Harden's problem is that he is not held accountable by McHale. The team should stop defering to Harden so much and just play - and when he misses his defensive assignments he should be yanked from the game until he starts playing defense. DD
I'm kinda torn on this. So far, Harden has been awful in 'clutch' situations, but he seems to have the mentality that he has to carry the team late in games. He wants to earn that superstar mantle. Admittedly, it's been hard to watch, but at the same time, we need a go to guy at the end of games. It can't be Dwight because of his foul shooting, so it's going to have to be Harden. I'm hoping he can grow into being more effective (whether finding the open man or creating a decent shot) throughout this season.
And they shouldn't defer to Harden. It's not like this team lacks talent where everything revolves around Harden. Dwight and Parsons are extremely capable to lead the team offensively for big chunks of the game also. Harden is getting exposed right now. Let's hope he steps up.
Why do you think that we are in a win now mode? We have a young team and a some cap flexibility. The message that I kept hearing Morey say time after time was that our goal for this season was to get homecourt in the first round. In fact Morey mentioned several teams that were better than us. If you've heard Morey say that we have to win a championship this year then please post the link. I have never heard anything like that. The Rockets are trying to build a championship team but I don't think too many people (including Morey and the players) thought that this was a finished product.
The consensus expectation for the Rockets leaguewide coming into this season was that they were a second round team and probably not more than that. Some folks thought they could make it as far as the conference finals and of course there are a few like JVG who picked them to go all the way. Right now though, this does not even look like a second round team. If we go into the playoffs without home court, the only team I could see us beating is the Blazers and that's only due to their lack of experience. They play smarter and harder than us and have a great home crowd, so we'd have our hands full. If we faced the Thunder, Spurs, or Clippers, we'd be lucky to extend any of those series to 6 games. What concerns me more than that though is that at the moment, we're on pace for 50-51 wins. That's a pretty lousy "improvement" over last season considering our returning players are supposedly older and wiser and we added Dwight Howard to the roster.
So the reason we lost was Harden huh? Rudy Gay going off in the first half had nothing to do with it? Demarcus Cousin's scoring and rebounding wasn't a factor? Thomas getting into the lane any time he wanted wasn't a problem? Fredette waltzing to the basket a couple of times and scoring 10 of the bench didn't happen? Do you think the rest of the team (besides Harden) going 2-17 from three point range was a factor? Did missing 12 free throws make a difference? How about the team starting the game with no energy? There's plenty of reasons that we lost that game. I just find it hard to blame a guy that scores 38 with 10 rebounds. Do you complain when OKC goes iso late in games? Miami? San Antonio? If you've got that big of a problem with ISO's late in games then you must really hate the NBA because the way the rules are setup that's how teams play. Who are the teams that don't do that in today's NBA?
Under the criteria described in this thread (last 3 minutes, 5 point game or less ) LBJ has dished a total of 3 assists for this entire season. He has Bosh and Wade as targets and he's still taking it himself 5 times out of 6 times. So either you're incorrect about him passing too often in the clutch or it's not working out into made baskets. Fouling wasn't a concern for Parson's last night? He couldn't throw it in the ocean from the foul line last night.
This game didn't have to come to the few bad possessions by Harden, but you are right that a lot of things came to play to lead to that. I hate when Houston goes into panic mode and Harden just takes over....to many ugly losses this way. Harden had a great game up until the end when ne needs to understand that there are 4 other players on the court. Lin and Thomas both cancelled each other out, I'd give Harden a pass for all those points and rebounds, but it was Gay and Cousins that pretty much outplayed their respective opposites. The game was pretty much loss in the 1st half.
This thread is about clutchness, right? So, are you saying that in the clutch your solution is to throw the ball inside to Howard? That's our best percentage play? If we had Hakeem in the middle do you really think that we'd play the same way ? Maybe there's different strength and weaknesses for each player? Dwight is a force on the court but he's not a viable option at crunch time and that's not a fault of the coaching or teammates. It's just a fact...his game isn't suited for that. Rudy T. wouldn't change that just like he (or JVG or Adelman) couldn't do much about teams taking away Yao by fronting. You couldn't front Olajuwon but it sure worked most every time against Yao...different players different skills and different limitations.
