Harden - and how to build a championship team around him

thanks for the info on stats for defense. i'll look for some more.

i got what you're saying, i think. doubt if you've entirely got what i was saying. but it's alright...

and it's "prerequisite".

 

No you are wrong about USG. USG is very very important becuase there is only one ball.

It would be nice to think that you can put all the players together and they would be the sum of their parts..but they dont'.

I can give you examples.
1) when lebron joined Miami Bosh had to forcefully lower his usage by A LOT. He became almost a glorified roleplayer. That hurt his stats, his happiness and his perfomance and it hasn't been appreciated enough the sacrifice he made that others do not.
2) same thing happening with Love right now. He unlike BOsh doesn't take it so well.
3) A player like Boogie who has EXTREMELY HIGH usage for a big has had problems and personal conflicts with high usg guards in the past. For example I.T and he was happy to get rid of him.(according to what the former Kings beat writer revealed to Lowe).
On the other hand now with Rondo who due to his own limitations doesn't have so high usg he is very happy and loves him.

4) My other team the Bucks have right now the same problem. We have 5 guys who need the ball and should have bigger usg but there is only one ball. MCW's usg was forcefully diminished to a low end for pg (around 20%) -which btw I'm sure he hates but he can ride the pine if he says anything ) but still it's not enough .That's why the solution is either => have a very low usg pg and c or stagger their minutes as it has been done lately with good results.


NOT EVERYONE in the team should be a star. There MUST be low usg roleplayers. Otherwise there will be conflicts, fights, bad chemistry And the perfomance of all the players will fall and it will not be the sum of their parts.

23 usg for Bosh is you know almost role player right? Very low.

The reason teh Irving example is different than Harden is not explained by usg. It's explained : IRVING with all his serious flaws, can play off the ball. And he does. So does Curry.

Now Westbrook is lucky to have found a player like Durant next to him because in the future when you are trying to pair Westbrook in another team with a pg partner there will be some real issues.

 

I never said that the total amount of usage added up to 100%. Usage is the amount of possession a player consumes while they are on the floor. The only way they would all add up to 100% is if all 5 players stayed on the floor for the entire game. But as I said, I never said that.

The assumption that you are making is that 2 high usage players can't play together and that's simply not true. Plenty of examples James/Irving, Westbrook/Durant, James/Wade.

You are correct that the NBA does keep # of dribble and possession time. Your are also 100% incorrect in your assumption that Harden is in the top 5 in either category.

Among the league's ball handlers (more than 40 touches per game), Harden is 32nd in average seconds per touch, 15th in total possession time and 52nd in average dribble per touch.

 

REALLLY? Did you filter for players who have played more than let's say ..1000 minutes and at least 30 games?
Otherwise those stats are meaningless.

A 10 day contract in a **** team like Philly can be in the top 10 if you don't filter...for actual nba players.

 

Two high usg players can play together if at least one of them, preferably both of them can play off the ball.
However it's impossible, and if someone claims otherwise I would like to give me a historical example, of THREE players over 30+ usg to be in the same team , if one of them doesn't come off the bench and their minutes staggered.
Harden's problem is he can't play off the ball. So the other star with the high usg will have to. And the pg next to him will have to.
(i dont' know if he can't, or if doesn't want to.)


Theses stats without filtering for actual nba rotation ballhandlers who have played multiple games are useless.

I did the filtering myself one month ago to post in another thread and Harden was in top 10 in most categories with the correct filtering to take out the noise.

 

Most role players don't have a usage of 23. For example, Lawson's usage last season in Denver was 20.3.

Irving gets 71.8 touches per game while Lebron gets 76.8. Also, Irving possesses the ball for 5.8 minutes per game while Lebron possesses the ball for 5.0 minutes per game. So, no Irving isn't primarily playing off the ball. There's plenty of possessions to go around.

 

Add the filter and his touches and time per game stay the same, 13th and 15th.

Dribbles per touch goes from 86th to 59th.

Seconds per touch goes from 49th to 34th.

 

but he can and that's why he fits. I didn't say he primarily plays off the ball I said he is able to and so is Lebron.

And btw in my simple opinion Kyrie hurts the Cavs more than Love does, and if they were smart they would trade him.

 

I will go with my eye level here...

So you're saying that a player that lowers his usage is not happy?

