I think he's angry that with Harden dominating at the point his Ricky Rubio fantasy is more unlikely than ever.
Last year Harden's turnovers were magnified because they cost the team games, this year with so many great shooters, and him at 2 to 1 Assist to turnover it is not such a big deal. DD
This, jopat isn't completely wrong. More wins than the 12' season, but our free style of play reminds me a lot of that. Team needs to play more disciplined. A part of that is...we just don't have all the pieces. Hopefully the trade deadline can do us some good.
You actually aren't making the same argument as basketballholic. I agree with the premise you've laid out. I think in a playoff series it will be difficult against s good defensive team to survive when we don't hit a high percentage from 3 and that we are prone to collapse because we don't have enough flexibility on offense to have someone else create when harden is getting pressured and swarmed. Thats not the same as saying we can't win with harden as the primary ball handler. In holic mind we would be a title team if we added Rubio and I find that preposterous. We need more talent on the team, more guys who can break down the defense and someone who can attack a defense when harden can't.
It's a give and take with the Rockets offense. They can go on droughts which will give up big leads, but they could also go on streaks that could eliminate big deficits. At the end of the day it doesn't matter who the Rockets beat in the playoffs if they cannot overcome Golden State at the end of the road. I don't feel like defensive minded teams have enough firepower to beat them, and good offense will always beat good defense. I think at this stage your best bet of beating them would be to keep up with them and hope they miss more than we do.
Harden acknowledged his turnovers last night post game in his interview. Even called out some of his "risky" passes.
As a filmmaker, I could not have scripted a better sequence of events than a shockingly good winning %, excellent performances against the top teams in the league, and then the Knicks game as the cherry on top to completely bury this silly, narrow-minded argument that we will never win a championship as long as Harden plays the way he plays.
I'm more concerned about the defense ranked 19th. Teams who don't shoot a lot of 3s can go into droughts too. Turnovers can make it harder on the defense though.
Durvasa and I are saying the same thing. He's just not being as critical of Harden as I am. I am not a Harden hater. But this organization is where it is because of the way we have handled and coddled Harden. We're treating Harden with more deference than Cleveland gives LeBron and LeBron is a proven champion. We give Harden way more deference than the Spurs and Warriors give Kawhi and Steph. Those teams built their rosters without running everything by their franchise players. Those organizations have a top down mentality. We have elevated Harden to having as much influence as anybody in the organization not named Les. (By the way on a side note, has anybody else noticed that Kyrie actually handles the ball more than LeBron does these days?)
YOU SEE GUYS, THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU INCLUDE HARDEN IN THE FRONT OFFICE DECISION MAKING PROCESS. 3rd in the West, outlook is tremendous. The horror.
Since you've seen the future do you know at least how far we got in 2017? Also who won MVP? Typically I don't like spoilers but I'd really like to know now.