Bottom line is Harden is not a team player - period! He just signed a 5 year max deal, so it's not like he needs to work his stat line to put himself into the position for a near future contract renegotiation... He has argueably the best center in the league... He could easily defer some of the offensive end assignments to D12 and conserve some energy to play better d on the other end... but he doesn't... I'm really starting to feel like this guy is just a gloryhound who wants to put up big #s to impress people - rather than win... I'm thinkin more n more that we're gonna need to trade this dude in order to win it all... let him go be the sole focal point on a crappy team, since he obviously doesn't want to be part of a winning team.... just my 2 cents...
Notice how when Lin brings up the ball Harden just stands there waiting for him to give him the ball instead of running trying to get open.
Yes, if you're basing your judgment of a team off it's play on December 31st then you're absolutely correct. So you think that this is the finished product? We've had a lot of changes since last season and we've had a string of injuries. Incorporating Howard into the team is a huge change but we've also added Beverley and Jones into the starting lineup, brought in Casspi and changed the roles of Lin,Garcia and Brooks from last season. We've also been without Asik for a big chunk of the season. You don't think that both the Rockets offense and defense will improve as they get more experience playing together? Based on the amount of change and adversity they've faced is 21-13 a disaster? I think the fact that we can still have that type of record shows the amount of talent and depth that we have. Certainly there's plenty of room for improvement which is the encouraging thing.
I think as a "closer" Harden is the guy to go to. But down the stretch, there's not a thing wrong with getting the ball to Parsons or Lin and maybe they'll even execute a play to an open Jones or Beverley when he comes back if they're going with the 3 guard line-up. I think good offensive possessions down the stretch to getting off quality shots > predictable Harden ISOs.
LBJ looks to make the pass when a guy is open. He has Allen too, he has great HOF players in Wade and Allen but I saw the last game against the Nuggets and he passed to Beasley late in the game for a big jump shot he knocked down. Harden doesn't do that, he takes the jump shot and works much more time off of the clock and too often when he passes it's last second bail out heave. There's no comparison to the way Harden ISOs or runs the team vs. LeBron in crunch time. Their approaches are noticeably different. Now, Harden isn't always like this. In some games he'll trust a team mate and pass the ball in close late-game situations. So, it would be great to get that Harden, not what we saw last night. I'm not anti-Harden. I like Harden and think he is a fantastic player but flawed, like others. And I realize he's very young. Parsons hasn't been great at the line but he has played extremely well most of December and was due for a not-so-great game.
He's not a team player yet he's leading the team in assists? Howard got 1 shot the 2nd half and Harden's not the only player handling the ball. Are all of the other players also not team players? Why didn't anyone pass the ball to Howard? Exactly what near future contract negotiations are you talking about? Harden has 5 years left on his contract.
Not totally true. I few times he ran free of his man to get the ball from Lin, especially when Lin picked up his dribble. I think Lin uses Harden as a crutch sometimes when he is, seems to me, playing not to turn the ball over. That's the "passive" Lin that CF complains about and I think with some justification. He wasn't totally passive in the last game but he wasn't the really aggressive Lin either. I guess he's trying to find the balance between control and aggression.
In the last 3 minutes with a difference of 5 or more points Lebron has a total of 3 assists for the season. So I'll ask again: Are you mistaken about how much Lebron passes in the clutch? Or is he really passing that much and his teammates are just missing the shots...if so why would you think that is a better idea than Lebron taking the shot himself? 3 assists with two All-NBA players as targets and both are good from the perimeter. Either he's not passing it or passing it is failing a huge percentage of the time. You should feel lucky, when you saw that assist to Beasley you say 1/3 of Lebron's assists in clutch situations.
Funny, he was pretty damn clutch when he was taking over games on the road against San Antonio. There have been other games where he has taken over in the 4th to pull the Rockets to victory over the last 2 seasons. Bad, suck ass thread deserves one star or even zero.
How much Heat have you watched? Or LeBron? Whether it is hockey assists, a pass that isn't knocked down, or the ball going through several team mates and then back to LeBron, he is always looking to involve team mates. At times he'll take some shots but his team mates know they may get the rock at anytime so they are alert and not standing by watching. That's the big difference between LeBron and Harden, regardless of any number of assists may be on any stat sheet. LeBron is looking to involve team mates much more in late game situations than Harden is.
