Harden would have a hard time deferring to anyone at this point imo. He's a Robin or 3rd wheel type player, not a Batman. This year has shown that more then ever so far. An elite player like Durant would really have a problem with the way Harden plays currently on top of not giving his all most of the time on the defensive end of the court. I truly feel there was a reason Brooks had Harden coming off the bench in OKC. Brooks probably saw something in Harden which he felt was best served coming off the bench instead of starting/playing the bulk of the minutes with Durant and Westbrook.
Yet Lebron left Wade and Bosh to go play with Kyrie Irving? A guy that is also ball dominant, is far less efficient than Harden, produces less assists and plays even less defense? Then he bought off on acquiring Kevin Love who fits that same criteria? I'm not following you logic.
I did. http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showpost.php?p=10294785&postcount=591 Let's chart this tendency, I'll use one game for his TO's that I watched very closely. Rockets 103 - 121 Spurs I don't even have to check the game commentary to tell you that I remember very clearly Harden had 5 TURNOVERS resulting in 14 points directly off those turnovers. That is incredible efficiency. Astounding Effective Field Goal %, mesmerizing True Shooting %. Anyway I will do my due diligence and check. 03:54 Harden Turnover : Lost Ball (1 TO) Steal:Green (1 ST) 03:54 03:48 Green 3pt Shot: Made (15 PTS) Assist: Mills (1 AST) Ok, 1-0 (3 points) 02:47 Harden Turnover : Bad Pass (2 TO) Steal:Green (2 ST) 02:35 Aldridge Layup Shot: Made (10 PTS) 02:35 Capela Foul: Shooting (1 PF) (1 FTA) (M Smith) 02:35 Aldridge Free Throw 1 of 1 (11 PTS) Ok, 2-0 (6 points) 04:50 Harden Turnover : Bad Pass (3 TO) Stealiaw (2 ST) 04:45 Diaw Cutting Finger Roll Layup Shot: Made (9 PTS) Assist: Parker (8 AST) 04:45 Beverley Foul: Shooting (3 PF) (1 FTA) (M Smith) 04:45 Diaw Free Throw 1 of 1 (10 PTS) Ok, 3-0 (9 points) 04:25 Harden Turnover : Bad Pass (4 TO) Steal:Green (3 ST) 04:13 Leonard 3pt Shot: Made (20 PTS) Assist: Diaw (2 AST) Ok, 4-0 (12 points) 00:49.9 Harden Turnover : Bad Pass (5 TO) Steal:Mills (1 ST) 00:33.9 Ginobili Driving Finger Roll Layup Shot: Made (8 PTS) ok, 5-0 (14 points) 5 Harden Turnovers resulting in 14 points directly off those TO. Keep stating TOV% or other stats to prove his TO's are acceptable. Fact of the matter is Harden's long range bricks and Turnovers hurt this team. If you deny that, you're just basketball r****ded. Cheers
If you can't find a single game to back up your claim then there's no need to do an analysis on a full season. A single game or two would require less than 5 minutes research. You've already spent more time than that replying to posts in this thread. Based on the number of posts that you have in this thread alone, time doesn't seem to be a problem for you.
Lebron and Harden are nowhere near the same caliber player. Lebron has played in 6 finals, won two. What really separates Lebron and Harden is their mentality. Even when Lebron's clutchness was being questioned he hardly had the character questions like Harden does (lack of effort, not caring on the defensive end, etc.) Lebron is an all time great. He felt the need to go back home and try to win an championship in his home area. Lebron elevates his teammates way more then Harden. Bad comparison.
Even when Irving was 'the man' before Lebron, he never posted turnover numbers akin to Harden. In fact he averaged 2.7 topg the year before Lebron joined the team. Could you ever imagine Harden averaging 2.7 topg as the primary ball handler for a team? Defensively, they are on par. Both are recognized as two of the worst defensive guards in the league. The only aspect Harden has a clear advantage over Irving is in drawing fouls.
I mean...maybe? How do we know? He hasn't played with another elite offensive option during his time in Houston (Dwight's great, but he's never been an elite option offensively during his time here). He seemed okay in OKC with other stars. He seemed okay in FIBA with other stars. Sure, those aren't the same situation as the one he's in in Houston, but maybe Harden changes his play style if he starts playing with another elite offensive player? Maybe a better coach helps that as well? I don't know. It's hard to say right now. I think just assuming he would clash with somebody is pure speculation though, especially when historically that hasn't been the case. As for his time with Scott Brooks and the Thunder...it definitely made sense for Harden to come off the bench and provide a spark when they already had Durant/Westbrook starting, but many statistics shows that he performed very well alongside both of those players during their time on the court together.
It's not a 'narrative'. It's speculation based on common sense principles. I freely admitted that before. You act as if you you provide a data set that contradicts my speculation then that will some how melt me. By all means, tally all the turnovers and missed threes Harden has committed this season and see how many ppg he has contributed to the opponent in those regards. I'm sure he's contributed a substantial amount more with his ball watching defense. If it isn't a substantial amount. I'm wrong. No big deal. But I'm not tallying them up. Someone else can do that. Finding individual games is not sufficient evidence.
