Yeah, I think he himself knew that if he didn't make a big change, then it'd only prove what everyone else was seeing to be true: that his game was falling off a cliff. A lot of factors I think played into the 2018-2019 season that made it his worst of his career though: another injury, another year for the league to adjust to our iso-heavy offense (which he couldn't do anymore), worse supporting cast than previous year to give more room for error for our team as a whole. One of the big changes that you see from his game the last 2 seasons is that he doesn't iso nearly as much out top from 3, and when he does it's when it's his last option, when a big is guarding him, and probably at the midrange areas. Instead he's just even more insistent on utilizing screens, resetting to get another screen multiple times if necessary, and hunting for his elbow jumper even more aggressively. But having said all that, I still think he's quicker today than he was in that dreadful 2018-2019 season. You just didn't see him beat ANYBODY that year off the bounce.
I know Harden was the better player, much longer resume as a Rocket, etc, but Chris Paul took the team to another level in 2017-2018. It’s almost unbelievable when you look back - 65 wins. The only 60+ win season. The only time the Rockets ever clinched the #1 seed. A 3-2 lead on the Warriors in the Western Conference Finals... Then the fairy tale ends. Nevertheless, and albeit for a relatively small amount of time, Chris Paul was the best leader of the Rockets since Dream imo.
It was a crushing blow for sure. But I’ll never understand why everybody glosses over the finals as if we were guaranteed a championship.
Do we blame DanAndToni's limited rotation for over working Paul and the subsequent hamstring pull? Rocket River
This has bothered me almost every day since. When talking about legacies and choking ... blah blah blah...and all that was going to be out the window had Paul not done the I’ll-timed spin move. It changed everything. Harden likely doesn’t go ring chasing in BK and so many other dominoes would not have fallen. No Russ trade being a big one-that crippled our franchise too...
more blame is the severe lack of depth for an older team, so there's no choice to play guys that give you a better chance to win more minutes. Spending for rotational depth should have been a no brainer
Yeah. Remember in Game 7 D'Antoni threw Ryan Anderson onto the court out of desperation and he immediately got switched onto Curry and got cooked? That was the moment I knew it was over.
when your best player off the bench turned out to be Shump and a sparingly rivers that's it. thats all anyone needs to know about the rockets depth playing GS
I still remember CP’s spin move that led to the injury. The game was already done too. What a wretched moment.
It was 95-94 with 50secs when it happened. Cook got a completely wide open 3 and missed. harden missed a 3 with 20 seconds life while cp3 never made is past half court originally. He was finally able to get out of the game after that. The game was far from done.
Oh I remember. We had a similar occurrence of those lunge fouls on stepbacks in game 1 the next year's playoffs. I was just addressing his skepticism on whether the Rockets could've beat those Warriors and refs with a healthy CP3.
Ya the chances would have been much higher if CP3 had played game 7 (forget game 6, silver isn't letting GS lose game 6 at home no matter what IMO). The odds just are not NEARLY as high as some people think. I had the rockets around +5000 in game 7 (about 50/1 odds) without cp3, with him it's still not much better then maybe 10/1 or 15/1. Maybe i'm just more cynical when it comes to Silver then most.
I actually agree with you. They really should have won game 7. Double-digit halftime leads in both games 6 + 7 and they couldn't close the other team out. Yes with a healthy Chris Paul it's almost guaranteed they win one of those two games. However the fact that the team ran out of gas in games 6 + 7, as admirable of an effort as it was, really ends up being a blemish on Harden's legacy (and Morey's for not constructing a more flexible roster and D'Antoni for, as anticipated, over-working the players). What I would say most people's frustration with Harden was was that he couldn't, or didn't, elevate his game when it mattered the most. Yes we was phenomenal, and yes he was taking on quite a load, but what he needed was a dominant, breakout performance when it mattered the most. And that never happened. The disappointment is as much with Harden's inability to "will his team" to victory like Wade, Bryant, Jordan, James or Nowitzki had done in the past. Yes the competition was supreme against the Warriors, but all the criticism and accusations of a regular season stat-padding, playoff mirage were unfortunately proven true. Doubly so in 2019 when the team, while inferior to 2018, still had Harden and a discount Chris Paul, and didn't have to deal with Durant. And they couldn't even go to 7 games. __ In the end 2018 will forever be a tremendous, bitter disappointment, but I think will ultimately prove that as great as Harden has been, he'll never truly be one of the all-time greats. Chris Paul was the leader. Harden was...Harden.
