Rockets showing interest in trading for Ricky Rubio?

My comment was not about Harden in a vacuum. I don't necessarily think Harden will win a championship as our only playmaker as he is now. This was a comparison.

I just think history proves that teams are more successful with the ball in Harden's hands than in Rubio's hands.

 

history proves that you need more than one legitimate playmaker, especially one that isn't also your main scorer. So until harden shows he is willing to adjust, expect the same results as they are now.

 

Harden played the same way past year and they made the WCF?

The team did better when JSmoove was on. JSmoove always thinks he's on and plays aggressive. He usually off. But on/off, Harden played the same way and "adjusted" - meaning he played the same.

Consider Draymond plays better than a good JSmoove every game. Consider Klay is on most games. Or consider Irving plays aggressive. Or consider the Thunder... Etc etc.

The Rockets results are because their players are way worse overall than the other teams. Not because of Harden, lol

 

why do people keep bringing up last year over and over. that's the problem. you can't play the same way. Teams get better, players get better. I guess this needs to be brought up again. Who on this team got better? No one did and that includes JH.

JS is no longer relevant. It doesn't matter what he did in game 6. what he does every 5 or 6 games. He just isn't a player to be counted on. He wasn't relevant in LA and won't be here.

The Rockets results are because of everyone on the team including JH. he doesn't get a pass. he hasn't played well this year either.

 

I thought this thread was about Rubio?

 

Your comments were relative to his style of play. His style of play VERY recently had success... And a lot of it and ESPECIALLY when he had at least one other aggressive player in the flow of the offense, much less a whole squad of all stars surrounding him.

I think your me on California, so assume you are sucked into the GSW and LA bubbles. James started out poorly but has since played as well if not better than last year.

The rest of the team regressing is definitely not on him or his style of play. It's them sucking, not playing as motivated (see Brewer, Lawson), the horrible Lawson acquisition and other bad roster moves.

Perhaps you want to make a comment about Hardens leadership style... Which I could agree could use some work. Maybe he needs to be a better motivator. But that's a tough thing to figure. Was Kobe a good leader? Lebron? MJ? It's hard to tell. Some teammates responded really well to their styles, others not so much. It does seem like their same styles worked a whole lot better when they had HOF teammates around them.

James Harden can clearly be the best player on a championship team. He can be the best player on a multi ring team. He's one of the best offensive players in the league, efficient, clutch, can hit free throws, and creates for others exceptionally well. He can get better... He's not Steph... But very few in the history of the NBA have ever had Steph's current season.

 

JH is no where near the level he was at last year and that includes everything hes done to this point. Him being the best player on a championship team is very much up in the air and as it looks these days it doesn't look too good. Of course those guys were great leaders. how is that even questionable. Their resumes speak for themselves and on a consistent basis. Harden has a ways to go to become a leader like those guys. He may not ever be. That's not really a knock on him because not everyone can be. But how many more seasons are we going to keep discussing hopefully he figures it out or hopefully he does this and that. The door is going to close faster than people may realize.

 

Agree 1000%

 

Spot on.

 

I totally agree, and have said that all along! The one and the four positions has been very poor all season. Harden plays better when playing fast. Patrick does not push tempo which actually hurts Harden's game. He plays better with guys like Lin & Dragic, and guys that play a more uptempo style.

 

He's actually almost, statistically, the exact same player as last year.

The difference is his supporting cast has failed him. Last year those guys were hitting shots. This year, they're not.

T Jones has been awful.
Lawson is ridiculously bad.
D-Mo has been hurt
Brewer=down.
Smith=bad

 

Of course the average person would just look at stats and believe so. I don't care for statistically. Its not even close to the impact JH had compared to last year. Anyone who has followed him consistently would know the difference.

No the difference does not come down to hitting shots. The actual difference is the defense has gone completely south. That's the #1 thing people should worry about correcting before anything else especially if you're trying to fixate anything having to do with offense

 

Hardens turnovers are up and his steals (and overall defense) are down. And those statistics are killing us.

 

I think almost 100% of people who follow him on the site and on this board would agree with the above. He has decent games and stretches defensively, but on the whole it's a level down. Eye test AND defensive statistics shows the same thing.

That said, why have you seemed to focus on his offense so much? eg...

were you talking about adjusting his defense??

 

Ive made it known the 1st problem to fix over anything else is this teams defense. Without making a huge change on this end, it won't matter how many points the Rockets score.

 

Yep. Turnovers are higher, defense is worse, steals are down, his explosiveness seems diminished (fewer dunks) which leads to fewer change-of-pace moves/EuroSteps so when he gets hit, it seems to be straight on instead of the brush fouls that the rest of the NBA hated to see James get. I think those impacts are taking their toll on him too. Despite that his FTR is actually lower as refs have swallowed their whistles a bit. So some of it is on James, some if it is out of his control, and some of it may be fatigue-/health-related.

He's definitely not the same as last year, even if he's been very good.

 

Great. Everyone agrees with that.

Sure seems like a lot of random opinions about JH's offensive style and game and adjustments needed and ability to lead a team to the championship - offensively - when the big issue, obviously, is defense.

 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Minnesota has no ongoing trade talks for guard Ricky Rubio now, league sources tell <a href="https://twitter.com/TheVertical">@TheVertical</a>. That may change in the summer, though.</p>&mdash; Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojVerticalNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/WojVerticalNBA/status/699714353847791616">February 16, 2016</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

Not really

 

REALLY...

http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/r/rubiori01.html