You do know you will get the exact same results if you look up Kobe at 22 and Kobe at 28. Or LeBron at 22 and Lebron at 28?
Kobe was pretty good at maintaining his body weight throughout his career. Lebron seems to be doing the same also. 27 is still in your athletic prime.
Look how quick Curry or Westbrook moves. Harden is actually one year younger than both of them, there is no excuse.
Harden doesn't need to be super quick, but he looks way too lethargic for his age and talent. If you don't see this, you are either delusional or just flat out lying. And it really hurts his game too; he takes way too many contested jumpers because he can't blow past by his defender anymore, unless it's against even slower big man.
He doesn't look all too different to me. Maybe you can show some pictures contrasting the difference?
This is Lebron in 2007. This is Lebron in 2012. Notice the clear agility difference between the two? Lebron got far stronger and bigger enabling him to post up more and bulldoze his way to the rim every time around.
Is he not playing elite level basketball worthy of a max? I'm sure your employer would appreciate it if you slimmed down your damn self. So sick of the constant whining about Harden whenever he had a bad game. Lots of ungrateful bastards here.
What is night and day is that Harden is statistically better in nearly every category this season vs. that season. Honestly, who the **** cares what he looks like if he is producing? He is the MVP this season (imo). Heck, I don't care if he is 400 lbs if he is putting up MVP caliber seasons with excellent durability.
He could stand to lose a few pounds but it's a slippery slope. plus his game has never been about blowing by guys so I'm not sure how much that is going to help him besides maybe with stamina. You kind of need to be on the solid side to finish at the rim - smaller guys just aren't able to take contact and still get off a decent shot like Harden. ...to me the big difference between harden then and now was he used to be more a downhill north/south type slasher and now he has a FULL array of crafty moves so he spends much more time reading and reacting to his defender than he did earlier in his career when he just tried to get people to do the eurostep dance with him. One other random observation - He also seemed to be on his toes more earlier in his career than he is now, fwiw
OP could be on to something actually. Look at Bev's increased agility this season after he explicitly went on a program to slim down and lean up this past summer. So I'm not dismissing the argument out of hand.
What's most important is he's durable AF. He plays a lot of minutes and hardly ever misses games knock on wood. He's deceptively athletic, quick and strong. He's more than getting the job done. I don't see what the problem is.
I will not be talking about his body. Does he have the heart and mind of an NBA champ though? Remains to be seen in the playoffs.
