Here's the thing though, he actually was. People didn't see it at the time because most people are incapable of looking past just PPG, but in our case Morey was beyond that and saw the numbers beyond just ppg. He saw the insane efficiency and realized that you could up the usage and even when his efficiency dropped, you would get star/superstar production. It's very similar to young Jokic. People at the time maybe didn't see he was a star, but if you look back now you can see that he was.
Dude, stop it! Morey was not a visionary as far as evaluating talent. He was strictly a numbers guys. He believed in obtaining as many assets as possible to get a better player. Harden actually fell in his lap because no other team had accumulated as much and Houston had a great pkg or so OKC felt at the time. His 1st rnd picks rarely materialized into good or great players, there was a running joke that he should just trade away his #1 picks rather than use them, so he did. He would actually have better luck picking 3 and 4 yr college players in Round 2, because they were some what more proven. Morey was not a good talent evaluator what so ever but a good ASSET MANAGER.
Since you’re a NUMBERS guy, Harden has had over 300 games with 5 or more turnovers. And he's played a total of 1,026 games played. So if you calculate it, in a 3rd of his games, he's turning the ball over 5 or more times, correct?
People are a lot smarter now than they were years ago, the harden thing happened in a different era. There's not as big an edge now for analytics focused teams these days since everyone does it.
That's not how it works. You need to do it on a per possession basis, not a total. Harden had massive usage, but his turnovers as a % of his possessions were never high, hence the rockets being a low TO team when he was here. Player A: uses 50 possessions, turns it over 5 times Player B: uses 20 possessions, turns it over 3 times Who is the higher turnover player? A or B?
You could argue our very own Amen Thompson fits the criteria. Lower minutes bench player and thus lower counting stats, but a look at the advanced metrics showed a player who probably could/would thrive in a bigger role. Morey also identified Lowry as someone who could/would flourish in a bigger role by looking at the advanced metrics rather than the counting stats.
I don't see how this works really. Harden from Houston to OKC didn't change his core play style. In OKC he still was a on ball playmaker just with lower usage because talent was more distributed with Westbrook and KD. From Harden's sixth man role he was still attacking half court set POA defenses in OKC off the dribble. Amen's offensive stats currently are stats with opposing defenses not centering their half court POA defenses towards. Amen is often used as a connector in the short roll or in the dunker spot playing off the gravity of Green and Sengun. Harden wasn't playing the short roll or dunker spot position in OKC. He was essentially a 6th man primary ball handler. If you change Amen to that role expect things like turnovers per game making a leap and his ts% dipping.
How is that different with Amen? I wouldn’t say he has changed his core play style since being inserted in the starting lineup hes just gotten a lot more minutes and maintained or even improved his advanced numbers.
I'm assuming when you Amen fits similar to Harden's trajectory, I'm assuming you believe Amen upping his usage and on ball reps to what he has been the past few weeks would see a Harden type leap. Not going from his bench role to a starter. When you imply it might be similar to Harden leap I am assuming you mean Amen increasing his role to a primary ball handler attacking POA half court sets and handling press coverages with a live dribble. I'm simply asking "what would Amen's stats and efficiency look like if defenses guessed him like they do Alpi and Jalen and Amen has to maintain possession and love dribble while being constantly pressed by multiple defenders.
No that’s not what I was meaning to imply, they aren’t even remotely the same kind of players. I wouldn’t want Amen in a Harden type ball dominant position, but I think if you looked at Amens advanced numbers as a ~20 minute bench guy you could see someone who deserved a shot at a lot more playing time(bigger role).
Usage is a lazy argument. People always fall back on usage when pinpointing Harden's turnovers. Was Harden a main ballhandler for the majority times he was here, yes? However, he played with Jermey Linn, Patrick Beverly, CP3, and Westbrook, all players who shared the ball handling responsibilities with Harden. He didn't become the quasi PG until MDA was the Head Coach. However, if you notice Ime is putting the ball more into Green's hands
I would be pretty interested to hear how someone could find a way to spin the idea that looking at per game/ totals with zero context added is not lazy analysis while someone who adds context to the per game/totals with more info such as role/time of possession/usage somehow is the lazy one.
You asked a question about who is rising to take over that role. My answer was about the future not about today. Although against certain matchups I would still trust Amen to score over Jalen in the half court right now. His little tween floating shot off a Eurostep has basically been unguardable all season. Amen has not been utilized in this role all season but these last few games we started using him more to initiate offense. You can see Ime is trusting him more and more. Just last night after Jalen turned it over multiples times in a row, we went to Amen he was able to get to rim off a quick spin move and draw a foul to get us points. You read what I said and then just went on rant defending Jalen on things I never even criticized him for. Me saying he struggles against physical defenders has nothing to do with finishing at the rim. His rim finishing has drastically improved this year and if he can get downhill he's very dangerous. I never question Jalen toughness or physicality either. You're just making things up cuz you are soo bias in trying to defend him. All I said was he still struggles trying to isolate against bigger more physical defenders and that is absolute facts. Did you watch last night? How many times did he try to do something and just get stonewalled and just pass it out or pick up his dribble or just settle for a terrible midrange fade or worse just get stripped of the ball. Jalen still just isn't strong enough to consistently beat his man over and over again, he's much better off screens where he can get downhill. Cuz what's happening with him when he isolates is before he can accelerate he get bumped off his spot by the more physical defenders and has to reset.
Jalen green with one defender to do euro step floaters and lay ups in the half court is money as well. That's what I mean you aren't able to read how NBA defenses utilize point of attack defense towards the primary ball handler where they hedge of off ball players to cover driving lanes with help defense coming from multiple defenders. When Amen does his crafty euro floater finish it's with one defender between him and the paint. Green is even more money in this situations because of his touch being more creative. He is more skilled as a finisher akin to how Kyrie is a better finisher than Green even though Green has size and athleticism advantage. Jalen Green will do a fancy finish at the rim after splitting a double team off the dribble. That isn't something Amen can do yet. Show me Amen splitting doubles in half court sets once in his career. Green did that at 19. When Green stops his dribble it's the vast majority of time because he was not prepared for double team blitz off the screen. Even then Green more than not can Marian a live dribble in those situations and even often split it. Amen stops his dribble the moment a defender presses on his live handle.
This is absolutely crazy. He gets guarded 1 on 1 plenty and never does anything successful. Just watch last night and tell me his issues were with double teams. He had 7 turnovers trying to do something against Dyson Daniels. Same thing against Detroit he was having issues with Ausar and Cade and Boston against brown and holiday. Majority of his points come off screens so to say he's scoring in isolation in half court is a stretch. one of my biggest knocks on Jalen is he rarely does the eurostep floater anymore he was way more successful doing it as a rookie, dunno why he went away from it, so to say it's money is insane. 95% of his points probably come from free throws layups dunks and threes
He had 7 turnovers trying to something on Dyson Daniels. And Amen would have 14 trying to do the same thing. Again you are failing to read defenses. For example look at the times Green gets blocked on finishing attempts. Its due the POA defense squared in on um where a help defender is pre guarding his potential driving lane to help and Green fails to see it and thinks he has a true one on one match up. With Amen, he genuinely has one on one match ups where there is literally one defender between him and the rim where a helps defender didn't come into play. How many of these type of offensive plays you see Amen actually doing? Ya obviously he can catch lobs like that. But the splitting of the defense, scoring on multiple helps defenders multiple times etc.
