The media agenda regarding James Harden's "defense"

BUT THE NARRATIVES MUST GO ON!

 

I am not sure if people appreciate how terrible this team performs outside of Harden. It is utterly incompetent when he is on the bench.

The defense nitpicking is just plain stupid at this point. He is the only player on the court doing anything.

 

DD I know you're not on here charging anybody up on man crushing. Bwhahaha

And of late James Harden's defense have been much better.

 

ESPN:

"And now, for highlights of James Harden's 50 pt effort.

But first, let us show you where he's given up on defense.

Now let's look at all the turnovers he had.

And those highlights we were going to show you? Forget about them. Here's Curry's daughter at the post-game press conference!!!"

 

Correct me if I'm wrong. I just pulled the stats but don't know a lot about how they are calculated.

My understanding is minutes has some effect, but this is judging how much time the player is actually running, as opposed to lazily standing around.

But yes, I found the average speed pretty comical. But hey if he plays defense like he did last year, I don't care what his average speed is. If it allows him to play 38-40 minutes every night and stay healthy for 75-80 games a year, then frankly I don't give a damn.

 

You are joking right?

 

His lack of defense is in reality a strategic effort to conserve energy for his offense.

 

watch the games and you will know that he ISN'T joking unfortunately!!

 

uh-oh, MEDIA CONSPIRACY!!!!!!!!!!!!

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I don't disagree with you about the bench and even the role players. But no one is giving a reason why. People were beaming about how we were a deep team right before the season started. And last season the role players did fine.

And this "role players are trash, bench players are trash" narrative is pushed by some of the staunchest Morey apologists. Where did this trashy bench come from? I guess you can't be both a Harden apologist and a Morey apologist at the same time.

 

Why?
1.) Team wasn't hitting open shots. Sub why - who knows, not practicing? Bad luck.
2.) Older - Older players decline. Ariza, Brewer, Terry, Howard all older and less effective.
3.) Complacent - Beverley / Brewer got new contracts and haven't played as well.
4.) Injury - Atleast one PF has been terrible due to injury.
5.) Mystery - Jones and Lawson all of a sudden just stopped being good.

There are your "whys"

Here is your problem, you are looking for someone to blame and therefore have created fictional characters called apologists. It always has to be someone's fault. Sometimes things go your way, sometimes they don't.

 

When Les Alexander asked Morey why we were doing so bad, I guess Morey just shrugged, "You ask me why? Sometimes things go your way, sometimes they don't. "

I am guessing when Morey asked McHale why they were doing so bad, McHale just shrugged, "Sometimes things go your way, sometimes they don't!"

 

Scathing... it will be hard for him to defend himself from such criticism.

Seriously, he needs to play better D, and it should be better and improve, but it is difficult to play D well all night when you play 800 minutes a game or whatever he's averaging.

 

They might run Harden outta Houston playing him 40 minutes a night . Other teams rest thier players ,we run ours in the ground .

 

Oh it's terrible. But if you are suppose to be a top 5 players, you have to bring it every night. That's part of what leadership is.

Yes he's amazing, yes we should build around him, but that doesn't make him above criticism.

 

ESPN has a video on its sidebar at the moment, highlighting an Isaiah Thomas play.

The caption? "Isaiah Thomas showed off some nifty ball-handling on his way to the basket. James Harden? Not exactly defensive player of the year material."

smfh ESPN.