Jay, that is why I say Grow up, he is trying to do too much especially late and it is hurting the finishing of this team. DD
People called LeBron a chair artists his first few years in the league.. Hardens a legit superstar he's 24 and has been in the league what 4 years? He will be fine.
The thing is though, this is just how the NBA works. It seems the ISO to your best player is the go to play. People talk about how much they like George and I saw the Pacers do the same thing, George just got the FTs for his shot. I think one area he can grow up is leadership. Like I don't think this game is any close if he settles the team down when they go into their "Lets shoot threes!" mode. If he like Chris Paul does calls a timeout and refocus the team and get them back to what was working. This team always just suddenly goes to shooting 3s. It's like they get a nice lead and figure "Hey, why not?" and they should IMO be up there like at 10-3 or something. The Boston game is the only game I feel like they never fell into that mode. I think part of that is what we'd like to see from him. When the team starts chucking threes and the lead starts diminishing and he goes into that superstar mode where he says to Mchale "Put me in." then comes in and scores a few buckets to quell the Dallas run. Too many times he just falls into passive mode and watches as his team just chucks up threes. He has to have that "Give me the ball" mentality like Hakeem had because Dwight surely isn't going to ever be that. Harden can...and guys have won championships just knowing when to be selfish and when not to.
One of the core problems of this team is Harden trying to be a hero. He is like a michael jordan wannabe. Harden would be help this team by not wanting to be the hero and play team ball. Harden is very gifted but should get his points in the offense and not force things. I believe this team is best served by Lin playing point guard and being the primary ball handler and facilitator and Harden playing off the ball as a SG that you can go to for ISO when the play breaks down. Harden also needs to stop being treated like a prima donna and if he plays poorly (ex: no D) he should be benched. His average minutes need to be reduced to around 30-35min. Until Harden, Dwight, Parsons and others understand the roles they need to play and not to crossover into other players roles, this team will not gel and become a truly elite team. It's on the coaches to make roles clear to the players and lead but alas, i feel our coach is very poor at player assessment and understanding their capabilities and thus developing team identity. Lets hope this S****y play ends soon.
Didn't really want to create a new thread for this but I'm just curious= Has there ever been a superstar player that has turned around a franchise as quick as Harden did with the Rockets, where the fans did a 180 and turned on him just as quick if not quicker???? Are Rockets fans REALLY starting to turn on Harden already? and if so, is it justified or should we be embarrassed that the fans that follow the Rockets are this petty??? http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=247388 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=247107 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=247149 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=246646 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=246471 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=246885 http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?t=246746 Just to name a few threads that have come about recently...
