Breakdown: Bickerstaff Was Talking About James Harden

The only reason why James Harden was the sixth man on OKC is he took longer to develop than the other two guys. He was viewed as less talented than the other two but talented enough to be a star. He could also run the offense. They didn't need him to start because they had Westbrook and Durant. If either Westbrook or Durant was not on OKC Harden would have started. It made more sense to have him on the bench and they were a deadlier team because of it. Your whole post is complete nonsense and you are only saying this because we are not winning now. Where was this the last three years though??

 

Rockets bench builds lead, Harden comes in..... what happens more often

A. Rockets continue to build on lead

B. Rockets lead dwindles

C. Rockets lose lead

I say. B and C happens more often than not, and its because...James kills the ball movement...and starts jacking 3's to pad his stats once he feels the game is in the Rockets control

The movement of the Lawson, Thorton, Brewer, DMO/Jones ,Capela/Howard lineups are night and day better than any movement with Harden, where people just tend to stand and wait and wait and wait

 

Did you just say our lineups are better with Sewer than James Harden?? Are you guys high?

 

I said the MOVEMENT - Brewer may suck at shooting and finishing this year, but one thing he does, is he moves, and cuts on the offensive side of the ball....

 

First all, calm down. That was a long post, but very little was actually data or argument.

1) ORtg isn't a legitimate complaint but drtg is? Ridiculous. He is playing his worst ORtg and ts% since his rookie year.

2) Yes, he absolutely is less explosive and slow laterally. It's just plainly obvious how difficult it is to create separation and finish at the rim now. He can barely even get open to receive the ball as we saw at the end of last game.

3) you agree he's had significant drop in 3pt% then follow it up by saying he isn't settling for 3s. You're contradicting yourself! It's obviously NOT his most efficient shot as this is the worst efficiency since his rookie year.

4) Wow, raw block numbers. You fail here by not considering that he's not getting to the rim anywhere near as much.

Seriously calm down, stop being a terrible ROCKETS fan and silly poster who cherry pics data.

Or if you're just trolling, try harder.

 

The statistics do not support this claim at all, but sure. Whatever. Go ahead.

 

We are like number 1 or 2 in blown double digit leads in the league....and we only won 1 or 2 games all season as blowouts...yet we have been up by 12 or more multiple times.

 

lol ok fine. Even if you just say ball movement is better with Sewer it doesn't matter because he will just turn the ball over. Regardless everything else you said is also utter BS. Next time provide some type of stats to back up a claim like that. It's a foolish post.

 

You've yet to explain how James Harden is the sole reason for this like you stated previously, other than just saying it without any statistics or rationale.

 

Ive watched every Rockets game the last 2 years, and if you go back and watch the games, hell, even pay more attention to games going forward.

There will be games when, the starters suck, and the bench will come in and start moving and passing the ball around....and we will build a lead, then in comes Harden and the ball will get sticky, because he will start to dominate it....

It wasnt as noticeable last year, when he was shooting well...but this year... it stands out like a sore thumb. They even talked about it on the radio earlier today.

 

Wow, they are running "no dribble" drills. Good to see JB is actually attempting to implement his message thru practice.

 

JB may be a good coach one day...he's way in over his head with this team and the egos on this team though...would loved it if he surprised me.

 

I wish they had a more senior staff to help him out at least.

What I really wonder is what Morey REALLY thinks about this season and JBs ability to help save it

 

Who comes into the game, and then dribbles the ball for 20-22 seconds before passing it to someone standing at the 3pt. arch or taking a well guarded 3/ jumper?

The ball gets sticky when he is in the game...he refuses to play off the ball and move around...unless he knows it going to end in him getting the shot.

Just start paying attention to the games, or go back and read game threads as Rockets start losing leads....Majority of time it has to do with Harden starting to play HERO ball

 

Yeah I wonder that too. He feels like a filler coach for this team (No evidence from me, just my feelings on it which is nothing) as it's going to be hard to hire a big name coach like Thibs in the middle of the season any ways.

 

Harden;s problem has never been not wanting to win, he wants to win as much as anyone can, his problem has always been (going back to HS) that he's often not quite sure what he should be doing in a given game, shooting more, passing more, and that's why he needs a coach he responds to, to tell him. How many times have we heard him say that he was told he needs to attack more because he's too passive in the first half?

JB made mistake after mistake, really blatant, worse than mchale ones, and the players were at fault?

 

they likely wouldn't want the job mid season, at least not one that comes with expectations because he'd need the pre season to implement his defensive system. He'd be coaching blind taking the job mid season.

 

You missed my point. What I was getting at is that it shouldn't take a good coach to motivate a pro athlete into trying each game. These guys are professionals who are paid a ton of cash to play sport; the reality is that they should be self motivating.

 

I have no doubt that sometimes that happens. It also happens when he isn't playing. One thing I know for you sure is we don't have a big enough sample size for when Harden doesn't play full games, if we did we could compare those. However Harden is just too damn reliable that he barely misses any games. You'll miss him when he's gone.

 

He's dropped off in box plus-minus and espn's real plus minus since last year, and watching the games can see where you're coming from, I get the feeling there is more flow and movement when he's on the bench.

However he's still a pretty positive player by plus-minus stats, with big drops from last year.

Real-Plus Minus:
This year- +4.99, good for 13th in the NBA (defensively he's 361st)
Last year- +8.50, good for THIRD in the NBA!

Box Plus Minus:
This year- 5.7
Last year- 8.4

VORP:
This year- 2.4 (worst since his second year)
Last year- 7.8

I would guess Morey's in-house numbers show even bigger drop-offs, but that's just speculation.