Wonder if he can get another runner-up award to add to his collection. For some reason I am surprised he made the final three, given the annual lack of respect he typically gets from the media.
Imagine being so consistently good that you've either won the MVP or are in the top 3 in voting for like, 5 out of the past 6 years. And in that lone bad year ('15-'16), he "only" averaged 29 / 6 / 7.5. And yet, the media hates. And hates. And hates.
It’s not surprising to me. Harden’s excellence in the regular season is rarely disputed by the media at large. They remain skeptical of his ability to rise to the occasion in the playoffs, and fairly or unfairly the only way he will change that is by advancing farther than he has on the strength of his performance. And, sadly, doing it in an asterisk year may not be enough.
They should just make a Runner up MVP award called the James Harden. Justified or not. Ive never understood why the award cant be objective. Just aggregate all the player of the week and player of the month accolades and that player wins the gawdam award. Easy. If that was the case James would have multiple now.
So many things work against Harden. He's already won it. Doesn't have the prototypical "look" of a basketball player because he doesn't have the muscle tone of LeBron or the freak physical qualities like Giannis. Not a family man like LeBron nor Giannis, who is a new father. Doesn't lead like LeBron. Doesn't play defense like Giannis. Flops. "Bends" the rules and travels 100% of the time. Not better than Luka. Not better than Kawhi. Compared to Lillard when Lillard should be compared to him, instead. Ran Dwight, Melo, CP3 out of Houston. Too many 3s. Just take your pick. It's what the media hangs its hat on.
Of all people, Draymond praising Harden?! What has this world come to? Timestamp discussion of Harden only is 4:30 - 6:35. tl;dw? Draymond asks "does Harden get overlooked in the grand scheme of things because he's averaging typical Harden numbers?" Kenny says he's impressed by James' offense, but also his desire to take on defensive challenges. Charles argues that he's not being overlooked because he's an MVP finalist. And then says he's the greatest offensive talent ever (better than Michael and Kobe). Draymond says the best offensive talent ever is Durant. /segment on Harden.
First, Harden shoulda won it over Janice last year. He’s not going to win it over emperor Lebron this year or Janice. Second, how is Janice a DPOY candidate? 1 block and 1 steal a game? Harden averages one block a game and almost 2 steals a game.
Yup and Harden will be screwed yet again. At this point he is far better than LeBron and honestly should ahead of Giannis but whatever. Nothing new for Harden.
There's no chance the voters do the right thing and pick the actual MVP, their track record is just far too pathetic to trust.
The goal line keeps moving when it comes to Harden. It always has. First, the MVP is a regular season award but beyond that, what the hell has Giannis won? Giannis’ numbers go down and he really isn’t all that young... he has been in the league 7 years now . It is a double standard and always has been when it came to Harden.
Barkley just called harden the greatest offensive player of all time but lin trolls like ashleym and fchowder will tell us harden is limited.
This pic pretty much sums up the Beards talent! He's in the middle of his prime years and barring injuries (knock on wood) he will have another 4-5yrs of being at this level! That's a solid decade of Kia and Harden being mentioned in the same sentence! If that's not "Greatness" then I truly don't know the definition of greatness! People often associate "Titles" with greatness, and yes there is a certain correlation between them, but it is not the most accurate way to evaluate a player's true value on a team/sport. Being consistently in the podium is! People often say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery....well look around and you'll see that in virtually every team there is someone trying to emulate Harden's game! The hate?? Well, hatred is also another form of flattery! When you're consistently outperforming the competition people start to feel disdain for that individual (if you're not in the Nike click, that is). Kudos to James for once again landing on "Harden's Podium"! ... Go Rockets!!! ....... ....... .......