Grantland: Ibaka’s Return Fuels More ‘What If’ Questions About James Harden

Nice argument that they could have kept both. OKC pulled the trigger too early...

Shows the danger of "smart" long-range planning. I think we can sympathize thinking that keeping Dragic for an extra year would have hamstrung us a bit too much.

 

Kind of hard to make a judgement call on whose fault it is though. Presti may have had a mandate to never pay any luxury tax at all, in which case the blame really lies with the ownership.

 

Hindsight is 20/20 but the article basically lays out all the reasons they could have just kept all 4 and also discusses all the reasons they decided to make the move. Also I don't remember hearing that at the very end OKC offered a deal that was only 4.5 mil short of the 4 year max. Surprising they wouldn't just offer the max.

Some key points I took from the article regarding Harden.

So for those who put stock in what Lowe has to say. You don't trade young top 15 players. And yes you can still be regarded as that good even with terrible defense.

 

Apparently there are more than a few posters on here who are more than comfortable trading Harden even now as he's shown he can be a 25PPG scorer, be a perennial all-star, and take a team to the playoffs pretty much by himself.

But now that we've put together a compilation of the worst 12 minutes of the season for Harden on the defensive end he's now "exposed" for his weaknesses and should be traded.

 

Realistically Harden isn't worth max with two other perimeter stars on the same team, because of his lack of portability. For instance, OKC would be much better team if they paid Asik and JJ Redick each $8M rather than Harden $16M.

 

Oh really? Please explain.

 

I think those posters would only trade Harden for another top 15 young player (MELO doesn't count) or Lebron James.

Knowing Morey, he probably doesn't consider anyone untouchable.

 

Summary: The Thunder were too cheap to pay for both players, even though they could afford it.

The article also ignores that Harden agreed to their number, but they didn't want to give him a trade kicker, which cost them nothing.

 

I...disagree.

 

How has Carl Herrera not posted some BS by now

 

What the hell did Jeremy Lamb do for OKC in this series? I don't think I have seen him play anything other than garbage minutes.

 

^ He played some critical minutes the last couple of games. He produced admirably when Reggie Jackson left game 4 with an injury.

Brooks finally trusts him a bit more and it shows

 

I don't believe that was the case.


http://www.cbssports.com/nba/eye-on...little-time-to-decide-on-thunders-final-offer

"After everything we established – everything we had done – you give me an hour?" Harden told Yahoo! Sports on Monday afternoon. "This was one of the biggest decisions of my life. I wanted to go home and pray about it. It hurt me. It hurt."

Asked if additional time might have caused him to accept a deal several million dollars short of the $60 million maximum contract Harden had long sought, he responded: "Who knows? Another day, who knows what another day would've done?"

What OKC couldn't offer Harden was a 5 year extension. The rookie extensions are limited to 4 years but each team is allowed to give one 5 year extension. OKC had already given their 5 year extension to Westbrook. Houston still had their's so Harden ended up with a 5 year $80M deal rather than 4 year $60M.

 

I wonder if Morey reasonably forecasted his good fortune that the cap would jump so much in 2014-2015 that he would have room to sign a 3rd star in 2014 or 2015 and resign Parsons.

 

He's gradually improving...

 

Some key points I took from the article regarding Harden.

That's so perplexing. 4.5mil short of the 4 year max.

That's the equivalent of about 1.1ish mil per year, which is the same as signing a veteran.

I really think even being 8mil south of the max(2mil per year on a 4 year contract), you just don't sign two vets and call it a day.

 

Most people can score. Only a handful of players in the league can score as effortlessly and efficiently as Harden. The only 2 big time scorers currently more efficient are Durant and Lebron. There is a reason that even after 2 straight bad playoff showings and 2 years of bad defense the general consensus is that he is still a top 15 guy. His offensive ability is rare. Very rare.