You know Harden plays most of his minutes with the 3 best defensive players on the team right? You know the bench typically brings us Jason Terry, Corey Brewer, Terrence Jones and previously Marcus Thornton or Beasley now? The fact that the team is still worse when he leaves the floor shows just how terrible he is at defense. Having said that, he remains all-world at offense so he's still a superstar. He's not a prime Lebron James but he is as good as anyone else. He's every bit as good as Curry given the same environment IMO.
Look at his DRPM stats then, which factors in all the elements you have mentioned, such as the level of teammates and opponents he is playing while on the court. Harden's DRPM is -0.98, 44th among 97 SGs in this league. I would say that's about average to below average, but it's far from being "terrible" or worst in the league. FYI, Lillard's DRPM is -3.40, 80th out of 84 PGs and Irving's is -3.46, ranking him at 81st. Also, Demar Derozan's DRPM is -2.62, which ranks him at the 87th among the SG postion.
Harden is one of the top 5 players in the Association as far as I'm concerned. And I love watching him play when he is on and engaged. He's a monsta. But I do feel he is mostly responsible for this current system and roster. Morey has catered to Harden and built the system and roster around him. If you think Morey would have traded any assets at all for Lawson if Harden had not expressed desire for Lawson to be here then you simply don't understand Morey. So to not recognize Hardens culpability in our current plight would be ignorant. This whole franchise revolves around James Harden. Our offensive system is built around James Harden. Our defensive system is built to protect James Harden. Our roster is comprised of players Harden wants to play with. When Harden doesn't want to play with a player, that player is benched and eventually removed from the roster. The reason why we fooled around with Terrence Jones for 4 seasons is because Harden wanted him. The reason we re-signed Jason Terry is because Harden wanted him. The reason why we got rid of Jeremy Lin is because Harden didn't want him. The reason why Marcus Thornton was traded was because Harden didn't want to play with him. The reason McHale was fired is because Harden didn't want to play for him any more. The reason why we traded for Lawson is because Harden wanted him. If Dwight leaves it will be because Harden didn't want to play with him any more. We don't trade for players that Harden doesn't want. And we don't trade away players that Harden wants on the roster. And the primary reason why we are under .500 this season is because of........James Harden. 1. Harden came to camp out of shape. 2. Harden has been terrible on the defensive end and practically normalized his own high octane offense with his terrible defense that has allowed his man to post gar gargantuan box scores. 3. Hardens record-breaking turnover count has placed us in transition defense more than any team not named the Sixers or Lakers with significant man disadvantage because his teammates too often have to play 4 flat to accommodate his offense. 4. Harden has not made any adjustments this season. He has stubbornly continued to dominate the basketball while basically standing around on defense. Hee has not made his teammates better. He's only made some of them bitter. This debacle of a season is on Harden. There's no way around it.
I can't find a single defensive metric that shows Harden is as bad a defensive player as he is made out to be. All the evidence shows that he is a below average defender, but not terrible. Harden has that "WTF" defensive lapses time to time, that gets circulated in the social media, but that doesn't mean he's always playing like that. Even if you don't have those "WTF, LOL" moments, you could be a very bad defender, just less noticeable. I would argue among all-star tier guards, Lillard, Irving and DeRozan is actually worse than Harden when it come to defense. Recently, Harden has been OK to passable defensively. I would agree with some people here that his D was not very good in the early part of the season, but we are over that now. His man-to-man defense is actually pretty OK, but he still struggles with team defense and rotations. It's just not effort related though, 'cause Harden is not very quick or athletic for a guard, so it might just be a physical limitation on his part. Or, let's be honest, it might be defensive IQ issue, lacking "awareness." But chalking everything up to his effort is unfair.
it's really unfortunate...but I think Harden leaves at the end of his contract unless the team dramatically improves...if we trade him before then, we cannot get equal value
1986-1987 Micheal Jordan : avg 37 PPG but team was 40-42 2002-2003 Tracy Mcgrady : avg 32 PPG but team was 42-40 2005-2006 Allen Iverson : avg 33 PPG but team was 38-44 2006-2007 Kobe Bryant : avg 32 PPG but team was 42-40 2008-2009 Dwayne Wade : avg 30 PPG but team was 43-39 Were those 'debacle' seasons all on MJ, Kobe, Wade, T-Mac, and Iverson, too? Maybe not having enough help was a significant factor since no player - however good he might be- can't do it all by himself? Also, what do you think Dwight's role has been for our mediocre season?
On the court, I blame Harden for atrocious defense - taking several plays off, not focussing at that end and just freelancing. I also blame him for poor leadership and an insanely high number of turnovers, a record breaking pace Much of the debacle was because of last off season. Despite what the delusional kool aiders here say that he was a gym rat all off season and working on his game and had no distractions, it's all false. Harden was too busy this off season b****ing about Curry's deserved MVP, his marketing campaign and personal brand and tapping Khloe instead of focussing on becoming a better player ala Curry The problem is Harden has Mauri and this organization by the cojones. What Harden says goes. So we will only be good as Harden can take us. Make no mistake, Harden wants to win but he wants to win on his own terms. Whether that is good enough remains to be seen but all indications are it's not.
He could improve on turnovers and defense. That doesn't mean he deserves blame. He's earned his paycheck relatively.
Honestly, if you look at our roster, and take Harden off and put in some average shooting guard, what do you think our records would look like? Warriors, Spurs, Cavs, OKC, and Clippers all have Big 2 or Big 3.with deep bench At least several all-star level players on their squad. Remind me, how many do we have? Wouldn't it be that crazy to assume that we actually OVERACHIEVED last season, despite not being that great? Because our team stats that year were definitely not as good as our final achievement, you know. Even if Harden was perfect this season, I still don't see us being one of the top contending teams. With this level of talent pool, it's just impossible.
thanks for all the replies. i see many objective and reasonable posts here. i'd appreciate them as they make me feel better about this board.
Not really Harden's fault that everyone else on the team shoots so terribly. We couldn't hit water if we fell out of a boat.
Rest of the team beside Harden is just so bad. Hard to win games when scrubs like Beasley play almost 20 mpg.
