Anyone who thinks this is beyond delusional. Harden is NOT the type of guy who would take responsibility. He would completely believe it was his teammates' fault as well as the organization that let him down.
Then, let's give him the biggest stage, post game in the playoffs, to make those comments. I'm against the notion of wishing to lose. Try your best and let the chips fall how they may.
I agree. That's another reason why I want the 8th seed. Even aside from that, I think Harden would just respond better to getting embarrassed in the first round of the playoffs rather than missing them altogether.
the key word in the first quote is "humiliation," not "responsibility" as in the second quote. As such, missing the playoffs might just be humiliating in much the same way as that James Haren lack-of-defense video motivated him to improve his defense last season. I don't think anyone's suggesting that James would accept "responsibility" for this season's woes . . . on the other hand, missing the playoffs entirely would certainly give him some pause to reflect during the off-season about how he can avoid a repeat next year. Humiliation does in fact seem to be the one thing so far that has motivated Harden (well, that and big booty). I joke, I joke. :grin: So I'm in the 'missing the playoffs might be a good thing' camp on this one, only because I hope it would make James do a bit more off-season soul-searching than if he were to play in the first round or even the second round of the playoffs. Much easier in the latter case to excuse the sloppy play all season by saying only the playoffs matter, which seems to have been this team's MO all season long.
My 'heart' wants me to root for the Rockets. I want the Rockets to win. I enjoy them winning. The losses hurt. My 'head' tells me the Rockets need to miss the playoffs to keep their 1st round pick as it is another asset to help better the team in the long run.
Same, but another pick like Dekker wouldn't help us at all. So we might as well just try our best and see where the chips may fall.
Having a pick at least allows the Rockets options. Last year it was rumored the Rockets tried to trade up to get Booker (13) or Turner (11). You can't do that unless you at least have a pick to start with. Either of those guys would have been amazing to add on the Rockets.
Ofcourse it affects the FA pitch. "Join us to win a title" sounds much different when coming from a team who didn't even make it to the playoffs than from a team who did. There are no Bookers and Turners in this draft. Even Dekker he would be one of the best options if he was in this years draft at pick 14. You will be lucky to find one single starter after pick 6-7.
Don't forget that he's on the USA team for the Olympics and if the past means anything, he came into training camp in much better shape after the 2014 FIBA championship.
Clippers won't help us: <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Full LAC injury report for Fri in UTAH: Green-Quest, Rivers-Quest, Griffin-OUT, Johnson-OUT, Jordan-OUT, Redick-OUT, Paul-OUT</p>— Dan Woike (@DanWoikeSports) <a href="https://twitter.com/DanWoikeSports/status/718170124922957824">April 7, 2016</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
People out of this lineup: PG: Pablo Prigioni SG: Jamal Crawford, C.J. Wilcox SF: Luc Mbah a Moute PF: Paul Pierce, Branden Dawson C: Cole Aldrich, Jeff Ayres
Yes, I was thinking about how the only game of any real consequence for our playoffs competition might be when Utah and Dallas actually square off. But by then, who knows? We might have already thrown the game against the Suns and such. It's really starting to feel like we're out. And if so, this team deserves what it gets. Only thing to hope for then is some kind of trade greased with the first rounder we keep. Maybe something that gets Brewer as far away from our salary cap as possible.....but that's only more likely than Trump's Wall or Bernie's free education for all.
i'd really rather avoid the bullsh!t propaganda and "i told you so's" from casual NBA, GS fan, SA fan and everyone else who said this team would never succeed the sentiment will propagate in articles, forums and word of mouth after getting ass raped by pretty much any other playoff team we will be a joke (if we arent already) "Anything can happen in the playoffs..." Not with this team, they just dont play hard enough.
