Not only deflecting but completely dejected. He needs to keep his head up and get his smile back. Losses hurt but you got to shake that shet off.
Don't know why so many people are claiming harden is playing hurt. His coach doesn't think he is hurt. The medical staff cleared him to play days ago. Regarding calvin murphy's comment about harden quitting. I like calvin and respect his opinion, but in this case disagree. While it's true harden was passive and did not display the best effort or aggressiveness/decisiveness... He was a very good and willing passer/playmaker. He didn't hold or monopolize the ball. He passed quickly and made some great drop offs. The issues with his passive play imo is due to him not fitting in with the offense and wall. Harden is accustomed to having the ball 9+ minute per game. Only harden, wall, WB, doncic and trae have dominated the ball that much since the stat was tracked. Hardens time on ball has dropped to less than 8 mins per game (after this game). This is a function of playing with wall AND the new offense. It's going to take harden some time to play this way. The last time he did so was prior to Mike dantoni.
This does not bode well for the rest of the season. Coach can't be acting like he's out of answers 6 games in
Our offense will be better when Mclemore returns. He's our best shooter and i think Silas will run some plays for him that should fix some of our 3point shooting woes. But the defense isn't gonna get any better.
3pt ---- Tucker: 2 of 2 Cousins 1 of 2 Wall 0 of 3 Harden 1 of 5 (at least one was a heave before halftime ended, appreciated that attempt.) Nwaba 1 of 5 Tate 1 of 3 Gordon 2 of 10. (he was 7 of 15 overall, his layups and drives was much more effective) Brown 0 of 0 --- Brogdon 4 of 6 Holiday 3 of 4 * Is there something off with our permieter 3 pt defense? Should Boogie played more? We need BMac back ASAP.
ppl here are so critical of Harden. I got pissed at him as much as any other fan here when he ignoring covid protocol but... He already said he wants out of here no matter what and yet people expect him to play like he's happy. He's not happy being here in the first place to start the season. The fact he's even in games when he can pull a Vince Carter and force a trade immediately is already a miracle. Yes.. he signed a contract and is getting paid millions but he already declined even more $ offered (50mil/year extension) and what player would care about a team when he's unhappy where he is. EG was doing the same **** when he was on the Pelicans and all the fans hated him as a result. If you didn't know EG said he wanted out of NO when he was a RFA but the management still matched the highest bidder and retained him. He was extremely unhappy there for years and his on court play showed. At this point, you either blame Harden for wanting out or blame management for refusing to move on from him but wondering why he's playing so poorly is just silly.
I think it's alarming how much Harden play declines with an injury. He really needs to stop playing through it then. I think the months long slump last year in Jan was also him playing through some injury. Hes no spring chicken anymore, there's no Margin of error in a lot of things he does. A bum ankle is the difference between hitting a layup on a iso, vs struggling to get by the first defender
we seen how quick and agile harden looked before his ankle injury. he's obviously been 2 or 3 steps slower since then.
The GARM gonna be unbearable in a few weeks... All your hopes and dreams put into a slow dinosaur center and a rail thin forward...
Somebody tell Silas that this is the city of Houston..... We don’t care about your head being down and acting all defeated.... Man up ...Do your Job... And get it done... Take that soft crybaby **** back to Dallas... It won’t work with me... I’ll never feel sorry for you... Grown man ****
Harden just said his ankle is ok but that doesn't matter to all you ass hats on this site who continue to defend his half-assness...