Harden is in a better situation. As good as Woods is, he's never going to be Durant level and the Rockets will never spend like Brooklyn will. Also, from a lob perspective, there are two players in the league where the lob is a weapon. We had both of them during the 17-18 season. Wall isn't going to develop it at his age. You can only use the lob if you can jog into the lane at half speed. Harden can do that, Paul can do that, Wall does not.
Eh, it's still easier to just take the easy route and join a super team. Of course, it sucks that it's even allowable. In a perfect world the cap would be set up in a way to make it difficult, but not impossible to get 2 super stars on a team via free agency or trades. Three shouldn't even be in the cards. Then, players like Harden wouldn't so easily be able to pout their way out of contracts, because the options would be limited. Parity would increase and players would simply have to play better if they wanted to win. Of course, the media, the casuals, and the NBA itself loves the super teams, while the rest of us honest-to-god fans of the 28 or 29 other franchises can only hope to somehow pull off upsets against whatever 1 or 2 other super teams happen to be contrived any given season (or monitor the injury situation).
I was just speaking generally - I like Wood the player. Just kind of soaking in all the positive vibes and my half cup empty world view wonders how many will be rudely awakened. It is fun watching this team though. Reminds me of the Lowry, Scola, AB Loveable Losers era.
Russ did it. And he was not going at half speed. But all in all, I'd rather have Wall over Russ of course.