I believe James Harden is a gifted scorer - but is not a great team player - still has a ways to go.... Those calling him Adrian Dantley 2 are pretty much spot on at this point in his career....he has a lot of growing up to do..... And there may be 200 million or so odd reasons that he doesn't.....guess all we have is hope. DD
It took 5 minutes for the game log on ESPN, and another 2 on the video box score on NBA.com to look at the replay of the Lawson foul to see if it was fast breakish - it wasn't. Every single play is charted these days - if there was a case to make against Harden it wouldn't be difficult to make it if the data was there. Instead you get posters like DaDakota, fchowd, and the rest of these clowns for whom citing data is way, way less important than proclaiming your opinoin, as loudly and frequently as possible, in order to self-verify.
Christ. The amount of ignorance in this post is outstanding. Equating the Lebron situation is extremely stupid, and he already won 2 rings in Miami to show for it. It was more of a redemption story to go back to Cleveland, plus wade's knees were giving out so he might have found himself in a similar situation regardless. Durant made the conference finals the year before last and is on a team sitting at the 3rd seed right now. It is beyond moronic, absolutely stupid, and insane to put your hopes into thinking he wants to big booty hoe around with Harden. Put your money where your mouth is and place a bet with whatever conditions, amount , you want if you really believe there is a chance he'll come here.
I don't always agree with you, but in this case the data actually backs up your eye test. By just about every advanced stat Harden is worse than last year and having one of the worst years of his career. By some hes down more than others, but whether it's ORtg, drtg, win shares, ts%, all the turnover stats, all the plus/minus stuff, he's worse. Also if you look at stuff like how often he shoots at the rim or his free throw rate, it's down. His box score stats are still decent overall (scoring 28ppg on 59 ts is pretty good) even if not by usual Harden standards but not so much his plus/minus. There isn't much good defensive stuff out there but it's safe to say he's having a horrible year defensively, horrible even by his standards I would guess his plus/minus is down because of his one man zone defense and his "pick two" turnovers but that's speculation at this point But he's rebounding better, so there's that.
i still believe,,, in harden,,, in that he cant lead this team,,, or any team to a championship,,, with him being #1... there you have it.
LOL, he's second in the NBA in the points produced metric to Curry (he was first last year, I believe) - According to clutchfans Hardenhaters lobby -> this proves he can't be the lead dog MORE THAN EVER You guys are great. Never change, with making lazy assertions that take about 66 seconds and a search engine to dispel. Never change, you hear?
while a lot of what you said here is true. A lot isn't exactly correct either. His PER and Box Plus Minus are the 2nd best of his career. Two advanced stats that aren't in the tank. 27 points on .590 TS% isn't just "pretty good". It's good for 4th among all shooting guards this season. Him being the only one of the top 4 who isn't mostly assisted on their shot attempts. I mean just go to basketball reference and do the season finder for 27 points per game on 59.0 TS%. The short list of names it spits back at you are a list of some of the best players to play basketball, ever. Kareem, MJ, Lebron, Durant, Shaq, Drob, Barkley, Malone, Bird. Box score stats "decent"? Again punch in 27/6/7 in basketball reference and again you get a pretty damn short list. In fact only 6 other players in league history have pulled it off over a full season.
Ok if your point is my adjectives weren't strong enough, then fair enough. 27ppg on 59 ts% is pretty great. Although it does come on tons of usage and posessions, which is why his ORTg is only 113 (same as Dwight Howard). He's also getting tons of turnovers with his usage which is I'm guessing a factor in the plus/minus being worse. On his BPM, yes it's his second best of his career but significantly down from last year. This is true of Real Plus Minus as well, when he was top 3 last year an this year he's down to 18 (between Bosh and Rubio). To reiterate my point from earlier, I think it's interesting that people are mostly defending Harden with volume-type stats instead of the efficiency and plus/minus metrics he was previously known for.
A bunch of vacuous guff in this post. Harden's one of the most gifted scorers of all time. 3rd wheel really? 3rd wheel's don't carry teams to the WCF. Besides, who's he going to defer to? Jeremy Lin and Trevor Ariza? Harden's never played with elite offensive talent during his time in Houston. The only time in his career he did he deferred to KD and Westbrook & even unselfishly came off the bench for the benefit of the team. Nothing Harden's done in his career alludes to him being a selfish player.
Ortg to me is kind of a tricky stat. It definitely says something, but I think it's more of a team stat. I mean you pretty much summed it up by showing Harden and Howard are the same in offensive rating, but there's not really gonna be any other stat or set of eye balls out there that has them as equal offensive players. TS% is basically THE efficiency stat. And 59.0% while lower than his usual , is still all time elite for a volume scorer. Assist % and Rebound% both a form of efficiency are at career high levels. His player efficiency rating, 2nd best of his career. Obviously the turnovers and lower 3 point percentage are hurting his offensive RPM and its down a bit from being the best offensive player by that metric last year, to now he's all the way down to 3rd best offensive player. The biggest reason Harden is worse in plus/minus or RPM is his defense. His efficiency is great, his statistical output is almost a mirror of last season. and its not even about crazy usage, his per 100 possessions numbers across the board are almost identical to last season. Steals a little down, turnovers and rebounds a little up, but it's kinda crazy how close everything else is. No one is arguing that this season is just as good as last year. The argument is that even though it is worse than before, it's still pretty damn good. That people have completely lost faith and would like nothing more than to rid him from the team is just crazy talk.
