Isiah on Harden and Lin: Could be the best backcourt in the NBA

Let's talk about now instead of the start of the season, bc Lin and Harden have clearly been trending up. Of your list, I think Curry & Thompson and Lawson and Iggy are close. I would take Lin/Harden (Linden?) over Curry & Thompson because I think the distance between Harden and Thompson is much greater than between Lin and Curry (and Lin continues to improve). I would also take Linden over Lawson/Iggy for the same reason. Iggy's great defensively but has gotten much worse on offense and is getting older. But both of those duos are good.

I take Linden over Nash/Kobe because Harden is basically a push with Kobe now (or very close to it) and Nash is now constantly hurt. Father time, and the lack of the Phoenix trainers' magic, has gotten to him. Also, now that he is with a ball dominant Kobe, his numbers have truly gone to pot.

And definitely not Jennings and Ellis. They have Larry freaking Sanders to protect them, and the Bucks are still struggling. Ellis is the proverbial master offense/horrendous everything else. He's Stephon Marbury - he makes a team better by leaving.

 

Because he gives out more terrible contracts than most. He overpays. Even Morey's mistakes are not too bad - the contracts are short term and flexible. Thabeet, Flynn, White were all on rookie scale contracts. Ariza was only for $5M a year and was tradeable. Thomas gave out untradeable contracts.

Having said all that, I agree that he could evaluate talent. His issue was overpaying, and not being able to get players that work well together as a team but instead hurt each other's playing.

 

But the potential is there. I buy into the thought that bad defense, while it can last an entire career, generally improves more than other parts of the game as young players gain experience.

Irving was obviously a homerun, and I think Waiters could be something special. They really should have drafted Valanciunas over Thompson, but it's not like Thompson has been a bust.

 

And as much as he sucked at talent evaluation and managing a team, the opinion of one who has no talent evaluation background or NBA team management experience AT ALL should be held in higher esteem?

Your opinions are no worthier than his, but you hold yours to be self evident. Your hypocrisy is ridiculous.

Whatever happens in the long run, happens. The short run, the Rockets are overachieving and in the playoffs with Harden and Lin leading the way. That's pretty good for a backcourt without any preseason and still developing their chemistry.

The only one stunting growth, IQ growth, is you. I am sick and tired of the frigging negativity because of their own personal bias. The Rockets are the youngest most experienced team in the NBA and they are in the playoffs. As a Rocket fan be happy right now, because this is a time to celebrate not denigrate.

 

This!

 

I disagree, their style will most likely result in one or both with injuries over time. The constant beatings they both take in the paint will eventually catch up with them. Splitting the beatdowns between the two is good for them. Neither player will last a season going solo.

 

Sounds like he could be a valued scout but definitely not GM.

 

Jenning/Ellis might be the worst backcourt in the league..

 

Agreed. Good post. Glad to know some people here #watchtheNBA and are #TrueFans.

Too many people these days read an article on RealGM and propogate it as the truth.

Thomas is excellent at drafting.

His idea with the Knicks (paring Randolph with Curry) was lambasted, because it didn't work out. That was largely because of Curry throwing his career away. Randolph is doing just fine as a franchise player, making the All-star team this year in Memphis, next to a low-post Center. Thomas' idea was to go big when everyone was going small, and to do it with a 20/10 PF (Randolph). It's the exact same thing Memphis wants to do.

 

Jennings is not that bad slightly above avg. , but Ellis is terrible

 

Isiah Thomas once said "Jeremy Lin is not athletic....."

 

they can be the most knuckle head backcourts!

 

from last year. thought it was funny

Knicks get Monta Ellis for Lin..

http://www.theonion.com/video/knicks-trade-jeremy-lin-for-selfish-*******-who-pl,27394/

 

No chance, in the future maybe but I'd take CP3/Crawford, Parker/Ginobili, LeBron/Wade etc over ours for example.

 

I agree that u need a 2nd superstar or at least 2 other all star quality players.

But I would like to point out that in 1990 eastern finals the bulls were a Scottie pip pen migraine away from the finals and pippen wasn't half the player he would become the following year. If not for the migraine the bulls would have won it all that year with Jordan as the primary ball handler defender and scorer.
Frankly Jordan would have murdered drexler.

Shaq was fat and slow when he paired up with wade. No doubt he was still very good but he wasn't the best center in very weak era or centers. Wade was scoring running the offense and playing d.

 

I guess that is another way to look at it.

 

U can easily avoid that by broadening their offensive repertoires. Lin seemed to show much more variety in his offensive game last year. Something that seems to be missing is that mid range stop and pop and his change of speed dribble. He also had a variety of floaters and tear drops last year along with turnarounds. Admittedly a lot of it was probably pulled outta his ass on the fly but it seems like new he's just driving into the lane and trying to draw contact or getting points in transition and shooting 3s.

 

Wtf? I did not denigrate any player on this team and neither am I unhappy about the Roxs finally being in the play-offs. I just stated a well-known fact concerning Lin and Harden's playing styles. Concerning Zeke, if you want to go ahead and perpetuate the myth that the guy is a good talent evaluator and knows how to recognise good fits; go ahead. We will just pretend that Zeke destroying the knicks with a poorly constructed and overpriced garbage team did not happen... I know know knicks fans hope that was the case.

I never said that I am a BBall guru, just that on the basis of his body of work, Thomas' opinion is most likely garbage.

 

Lets be honest, even as "good" defenders, L/H combo is at the top of the heap. I actually think Lin is a good defender already, if Harden picks it up - hands down. If they both take it to "elite" level for todays standards (not necessary Bad Boyz hand-checking defense), I think we have a championship team, as long as our bigs are decently good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adusCcba89o

You don't need to be as locked down as 19:55 of the clip.