I still consider Harden to be a top 5 player in the league despite defensive issues. I actually think Harden probably can be a slightly above average defender - he has that switch where he can make plays when he needs to...but we all seem to forget that he went from being a bench player to a guy who has to carry his team as the only real playmaker night in and out. He is still a work in progress and I think he will have more defensive impact as he becomes more seasoned in his offensive role and as his team develops a defensive identity. There are times I have seen Harden overplay to "let" a player go a particular direction and then he realizes there is no help defender there waiting like there would have been in OKC. Still even with those defensive problems, I have a hard time coming up with 5 guys in the league you would want before him. Lebron, Durant, CP3, and ummm? Harden? Dwight Howard (healthy)? Kyrie Irving? Blake Griffin?
what surprises me is if Lebron was a better freethrow shooter his ts% would be in the 65-70% range.. so awesome.
CBS ranking is based on games played by your team - Chris Paul miss bunch of games which count as negative toward his score.
No question...he's already better than Melo & Kobe and quickly gaining on Durant.No homerism..just the truth.
I didn't think he would be anywhere this good. That is straight off of nba.com, if you click on stats normally to see who leads in scoring or w.e it has this. Harden is damn good, some haters out there making their case for bad posters.
Harden ranks: 10th according to IPV (talking practice blog) 9th according to PER (Hollinger) 5th according to WS/48 (basketball-reference.com) 14th according to WP48 (wages of wins) 14th according to PIE (NBA.com & SAP) Factoring in all the minutes hes' played and the amount of responsibility he's been given, I'd say he's a top 7-10 player. These players I'd definitely rank ahead of him: LeBron James Kevin Durant Kobe Bryant Chris Paul Dwyane Wade Tony Parker
It's a good list except for Kobe. There is no reasonable justification for putting Harden below Kobe. They have roughly the same production but Harden is much more efficient.
