Well first of all I was a big lawson fan, the dude has never been a great defender but what always struck me during his denver days was how solid and versatile he was, offensively the guy was a swiss army knife and can hit 3's, make passes, penetrate etc. he can basically do it all so when I heard that he got traded to Houston I was ecstatic and saw no problems with pairing him up with Harden since he was also a decent shooter. I have no idea how a guy can go from underrated at 12M to total garbage in just 1 summer, maybe abstaining from alcohol is taking a toll on him in terms of enthusiasm and drive, or maybe his alcoholism has gotten so bad he was already damaged goods since last last year. Its just strange because he went from decent to not even deserving to be in the NBA so fast, I don't think I've ever seen anything like it since Wang Jiang Jiang or whatever that dude's name from China who was supposed to be the 2nd Yao Ming.
Harden did ok coexisting with Lin. I think he's capable of playing with a true PG. Apparently Lawson really did turn into a scrub this season.
The "Harden ruins Lawson" narrative might be my favorite narrative in recent Clutchfans history. Some people actually believed that!
TBF, right when Ty got to Houston there were pics of him and Harden at da club, seriously tho, that is not a place to take a recovering addict.
I think that by withholding his mojo, he became the one of the biggest damaged goods. He just can't do his job without a drink.
Strange that his game went to hell after he stopped drinking. Guys do have bad years, loss of confidence maybe... can't help a guy as small as he is playing in a game of giants. Pacers won't pick him up if they have a 1st round exit, any guesses on who would want him?
Seems like every Rockets player that CF claims is being held down by the team goes somewhere else and continues to be mediocre (or gets much worse).
What? I thought everything was the coach's fault. Seems like most people thought Lawson's failure was due to the Rockets' lack of a 'system'.
As some have said, I don't know if this proves that much (though I find it really interesting & I'm grateful it was shared). We already knew - from years before he was a Rocket - that Lawson is a flat out terrible defender. On offense though......From my understanding, Lawson isn't a "scorer". He's a playmaker. Wouldn't it be more important for a playmaker to have a camp or more time to adjust to a team? More important to know the offense? You can drop a Jamal Crawford on any team - it doesn't matter what offense they run - Crawford's gonna iso & chuck. If you're quarterbacking a team, you have to know the plays & all the wrinkles well and have some chemistry. I never blamed Harden at all for Lawson. I always said it was stupid to ever advocate turning the MVP runner-up into a Rip Hamilton clone. I did blame Finch & the coaches for not being more creative and figuring out how to get something out of a PG who was #3 in assists the year before. I think it'll take more time to conclude on root causes.
Thinking about it though - that's really an incredible stat when you think that I don't believe the Pacers games have been particularly lopsided. If you take out the times Lawson played in the games, I would bet the Pacers would be leading the series.
He sucks, and he sucks by his own design, not Harden's or anyone else's. The idea that Harden is a selfish player is ridiculous. Dude wants to win and there is no one who executes on this team other him. He ASKED for help in the back court, he wanted Lawson - how ridiculous this narrative that he is this selfish player. He's not. The stat analysis of Lawson rated him an average starter - he was in decline already he just accelerated it: http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/carmelo/ty-lawson/
What is special about this site? It appears it predicted Lawson would basically be as good as he was last year.
