Harden Absolutely MURDERED Portland

I do not know what is better (actually I know)

The team's record doing better while stars' numbers are diminishing from what they would have been on mediocre or bad teams.
He is allowing others to score more.

OR

The superstar's numbers are at an alltime high but the team's record is not good.

I would guess it is all about him being effective with the BALL IN HIS HANDS most of the time.

We had that discussion before.

I am guessing he really needs another superstar to take the load off him.

Those stars are not easy to get.

 

Clutchfans be like:

 

We knew he could score and assist in crunchtime that is why he was the best 6th man for the Thunder team.

His game is still based on that. Scoring and getting the ball to other players to make couple of shots.

Nothing has really changed other than him going to the line much more, making even more shots.

In OKC he had Durant and WBrook who could fill up the stats sheet as well and maybe both are a tad worse playmakers but

both Durant and Wbrook did not overdo the playmaking therefore they did not end up with many Turnovers and they could rely on each other

and they had younger and more aggressive Defenders at that time

Still could not win a title though, but if Harden had stayed with OKC he could have gone to the Finals more

And in the Finals there is a chance he would have won a title.

 

So are you saying that Harden is a bench player or that Westbrook doesn't TO the ball? Even though he's right below Harden in that catagory avg 4 a game?

I don't really understand what point your trying to make?

I mean it doesn't take rocket science to realize that had he stayed in OKC they would have won a finals or two, OKC would have 3 top 10 players.

 

All I said was it really takes a lot to duplicate the OKC team.

Harden at least needs another legit perimeter superstar (that can play off the ball- Ray Allen, Durant.....) and a killer bench.

They can duke it out who the No 1 on that team is.

But the management cannot be cheap and has probably to pay the tax every year.

And they probably have to go through the draft to draft a "WBrook".

 

Harden def needs another superstar on the perimeter with him. He's the only superstar that doesn't have one next to him.

 

Someone said last week he should still be a 6th man, lol. Man some of you guys are crazy. You know who you are. Watch next bad game they'll be out in full effect.

 

First it was Harden sucks cuz he turns the ball over too much, then it was that he was a cancer and bad teammate. NOW the story is Harden can be pretty good but it's management's fault for not giving him help.

Backtrack much?

This thread is comedy gold.

 

1) He was always good yet flawed, failing to make teammates better, TOs.......and so on

2) The narrative of him driving McHale out and pressing for a Howard trade.
Those things have to be confirmed first.

Questionable but not entirely out of the realm of fantasies. (He has a passive aggressive nature, demeanor)

3) Management is trying but I guess as Harden the management is going through a hit and miss phase - inconsistency at its worst and best

 

Well, the Spurs' defense is much harder to murder than the Blazers'.

 

And he still dropped 27 on them, with a moderately efficient game considering it's the Spurs. Too bad we need him to score 40 to win on a consistent basis.

 

I said earlier. We DON'T need him to score 40 to win IF he and the rest of the team play consistent defense.

 

Our defense really wasn't the issue last night.

Our complete and total lack of a 2nd scorer to help Harden was.

 

It's hard to have an offense with others involved when we've stagnated everything and turned the plays into let harden dribble and figure it out for so long. Not really fair to blame the players when they've been relegated to sitting and camping at the 3pt line and then are expected to score a bunch, after they've been taken out of their comfort zone and strengths. You're right to a degree, but the defense did matter and it's not as simple as wishing for a 2nd scorer. If I remember correctly, Dwight was putting up great numbers and playing good D in 14', but we still lost to a team we were superior to and had HCA against. At some point you can't keep making the same argument when the situation changes and you're left with the same problem. He can't be that ball dominant and expect anybody to be a reliable and efficient 2nd scorer. Just not possible . It's been stated numerous time due to its obvious nature, but James has got to play off the ball more, and to do that he needs to up his FG % (it's been up these last 15 games so I have hope ). Right now he's maintaining his efficiency by playing on the ball and looking to draw fouls as much as he can to compensate for his drop is shooting % this season. The other option is to surround him with as many off the ball players, catch and shoot guys as possible. after 4 yrs, not employing even one specialist shows you that the FO is more focused on star chasing and doesn't believe those FAs are worth the money. They haven't done it yet, and they won't be doing it any time soon. Expect more potential diamonds in the rough shooters to make their way onto the roster as they try and go all in for they Durant pipe dream.

