The coaching hiring process seemed to be Les's doing as, in my opinion, he would prefer being fun and exciting like the MDA's Suns over taking a chance on a coach who could be JVG 2.0. I respect JVG and that type of coaching, but it's not a very entertaining product for your average fan. One person can only do so much, especially in the playoffs. I think it's reasonable to put those higher expectations on Harden but that doesn't mean they are correct in most instances. I have nothing to base this off of, but I would hypothesize it is much easier for elite wings and bigs to elevate their games postseason than elite guards who are primary ball handlers. NBA defenses are too good for another Jordan-like guard to emerge in my opinion, which is why upgrading the roster to get Harden some more help is most important. I'm not dismissing Harden's play when it's bad, but like I said there's only so much one player can do in this recent NBA history and only so much they can control. Harden's inconsistent defense and late game execution are the two areas he needs to improve. They lost to the best defensive team in the league and I would argue that losing Parker actually hurt the Rockets. Only game 6 is where the Rockets should feel ashamed and hang their heads, they lost game 5 on late game execution by Harden. If they hadn't lost game 6 in the fashion they did, would we even be having this conversation? I'm not too down about it frankly as I believe we pretty much got as far as we would get based on the regular season. Teams are always in flux, I guess my point was not to try and build your team around a window of avoiding historically good teams. Can't say sure-fire #2 without specifics, but adding a significant upgrade of talent that meshes well with how the Rockets/Harden plays certainly improves their shot. Unless Curry tweaks an ankle that lingers throughout a season or Durant's foot issue reemerges and sidelines him for a season. Too much uncertainty, but calling the GSW the #1 seed for the next 5 years certainly isn't outlandish. NBA is tough to win it all. That era was depressing... when they were healthy we had a crappy supporting cast and when they couldn't stay healthy we had a good supporting cast. I hope we end up pairing Harden with another top 20 player to recreate a duo.
That was re: the ship having sailed on that idea. The tho't being that mediocracy is sucko and the road past GSW was too far away. Then the Rox did an Owner Alexander kida thing and ByGolly it worked! Then it didn't. This roster screams for one very good addition + one good addition. Then the Rox are in the puncher's chance division of the Heavyweights. Mebbe.
Idk if you can call having a terrible game as the only playmaker vs a #1 defense a choke, but it's just semantics at this point
technically i dunno, he didnt show up to the game from the start. so i guess u cant say he choked if he didnt even try. if he at least tried like wall, it'd be different. doing this for 6 straight po's is bad. every season in his career he's been in the playoffs. how much time does he need to get over this mental hurdle? he doesnt need to single handedly go to the finals, he just needs to show up.
It really depends on what this team plans to do. If we are satisfied with a spot in playoffs, then you are right. If championship is the goal, then we need to cut lose earlier than later.
We are a few pieces away. Not going to jump the ship claiming Harden is a waste. That's just stupid given this is Dantoni's system year 1. We are one or more pieces away to be a contender. I think fatigue factor finally settles in. We over performed this year rather than under performed. At least give Dantoni 2 to 3 years to work with Harden and crew and then reevaluate.
Yall realize we lost to a very good Spurs team (although no Parker and Khwai in game 6). We were that close. To be honest, we had very little chance knocking on Finals door this year. I though we were going to pass the Spurs, but we didn't and had a good opportunity. That said, I think we ought to give Dantoni, Morey and Harden at least 2 to 3 years before we gut the team. We are already in that 4th spot in the entire league. That's some progress.
It's hard for me to believe that he didn't care about game 6 and quit. He worked too hard to do that. I think he was simply drained and tired. Too much was asked from him. He is after all a mortal soul just like everybody else. He is ahead of where Westbrook is right now. We need to find pieces that can give him more help. Those pieces are not as hard to come by as him.
It's hard for me to believe he quit as well. Yes we lost game 5 by 2 freakin points. All we had to do is come back in game 6 and shove it right back at them and we would be right where we started going into game 7. But Noooooooooooo....James freakin Mc Harden decides he doesn't want to play anymore because he got his feelings hurt or he was toooo tired from clubbin the night before, so he just hands the the series over to the Spurs on a silver platter.
The idea of maybe, mayeffinbe, being an 8-seed or 9, 10 for years was truly frightening my fanaticism; I never expected 'this year' (I shirley did not expect Game 6 either...).
You know, this whole excuse of Harden being tired, I don't buy it. If Harden was really tired or drained, he would have told coach "Get me out of the game. I'm a liability. Put someone fresh in there." If he knew he was too tired to play, why was he in there then? Is he that dumb??? You expect me to believe that James Mc Harden doesn't know when his own body is fatigue?
Do not confuse stupidity with arrogance. Harden may know he's tired, but in his mind a tired Harden might still be the best player on the team.
what abou this 2nd playoffs with rockets? he had 1st year dwight, parsons best year as a rocket, and lin for hepl on offense. at that time he had plenty of po experience.
I think the MVP race took a huge toll on him and pushed him too hard, I would have to imagine the front office has tons of data about rest and Harden really wanted that award. He's essentially been top 10 (more so top 5) in minutes per game since the 2012 season while carrying an oversized offense load. Interestingly, Lowry has been top 5 in MPG for the last 3 seasons and he's stunk it up in the playoffs too.
