allow James to get through. It absolutely drives me crazy. WHEN James actually lets Dwight or Clint set up, he's almost always open for a mid-range jumper. When he fails to be PatIeNT, he runs into a trap or he's forced to make "that" pass that we've all seen this season. If you don't use Dwight the right way in a pick and roll, as we've seen, you're apt to turn the ball over. Do you think it's just a coincidence that JET can still make it to the basket--at his age--and hit a floater or a jumper? No, because he knows how to use picks correctly. I always enjoy watching Jet because he makes the game look easy, especially in a pick-and-roll. He takes his time, allows a big to come up, penetrates to the correct side and takes a brief moment to check his options. He either takes that baby floater or makes the pass to the strong or weak side. If James could improve just a little in that area, since he controls the ball so much, he'd greatly alleviate our spacing issue, and he'd finally see how often Dwight is open when he rolls to the basket. It's also no coincidence that we've played better since including Dwight more on offense. Even if it's not pretty, you have to take advantage of Dwight's size and power. For all that Dwight does on defense, in terms of protecting our basket and COVERING UP all of the mistakes that our guards make (ahem, not boxing out Tony Freaking Allen), you have to give him his touches in the post. PERIOD. I'm not Dwight's biggest fan, but I have been frustrated with the minimal role he's had on offense until a week or two ago. It started with McHale failingmiserably to require the guards to make the easy post pass to Dwight, and unfortunately, until JB took over, no one outside of Trevor, Pat and Jet would get the ball down to Dwight in time. For these changes, I'm grateful that JB is our head coach and has attempted to fix the Rockets' woes. We're getting better. A few tweaks here and there, and we'll move our way up to that 5th spot.
"First off.. James has been giving much better effort on both ends lately. Just saying, his stellar offensive game's only real problem is careless passes."
So OP, by your standard, give a little bit fork (when in good mood) is much better than give no fork at all?
Harden still has a ton of issues: - Inconsistent effort, especially on the defensive end - Carelessness with handling and passing the ball - Wastes too much shot clock only to pass it off to someone for a contested shot at the last second - Lacks explosion this year it feels like so settling for jumpers more - Sometimes doesn't even drive with any intention to finish at all - Loses motivation at times when his shot is not falling and he is not getting calls when driving to the rim - Doesn't take enough advantage of the PnR when he is running it with Dwight - Throws out waaaay to many bounce passes instead of lobs, especially with our bigs
Let me also say, Harden can be an excellent passer and sets up his teammates well every game. It's just the Hail Mary, desperation-level passes. Brain crap plays. It's one thing if you trip, fall, and throw a bad pass, but we're doing them for actual plays premeditated Just play a little smarter. No need for desperate measures when it's not necessary. Great post. The football equivalent to James' waiting for the pick is, a ball carrier letting his blocking develop. Great point.. and yes, Terry makes it look easy. Ima give James whatever he deserves. Not all posters can handle it, but I've accepted that reality.
His passing was brilliant down the stretch in the 4th and OT of the pacers game. He won us the game with his playmaking not his scoring, It was great to see. I think he had 4 assists and 2 hockey type assists. He made that all happen of his great vision. The only passes I don't like as you have pointed out is all those bounce passes into the middle of the lane. Like cmon James we don't have big men with the best hands first of all and second of all its just not a smart play, everyone knows you throw the ball high for bigs in the paint. James needs to be better in that department. But the rest of his game has been very good. He's playing hard wetting back on transition D and passing more early in the games. I think we've started to undervalue JH around here, he's still a top 7 player in the league and can win a team a lot of games. We're going to win 50+ games this year imo meaning harden is about to cooking again. Plus feeding Dwight has been great for the team on both sides he is beasting down low and easily been the best center since the new year.
I think fans of their team really start to undervalue their superstars. It makes sense too, you see them more than 82 games a year if you're lucky and then you see all their warts and flaws. NBATV shows a Harden hightlight of him dribbling around the perimeter and draining huge shots and other fans see that and go "That's a great player." but they don't see how often he does that same thing only to brick the shot or have it stolen. As a result what you see is people actually thinking HERE...on THESE forums that Harden isn't better than Klay Thompson...meanwhile going to a GSW forum they thought no way that Klay was/is better than Harden and on a general NBA forum as well thought it was pretty clear who the best SG is. It's just that we see every mistake he makes. That's why whenever we make a trade the first thing I do is visit the opposing teams forum to see what the fanbase thinks of losing said player.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">James Harden is dribbling about twice as much as 2014 to create his own shot. Not that it's a surprise. <a href="https://t.co/pCVp1fgvEi">pic.twitter.com/pCVp1fgvEi</a></p>— Dean Oliver (@DeanO_Lytics) <a href="https://twitter.com/DeanO_Lytics/status/689106812637937665">January 18, 2016</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
To narrow it down to a sentence: He doesn't value every possession. He turns the ball over too casually, and he is too quick to launch the transition 3 in critical moments.
along with 1) throws the ball away with bounce passes 2) takes too long to get the ball up 3) will not give effort if he's off the ball and 4) cannot consistently use screens effectively i'll add: he comes off the screen, dribbles into the paint and then picks his dribble up. Sure, it's related to problem #4, but it drives me absolutely crazy. Back out of there with your dribble alive and reset.
its just one turnover two turnovers three turnovers 5 turnovers 10 turnovers highest turnover average in rockets history its just reitrement
