The 4th quarter stats were posted earlier in the thread. He was more efficient on 3s over midrange in all three seasons. As far as clutch time, Harden was incredible from behind the arc in the first two seasons that you mentioned. 47.4% and 50% in cluchtime on 3 pointers.
I'm still having trouble understanding how taking an inefficient shot makes you or the team more effective. . Are you thinking that teams will try to adjust their defense to stop Harden from getting midrange shots? The opponent would welcome Harden taking a shot that he's only going to hit at 40%. Every one of those that he takes is one less of the shots where he expects to shoot in the 60% efficiency range. Do you also believe that Shaq would have been more effective if he'd have hoisted up a few 3 pointers per game rather than sticking to the predictable postups? You don't take a shot that is inefficient when you could be taking a shot with 50% more efficiency. That's just common sense. If Harden were 50% more efficient on the ball vs off, then whey would you ever play him off the ball?
So this will be my last reply to you not because I feel defeated or I feel that I'm wrong; I just don't see the point because you're engaging me in a conversation that started off with misinterpretation from you. If you want to respond back to this comment, fire away. I've never had any issue admitting a mistake I've made on this forum nor have I had any issues apologizing if I'm out of line. Now to your reply: Again, I'll respond with: I entered this conversation yesterday to disprove the belief/myth that Harden was "bad" at the midrange shot or that he "sucks" at the midrange shot. Never in my posts since yesterday did I ever say that the midrange shot was more efficient than the 3...in fact efficiency was never mentioned in any of my replies. As for "sucking" or being "bad" at this particular shot, I guess the definition will vary from one person to another but from all of the data I've provided Harden has been above the league average on midrange about half of the time during his career. The other half? It's been slightly below league average with one or two seasons with a % variance higher than 5%. So if a guy has had above league average % for half of his career....is he TRULY "bad" or "sucks" at the midrange? Even if he was terrible the other half of the time Harden would probably just be an average midrange shooter....which makes the whole "Harden is bad at the midrange", "Harden has always been a below average mid range shooter", "Harden sucks at the midrange" argument incorrect. To remind you of what you replied to me that started this conversation in the first place: I don't know if you either hit the quote button on the wrong member or you decided to reframe/misinterpret my post but here it is again: No where in this post did I mention the efficiencies or inefficiencies of the midrange and no where in this post did I mention wanting Harden to shoot more midrange shots over 3s. If the "you" in your response was meant to be in general terms rather than directed towards me, then I apologize for taking it personally, however, if this was the case then I'd like to ask that you don't quote/reply directly to my post to eliminate this from happening in the future. Just to humor you, here are Harden's stats from NBA.com compared to the stats I pulled from Basketball Reference for 16ft-3point line: 2009-2010: 38.6%; BR.com: 38.1% 2010-2011: 40.2%; 40.2% 2011-2012: 40%; 41.3% 2012-2013: 33.5%; 33.3% 2013-2014: 40.6%; 41.1% 2014-2015: 37.3%; 33.7% 2015-2016: 40.5%; 40.2% 2016-2017: 41.1%; 42.7% 2017-2018: 39.1%; 36.8% 2018-2019: 42%; 34.3% 2019-2020: 50%; 50% 2020-2021: 47.4%; 57.1% If you want to point me in the right direction to get the league averages on mid range FG% I can certainly do a comparison between Harden's averages versus the league average (because, after all, my stance has been on whether or not he's a good midrange shooter, not on whether or not the midrange is more or less efficient than other shots). If you want to even use, say, 40% as the league average on midrange every year, Harden has been at or above that threshold 8 out of the 12 seasons he's been in the league. Again, nothing about efficiencies of the midrange; just stating that Harden isn't "bad" or "always been below average" on the midrange. But point me in the direction of where I can find the league average for midrange shots and I'll gladly do the work for you.
Could an argument be made that by being less predictable, your more efficient shots become even more efficient (because the defense has to at least expend some energy on defending the "less efficient" shot - if they don't, suddenly that one becomes more efficient)? So by mixing it up a little bit, even though you are occasionally taking a less efficient shot, it reduces predictability and thereby increases the percentage on your already more efficient shots (as a team)?
Yeah no debate there. The question was never the efficiency, it was is he actually a “bad” mid range shooter or not. Going off memory of his numbers I responded to @Easy and disagreed thinking he was actually pretty bad. Going back over everything I’d say the fairest way to put it is overall he was averageish. Some really/pretty good years, but never elite. Some pretty average/bad years. And I agree that for almost every situation in games his shot selection strategy was the 100% right way to play it. But there were late game scenarios where it MAY have been a favorable option to consider some midrange.
Yes, this is exactly what I am thinking. Thank you. @AroundTheWorld put it quite well. I am not going to repeat what he has said. Would just quote him: Your Shaq example does not work because Shaq was a terrible long distance shooter. Harden is not a terrible midrange shooter, just slightly below average. If hypothetically Shaq could shoot somewhere between 30-35% from 3, I'd say he should shoot more from outside if the opponent kept crowding him down low. Giannis is a below average shooter. His bread and butter scoring move is forcing his way to the basket. So teams put up a "wall" in the paint to take away that move. Rather than continuing knocking his head on the wall, he needed to shoot and make some midrange, even 3-pointers to soften the wall. And that's what he did.
AND if he were to use it more in the games he would become even better at it... btw you made beautiful points in this post qouting around the world and giving the yanis example...you both made my day! its a paradox and i like paradoxes! by using a less efficient shots you become even more efficient! PURE GENIUS
This right here is what separates Greatness from the super stars. Greatness will take what the defense will give them and get buckets when the game is on the line. That Game 7 0-27 game could have been avoided had Harden just went got some mid-range buckets. We probabwouldnt be having this conversation today….
people keep talking about how 3 is more efficient than 2 when everyone already knows that What about when Harden is struggling mightily from 3 and we absolutely needed a bucket in clutch time? I would rather he tried a 40% midrange shot if he wasn’t going to drive to the rim than continue to miss from 3. and who knows how good a midrange shooter he could be right now if he worked on that part of his game instead of basically abandoning it completely When Harden warms up pre-game, he typically starts with a bunch of midrange shots to catch a rhythm before shooting threes. Why can’t he go to midrange when he was off from 3 to try and catch a rhythm instead of finishing a game 2-12, 3-14, or even 1-17 from 3?
Not sure if he would become significantly better. I assume that he can hit those shots in practice. But in real game defense wouldn't let him shoot wide open midrange. That's why I believe that the defense would adjust if he did, thereby forcing them to defend more space. He doesn't have to shoot a lot from there. Just let them know that he will if they let him.
Oooh no, Harden should never be blamed or held accountable for anything. All and every failure Harden has ever had is because of an outside source that caused it. Ref's, coaches, gm's and even owners are directly to blame for Harden's missed shots in the playoffs...
Were simply talking about threes over midrange which morey mandated to the team and still swears by after the facr Are blaming harden for not going rogue and not shooting midrange in defiance of moreys and mdas and teams gameplan?
