Why would any superstar really want to play with Harden?

Doesn't matter what we think, the owner will never trade Harden because you won't get the same value back in return meaning we'll be seeing the lottery for a couple years which Les never wants to happen. NEVER. tl;dr Les will never allow the trade to happen unless Harden wants out.

 

This is right. You have to rebuild around Harden. Howard is the wrong guy for Harden. Just as Asik was. And the reason Capela won't be more than a back-up on this team.

You need to find shooting big men to open up the driving lanes.

 

I have no idea if other players would want to play with Harden or not. The players DID vote him MVP last year, so they must respect his game. Not sure a player that dominates the ball as much as Harden would be a fun player to play with.

 

I'd kind of disagree. In my opinion the reason Dwight is wrong for Harden is the WAY he wants the ball. He isn't content to work off the pick and roll, which does a great job of opening up the lane for guys like Harden that can drive and pass the way he can. Watch the way Howard sets his picks. So much of the time it's done lazily and with no real effort like he thinks he is above setting picks. He thinks he is this dominant post presence because of his high FG%, but that isn't the case for anyone that actually watches him in the post. His high FG% is only a result of his frequent dunks and layups. He isn't Hakeem. He isn't Shaq. Dwight is a better version of DeAndre Jordan. But DeAndre buys into his role. For some reason, Dwight refuses to do that.

 

Harden only dominates the ball because no one else on our team can. Parsons had no problem scoring 19 a game with Harden and he's not even an all star.

 

Parsons was smart. He is a good shooter despite that flat as hell looking shot and he is constantly looking to slash or opportunities to move around off ball. I said as much when we first drafted him. Problem is, he is worth no where near what he got from Mavs.

 

This. It would be ideal to have versatile bigs but we also need to have bigs who set good screens/picks. Dwight is absolutely lazy setting picks, while DMo is probably the best we have at it.

It's pretty amazing how almost everything went wrong this season. I think if we had a healthy DMo and a TJones putting up past numbers then we would be looking a lot better.

 

Harden takes bad shots because he doesn't trust anyone to consistently knock down open looks (rightfully so). If he had someone like Durant (NBA gods please), he would definitely be a willing passer. The best description I've heard it before for the Harden-Durant combo is that "Harden is an initiator and Durant is a finisher", in that Durant excels when he catches the ball with the defense already trying to close out or out of position.

 

Player : time of possession per game / minutes per game = percentage of time a player has the ball in their hands while they are on the floor

Paul : 8.2/33.3 = 24.62%
Westbrook: 8.1/34.6 = 23.41%
Lillard : 8.2/35.9 = 22.84%
Irving : 5.6/29.8 = 18.79%
Rose : 5.8/31.9 = 18.18%
Lowry : 6.3/36.9 = 17.07%
Harden : 6.2/37.7 = 16.44%
Curry : 5.4/33.9 = 15.92%
Lebron : 5.1/35.9 = 14.20%

And really just about any point guard / main creator for their team is around or above Harden in %.

So really just about every player in the league plays with a guy who is as ball dominant as Harden.

 

Why would any superstar want to play with any other superstar?

1 DeMarcus Cousins, C SAC 51 20.7
2 Stephen Curry, PG GS 57 20.1
3 Damian Lillard, PG POR 55 19.9
4 James Harden, SG HOU 61 19.5
5 Kevin Durant, SF OKC 55 19.1
6 LeBron James, SF CLE 57 18.8
7 Russell Westbrook, PG OKC 18.7
8 Blake Griffin, PF LAC 18.4
9 C.J. McCollum, SG POR 60 18.2
10 Anthony Davis, PF NO 53 18.1

And every player on this list, with the possible exception of Brow, has at least one other teammate more deserving of those shots than anyone on the Rockets not named Harden.

Oh, and Harden is also more durable than anyone on this list.

 

PnR works against teams back when they played man. So many defenses are designed to eliminate the effectiveness of the PnR though. Against a zone it's not nearly as effective as it used to be. It can still be though.

Dwight can't do either well. He has no range, and he is not the type to play a PnR game. Ideally you want a guy who can do both.