Westbrook's Fit.

Lowe: NBA's six most intriguing players

Russell Westbrook, Houston Rockets

It might be the most interesting question going into this season: What is Westbrook going to do when James Harden has the ball?

He has to shoot better, for one. He can't cut and screen and dart inside for offensive rebounds and do all the sexy-nerdy basketball things on every possession. The game doesn't flow that way for most stars. Westbrook has hit about 35 percent on catch-and-shoot 3s in some prior seasons; he could bounce back to that kind of acceptable, non-grisly number on the looks Harden will feed him.

But Westbrook has to do a lot more of that sexy-nerdy stuff for this bizarro partnership to take Houston as far as the Harden-Chris Paul version got them in 2018. Westbrook has done almost none of that. He is the battering-ram-on-repeat who drove stars out of Oklahoma City. Playing with Harden -- a superior on-ball scorer in every sense -- provides a chance for Westbrook to rewrite the narrative of his career.

He'll still have the ball a lot, of course. Westbrook can reanimate a zombified transition game and thrive running spread pick-and-roll in the sort of spacing Oklahoma City rarely gave him. Harden has to play off the ball more, too.

But Westbrook has never been his team's secondary ball handler. If he spends his off-ball time chilling behind the arc, hands on knees, the Rockets have little chance to come out of the Western Conference.

 

Westbrook is inefficient and doesn't play a smart game. He is just a force of nature. We will be a great regular season team, but Westbrick can shoot you out of a playoff game and series. I think Westrbick will set a new NBA record for missed three's this year. The best playoff teams play smart and don't waste possessions with bad decisions/shots. See the Rockets/Warriors series last year. No question he will help with load management on Harden, but he is going to scrape a lot of paint off of the rim this year!

 

Not much chirping about Westbrook's fit today.

 

Is he the alpha dog now?