Aldridge numbers are the lowest they've been in his career and he's happy as he can be in san antonio..

When Barkley went from Philly to Phoenix his numbers dropped, but he was happy.

Too much is on stats and not on eye level or human nature... Stats don't tell the entire story...

Morey tried to build this team on stats and it didn't work.. He left out the human nature factor and stats can't give you info on that.

T_Man

 

If Harden were paired with another high usage player and Harden's usage stayed at 32% then even if they are on the court at the same time then there's still 68% of the possessions available for the other player. It's what Wade and Lebron did the first couple of years in Miami, they both took turns running heavy ISO and were very good at it.

It's also inaccurate to say that Harden can't play off the ball. He did it in OKC as the #3 offensive player.

What does 3 players with a 30% usage on the same team have to do with anything? The whole point was whether Harden could play with another ball dominant player. That's TWO guys...where did 3 come from?

As for the stats, as I stated they were filtered for players that had more than 40 touches per game. I'll make it simple for you:

Avg Sec per Touch: R. Jackson 5.9,C. Paul 5.55,Lillard 5.5,Westbrook 5.4,Rubio 5.29,K. Walker 5.08, T.Parker 5.06, M. Conley 5.0, Mudaiy 4.82, Irving 4.84, Lavine 4.81,G. Dragic 4.75,R.Rondo 4.71, Teague 4.56,D. Rose 4.51,Wall 4.48,Harden 4.47.

Avg Dribbles Per Touch : R. Jackon 6.24, T. Parker 5.61,C. Paul 5.6, R. Rubio 5.55, Lillard 5.44,Westbrook 5.43,K.Walker 5.21,M. Conley 5.04,G. Dragic 5.02, Teague 4.86,Irving 4.84, Barrea 4.77, Mudaiy 4.64,Z. Laving 4.51,I. Thomas 4.36,G. Hill 4.25, D. Rose 4.23,J. Wall 4.18, T. Lawson 4.18,D. Williams 4.14,D. Holiday 4.03,K. Lowry 3.88,J. Harden 3.81

Still think he's top 5?

 

Nobody is throwing out stats as some end all but stats are great to disprove things that are tangible.

How often do you really think that Harden dominates the ball for 20 seconds? That in itself is a great place to use stats. It's really simple to show that we don't shoot many shots with less than 4 seconds on the clock and it's also easy to show that Harden actually possesses the ball less than most primary ball handlers. The NBA tracks those things and they aren't disputable.

What's mind numbing is when people base their argument on contrived situations that never happen or happen very infrequently.

If you don't like usage you can certainly use touches as the NBA also tracks them too. You won't like the results however.

 

It is rocket science to build that team

 

Thank you zeeshan.

Corey Screwer is a major major culprit in all of this.

 

And Harden can also play off the ball, he did it in OKC. So why can't Harden still get his current usage and have the other player off the ball for those possessions and then switch roles?

Your whole argument is based off you declaring that Harden can't play off the ball. That isn't true and therefore your argument is invalid.

 

at the same time this assumption can be invalid as well because Harden is not the same player he was in OKC. Hes established himself in this league as a ball dominant ISO player when he decided to come here and have a team built around him. Its easy to say this player did this or that in the past but the fact remains the player who JH has become today is at his best with the ball in his hands correct? Or at least that's what the premise others have of him. As far as playing off ball this season, he has yet to show he is willing on a regular basis. And by off ball that doesn't mean just be stagnant while someone else has the ball and watch what happens

 

Harden can play off the ball. In Houston, he's been unwilling to do so. Because if he was willing to do so and give effort defensively, the Ty Lawson experiment wouldn't be the massive failure it has been to this point.

 

That's the problem. When he doesn't have the ball Harden just stands there.

May be related to his poor conditioning

 

oh godamn you will make me now go look myself. Did you filter for ballahandlers?

or did you include also bigs with their post touches?

Ok here it is. For some reason nba stats don't work today for me. I will come back to add those later.


For ballhandlers :
True usg :no.4

Plays involved :no.2
Time of possesions % : no. 24 with 16.8%
True TOV% : no.5 (includes two rookies above him)


OK I GIVE UP. I can't use the nba sttats page. When I try to filter it doesn't load. I tried 10 times.

You have to filter for guards plz. And I will really appreciate if some kind soul could help me out and give me a link to an already filtered page.