So in summary, were ****ed.

 

Which players have been taken out of their comfort zone? Ariza and Bev are spot up shooters what else do they do? Lawson has been equally bad when playing beside Harden or when Harden is on the bench and he has the ball in his hands. Brewer?

Who on the Rockets besides Harden is an above average offensive player? It's not like we have a bunch of great offensive players who are being held back. Most of our players depend on someone else to create a shot for them and they are best at hitting open jumpers.

You may remember it that way but that doesn't make it true.

Dwight has put up better numbers this season that he did in '14. He shoots the ball less but he's more efficient now. In '14 he shot .591 from the floor and this season he's shooting .608. In '14 he averaged 3.2 TOV/G and this year he's down to 2.5 tov/g.

In 2014, both Portland and Houston finished the year 54-28. We got HCA based off of a tie breaker. You may have considered us superior but that Portland team was talented (Aldridge, Lillard, Batum, Matthews, Lopez) and we were evenly matched.

Did we all think we were going to win? Sure we did and I'll bet most Portland fans thought that they would win too. It was certainly disappointing but losing to a team with an identical record in a #4 vs #5 matchup isn't a giant upset...even with HCA.

Just not possible? That's 100% incorrect.

Harden's usage is 32.8 so why can't another player use those other possessions? There's plenty to go around.

When Miami won the title in '12, Lebron's usage was 33.8 and yet Wade was able to still have a usage of 31.7. How were they able to have two high usage guys in the same lineup? Did you not consider Wade a reliable and efficient scorer?

Westbrook's usage this season is 32 yet Durant is still able to post a usage of 29.8. Is Durant reliable and efficient enough for you?

Curry's usage this year is 32.2 and Thompson still has a usage of 26.2.

Lebron's usage this year is 31.3 and Irvings is 29.5 and Love's is 23.1.

Lillard's usage is 31.2 and McCollum's is 27.3.

In their final title season of 2001, Shaq had a usage of 31.8 while Kobe had a usage of 31.7.

As I said, there's plenty of possessions to go around. It's simply a matter of making an intelligent choice about who consumes those possessions. You don't take the ball out of your most efficient player's hands. Instead you lower the possessions of some of the highly inefficient guys that are handling the ball too much already.

So if all of those guys could play together then why do you say that it's not possible? It is possible. In fact, it's quite common.

Do you realize that Harden is actually driving less this season than last year? His free throws are pretty much the same as last season. Also, that drop in his shooting % is 44% to 43.3%. That's hardly a huge difference.

Do you really believe that he's changed his game due to a 0.7% decrease in FG%?

 

LOL. Some of these dudes hope and pray Harden has a bad game so they can sharpen their pitchforks and riot.

 

....just watching aelliott go to work...

 

Not really, but it was pretty predictable than Kawhi would murder Harden. This wouldn't happen if Harden would just get in shape like last year.

Why did jbb think guarding kawhi with Harden one on one was a good idea? He thought it was better than putting him on Danny Green?

 

Asking why JBB did something is hard to answer. JBB's coaching is...questionable at times...

 

Kawhi doesn't usually cross you over and blow by you. He uses his pumpfake and does a lot of work in the post. Harden is a heavy guard. Kinda makes sense to let Harden guard him. Danny Green is the guy that takes a bunch of energy to cover because you just chase him the whole time, and you know he's not gonna hold Parker... Harden most definitely needs to lose some weight this off-season. Looking at old highlights, it's obvious he's put on poundage...