Beverley isn't going to dramatically change how bad this team is defensively. People may want to tone down that expectation.
Do you have any evidence for this? It seems like Harden should commended for his cavalier attitude towards playing with someone the entire locker room didn't like, rather than ostracized. Especially given that all evidence, including our current team chemistry (WITH Harden) points to him not really being the problem last year, mentally or otherwise. Are you one of those people that just randomly posts their opinions as fact? I don't really care, I'm just trying to make use of the ignore function so I can narrow down the site to only useful posts. Further more, your best individual player IS your team's best player. However, that doesn't mean that every play your best player makes is the best one in the moment. That's why you have role players. To cover your main players weaknesses. So when you ask your role players to do things, you know, that ISNT their role, your team will invariably be worse. It was the initial flaw in morey's thinking, that he has long since inproved upon. He can't isolate stats on a single player, because the variables can't be controlled effectively. What can be controlled across different groups is line-up based stats.
Basically I just looked at his achievements and environment. His best results came when he was a Thunder, needless to say he had Superfriends and his 6th man role was perfectly suitable for someone like him. He thrived in the playoffs. As the first option he went to several firstround exits and with Dwight we finished 3rd round (WCF) but he did not lead us in all of those playoff games You could blame coaching, the system, but sans Dwight, Durant and WB, Harden was not successful in the playoffs and the Playoffs are the bigger picture here.
It's not that I believe we will be a dramatically better team defensively. I think adding him marginally improves both our offense and defense. On offense, starting Bev would allow Gordon to come off the bench. This allows Gordon to be the offensive spark plug we need him to be, ala Jamal Crawford. Bev would also allow us to cut the minutes going to Ennis and Brewer, who are both heavily in the minus and are terrible floor spacers. So instead of Brewer and Ennis' 29% career 3-point shooting for a combined 26 minutes per game, you get Bev's 37% 3-point shooting (40% last year). Harden (36) / Gordon (12) Beverley (26) / Gordon (18) / McDaniels (4) Ariza (33) / McDaniels (15) Anderson (30) / Dekker (18) Capela (24) / Nene (24) Ennis and Brewer combined have a -18 for the season. If you replace that with just a zero from Bev, you probably win the Laker game and come within a shot of the Cavs. On defense, the improvement is obvious. Bev takes the top offensive starting guard, and Gordon gets fresh legs against the opposing bench. It's not that Bev is a superstar or even above average player. He's just the only guy on the team that has his particular skillset (defense and 3 point shooting). That makes him very important to the rotation. BTW, if we had DMO and Bev, we are probably undefeated right now.
I agree Bev returning does put some of our other players in better positions as far as roles and PT but not so much to where it actually fixes the lack of a defensive identity here. It's actually easier said than done in this case. On paper it looks good but the actually excucation out on the floor not so much. Completely disagree having those two would mean being undefeated. Those are two players who aren't capable of being the difference in winning and losing at all. They do not shift or affect the game enough to be that type of factor.
Again, I don't think this is about either DMo or Bev being exceptionally good players that tip the game in one direction or another. They are probably league average players, but when you're having to play boat anchors like Brewer and Ennis, league average makes a difference. For example, DMo wouldn't get punished in the post the same way Dekker was by Love, and Bev probably doesn't get abused by Kyrie in the same way our other guards were. Those were too pivotal matchups that lost us the game yesterday, and while Love and Kyrie may still play well, they probably don't light our defense ablaze to the same degree if Bev and DMo are playing.
One thing I think Beverley will help with when he comes back is the defensive rebounding. He always hangs around and gets those (as I like to call them, "Sura rebounds"). Those rebounds around the FT line on long shots. He gets those on both offense and defense. It makes a difference.
Another shocking +/- for Harden in the Cleveland game. He played 40 of 48 minutes Harden was +23 for 40 minutes Rockets were -18 in the 8 minutes he sat
I noticed that. (And Tristan Thompson giving Rockets all kinds of problems was -23. To add skepticism into the +/- lol.) Still, this game showed what difference Harden can make playing FOCUSED on BOTH ends. Yes he had a couple defensive possessions he was a turnstile. But for the most part Harden was actively trying to be disruptive on D. And he made up his mind to drive in and get layups. Really he did everything, rebounded, shot a lot of 3's, drove in, got free throws, facilitated easier looks for teammates, got steals & deflections, even limited careless turnovers.
Frye +18 Thompson -23 I was thinking, "Hmm, maybe that has something to do with the fact that Harden kept driving past Thompson for layups."
When I seen this last night after the game I was baffled that I still get shocked by how great he is. Harden absolutely found their weakness in the PnR and abused them taking Tristan to the rim all night.
Harden really put up a true MVP performance, as indicated by his wild +23, with no one else on his team finishing better than a +5. If you want more context on +/- numbers, look at the 5-man rotations. Look at popcornmachine.net's NBA game flows. http://popcornmachine.net/gf?date=20170312&game=CLEHOU I think we caught a break with CLE's coach not playing Frye more. His stretch shooting as a center was giving us major problems.
Lou seems to be hurting our second unit. We're 6.5 points worse when he's on the court. Small sample size and the usual caveats apply.
I copy this here, from our discussion in the Game Thread, for others to comment on/read You're right. Lebron played for the first 17 1/2 minutes of the game. Harden sat to start the 2nd. So, LJ played 5 1/2 without Harden, and again 1 1/2 minutes to start the 4th without Harden, until MDA brought JH back in early to match up. So, LJ played 7 minutes total w/o Harden on the court, out of Harden's 8 rest minutes. CLE was a +12 in those 7 minutes of Lebron in/Harden out. CLE was only a +4 for those 5 1/2 minutes in the 2nd Q. They actually went on an 11-3 run (in like 2 minutes) between the time Lebron sat in the 2nd and Harden returned. But they were +8 in the 90 seconds to start the 4th with Lebron in and Harden out.[
Completely agreed. I think this was Harden's best game of the season. When he plays engaged he does exactly what you said --- attack the basket, disrupt on defense, make deliberate passes. When he is playing casual he takes heat check three pointers, watches people pass by on defense, and makes soft first passes. Great game last night. MVP quality.
Integrating a point guard mid-season will always be difficult, but I think some of the issues are the spacing. I don't think Dekker and Capela/Nene is going to work in the playoffs.
