Yeah, down 0-2 at home in a must win playoff game, the Thunder minus Westbrook, Harden was totally gutless in game 3. Not trying on defense is disrespecting to the opponent, so that insults them and motivates them to pour it on, like the Thunder did. If you don't think the opponent notices if you are engaged mentally or not, they do. Harden needs to come out with intensity and aggression to start the game & not be so deliberate and tentative. That is the time the tone is set for the whole game. Parsons has been the only one playing good at the start of games. Steph Curry had a better regular season than him too, & now lead the Warriors to a 3-1 playoff series lead. Even, Jeremy Lin, who has been a scrub in the playoffs, doesn't seem to feel any pressure at the end of the games. He made a lot of late 3-point shots to win games & Harden can not be a number 1 option if he constantly tries to get bailed out by the refs.
IF you don't think Harden is a #1 option you are becoming greedy. He is a top 10 player in the league and the best SG in my opinion. He is playing hurt right now and is giving it his all. This is a learning process. He will adapt to the leadership role. He needs a #2 on the team to really free up some space for him. Do we not all remember the Lakers post Shaq pre Pau? Even a prime Kobe couldn't do it without more help. We are a better built team than them, that is for sure but we are far from being a completed project. We as Rockets fans need to be more supportive of our franchise player. He is here to stay so either get used to him as the #1 option, become less vocal about it (does no good to bash our premiere player) or go root for the Heat or someone with a true #1 in your eyes.
Man i was really hoping and rubbing my Harden idol, that Harden would take over and wrap up the last game during the dying minutes of 4th. AFTER DELFINO heroed up took us over the top to lead the thunder. Those 2 missed FT , and failed iso's . Seriously makes me consider that Harden might have a mental block and confidence issues when it comes to clutchtime for some reason.
missed FTs is not the reason why we couldn't execute. The offense is slowed down and it's pretty obvious Harden is not good at half court. I say keep playing uptempo offense unless we have the last possession.
Unless he develops a post up game I don't consider him a closer. He is shooting only 37% from the field because his offense is easy to plan for. That should be his biggest concern this off season.
Wait what, he isn't good in the half court? He's one of the best scorers in the league. He is ranked 33rd in points per possession in isos and 5th in points per possession in PnRs. Last season he was even better, ranked 7th in Isos and 9th in the PnR.
Well then I should say we're pretty inefficient half court in the last 5 min of the games. ISO when there's an opportunity and ISO by dribbling the ball for 15 seconds on top of the key without creating any opportunity are two different things. I'm not knocking on Harden. It's on McHale. if Harden is much better at PnRs than ISO, why don't we have any screen set for him during crunch time whenever he's having trouble creating opportunities by himself?
From what I see, we usually only have 1 big man(asik) in the game during crunch time, making him the only one who can effectively set a screen and not have his man be able to easily just switch on defense. Problem with this is Asik is almost no threat as a roller on PNR's. So we are essentially just inviting the other team to trap hard on Harden in these situations. We really need a better PNR finishing big man, it would open a lot of things up for our half court offense.
I agree we need a PF who's at least good at PnR. However with our lineup, we could still run off ball screens for our shooters. GS runs multiple off ball screens for Curry and Thomson and on ball screens for Jack each possession. When Harden is the ball handler, Lin needs to screen for him. Anytime there's a movement, defense has to move. With Harden's skill, there would be tons of opportunities to take it to the rim or for him to break down defense.
He seriously doesn't have leader material at the moment, besides his game, just the small leadership qualities including hustling on defense if your offense is struggling. That last play when Beverley drew a charge Harden was out in terrible position flat footed and just reached, he should have been up there hedge hard or doubling. I really hope he rocks up Wednesday.
Great post. People have become pathetically greedy. Amazing how fast they forgot about the past 4 years without James Harden.
Plz also remember those 4 years without JLin, fact is, he did contribute to the Rockets making the playoffs.
He MIGHT be able to develop into being a legit 3rd option for a title team one day....but I doubt it.
