Where Do You rank James Harden Among the Top NBA Players Now?

***Also, Tim Duncan -30% FT %. Sad.

 

For people using defense as an excuse. Kindly remove Anthony/Bryant out of your top 5 then. Horrible defenders at the moment(Carmelo always has been).
This list is so interchangeable. If Dwight or Rose were healthy, you can insert in your top 5.

Duncan is absolutely not a top 5 player anymore. Leave reputation aside, and thus far your top 5 players this season right now.

1.Lebron
2.Durant
3.Anthony
4.CP3
5.Kobe/Harden

Im obviously taking winning in to consideration or Kobe would be top 3.
Cp3 isnt as offensively gifted as the other 5 I listed, but he is just an incredible point guard.

Harden has consistently put up around 30 points a game for a while now, and somewhat efficiently. He isn't a player to kill his team by chucking, nor is a selfish player.

 

Taking L James out of the equation (clear cut number one), if you look at everyone you have ranked above Harden _ all of those guys have All-Star caliber players on the floor with them. I like Durant a lot _ but even when he had Westbrook, OKC was still a lottery team... And how good was New Orleans when CP3 was there...??? Remember when Shaq left the Lakers and Kobe had no other star player with him _ he lead the team straight to the lottery.

With that being said, as of now I agree with your list because of past accomplishment... But if Harden gets this team in the playoffs with this roaster I would have him in the top three on my list.

But regardless of the rankings, this trade is going to haunt OKC for years to come... Especially if they don't win a championship...

Very well thought out post Mr Crash and a great read...

 

Top 15 is where most un-biased fan would put him.

 

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In retrospect, that ESPN list is terrible for a lot of reasons if the criteria was to rank players for the next (this) season.
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Players ranked (considerably) too high:

Garnett -too old and not as effective anymore
Chandler- Not ranked way too mucher higher than he should be, but still should be lower than he is considering guys like Noah and Varejao, hell even Asik impact the game very similar to how he does.
Bynum- injured forever
Rose- probably not coming back till the end of this season
Wade- Not having the best season. Should be in the 10-20 range, not top 10.
Dwight Howard - possibly still recovering from injury.. defense has lapsed. i'd have him in the top 15-20, not top 10.
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Players ranked too low:

Harden- obvious reasons
Zach Randolph- Um, how is Randolph not in the top 25 list? That's what you call media bias folks.
Kyrie Irving- This guy is just a monster
Curry- Needs to be on this list for sure
David Lee- He's playing better than the monster he was during his last season in NY. Probably the biggest reason why the Warriors are so good now.
Holiday- Having a breakout year and is the reason Philly is in the playoff hunt in the east.
Duncan- Agree with OP, how can you not include Duncan on this list?
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My own personal top 10 (skill and contribution wise) would be:

1. LeBron
2. Durant
3. CP3
4. Carmelo
5. Harden
6. Kobe
7. Kyrie
8. Z-bo
9. Parker
10. Curry/Lee (I can't choose one)
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Narrowly missing it because of their performance this year are:

Love
Westbrook
Griffin
Rondo
Wade
Dwight
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X-factor:

Rose- Who knows what this guy will be like when he comes back. Will he pick up where he left off? Will he be a shell of his former self? I'd be more keen to lean towards the latter than the former.

 

Top 10 FOR SURE

 

1. Lebron James
2. Kevin Durant
3. Chris Paul
4. Dwight Howard
5. Kobe Bryant
6. Carmelo Anthony
7. Russell Westbrook
8. James Harden

 

I think Harden is unarguably top 10, but if you were gonna make an argument for top 5 this guy has IMHO the best post for it, although personally I'd put DH at the top 4 spot instead of Melo. Anyway, Kobe/Melo/Wade/DH/Harden all belong in that same bracket anyway, which is amazing for us IMHO.

 

Lebron, Durant, Paul, Harden

Howard should be up there, but he's been buried by Kobe.

 

Not to derail the thread but OKC was just making the most of a bad situation. It wouldn't make sense for OKC top 3 guys the max and 1 guy the near max, they are only a small market team and can't afford paying luxury tax every year like the Lakers or Dallas. They had to choose one guy to go and for better or worse Harden was it.

As far as the trade, it's looking bad now only because Kevin Martin is the only guy currently playing. KM is a downgrade from Harden so of course it's gonna look bad. But part of the trade was for the future, once Lamb gets some seasoning and they get that lottery pick to add depth to their team then the trade would look so much better on their side.

 

If this makes sense, Harden is playing like a top-10 player, but I'd be hesitant to put him in the top-10 just yet...due to the sample size (amongst other things).

I'd put: LeBron, Durant, Paul, Kobe, Dwight, Melo, Westbrook, Rondo and Wade (I'm still convinced he's in a slump, and will come out of it) over him. There are a handful of guys who are in the next group, like Parker, TD, Griffin, Kyrie etc, but I'd probably put Harden over them.

So he's on the fringe for me only because of sample-size, and will likely concrete his status in the 6-10 pretty damn soon.

 

Would you seriously take Kobe, Melo, Westbrook, Rondo and Wade over him?

Short-term or long-term, I would not.

 

If we go by the entire season so far in general, he looks around top 15-top 10.

If we go by the last month or so, he is definitely top 10, and not too far off from top 5.

 

Yeah, but OKC could draft another Cole Aldrich, or Toronto may have to give them the pick in this draft, which is weak. Lamb could bust. Even when the trade happened, I did not understand why OKC would trade Westbrook over Harden. Westbrook is also known as Westbrick or Westchuck for a reason. Maybe they just felt loyal to Westbrook because they had given him the deal already. Westbrook just does not have basketball smarts and it will be exposed in the playoffs. We all saw Harden control the ball in crunch time during the Thunder's run. Westbrook wants to run his own show like Francis or Marbury. That's all he is to me.

 

1.Lebron James
2.Kevin Durant
3.Kobe Bryant
4.James Harden
5.Carmelo Anthony
6.Chris Paul
7. Russel Westbrook
8.Dwight Howard
9.Derrick Rose
10.Dwayne Wade

 

Tied for fourth/fifth with Melo, after LeBron, Durant, and CP3.

 

Actually I meant they should have traded Westbrook and kept Harden.. The draft is a crap shoot, you never know how lamb will pan out, and KMart will be gone after this season. They're still a great team though. I just think the took a few steps back with that trade. And Sam P. could have waited till the trade deadline to trade Harden so him and KD and the rest of the team could try to convince him to stay.

 

I say he is top five because I think about who would be the hardest players in the league to stop from scoring.

The thing that gets me about this poll is Chris Paul. So many people are rating him at #3, I just don't see it. I think he is a great player but I don't think he is in the top five. I don't like the way he acts and I wish somebody would knock the #*it out him so maybe that has something to do with it.

 

Exactly....

 

I voted 6 thru 10 but the more I think about it, there is only two people I would pick over Harden if I was starting a team right now. Thats Kevin and Lebron so I think he might be top five.