James Harden. 2015 NBA Most Valuable Player Runner Up. 5x NBA All-Star. 2x All-NBA First Team. 2013 All-NBA Third Team. 2012 Sixth Man of the Year. 2x Gold Medalist for USA Basketball (2012 Olympics, 2014 World Cup). Leading the league in both scoring and assists in a season has only been done ONCE in all of NBA history. In 1972-73, Nate “Tiny” Archibald of the Kansas City Kings finished with averages of 34 points and 11.4 assists per game. James Harden almost achieved that same historic feat this year, leading the league in assists at 11.2 per game, and finishing second in scoring at 29.2 points per game (behind Russell Westbrook’s 31.7 ppg). Two things worth pointing out in favor of Harden: Westbrook has attempted close to 400 field goals more than anyone else in the league (he stands at 805-1899, good for a 42.4 field goal percentage, DeMar DeRozan has the next most FG attempts at 1530. James Harden is 655-1489, good for a 44.0 field goal percentage), AND James leads the league in win shares. Tiny Archibald’s Kings that season went 36-46, Harden and his Rockets were at 36-16 with 30 games left to play.
The Houston Rockets were projected to win 41 games this year*. They were supposed to sneak into the postseason as a low seed (41 wins would be good enough for the 8th seed, if you think about it without the tiebreakers and the like), but there’s been nothing sneaky about these Rockets. Mike D’Antoni was coming back to the league after disappointing showings in New York and LA, with a team that could actually play the way he wanted to play. Mike wanted to move James to run the point, and create for others more. It was SUPPOSED to be easy to game plan against. Houston stands at 53-26 right now, meaning they could be anywhere from 56-26 to 53-29, if it’s the latter, that’s still 12 games better than most projected.** That’s obviously in no small part thanks to James Harden, who has played in all but 1 game this season through 79 games, averages 36.6 minutes per game, and is the center of everything that Houston does.
If you’re still reading this, you’re about to witness a masterclass in the pick and roll. Harden is a clever and creative playmaker, and in D’Antoni’s spread system, the game looks simple, and the reads are basic, but there’s no questioning the effectiveness of the action. One of his greatest assets as a passer are his eyes, if you watch Harden closely, and most defenses do, he shifts everything in one direction, only to whip a pass with incredible pace and accuracy the opposite way. When you blitz him, his patience and poise allow him to absorb the double and wait for the right angle so he can get the pass to the right spot. When you switch, he’s going to exploit the mismatch, whether by taking his man off the dribble, or waiting until his big can bury a smaller guard inside. If you overload the strong side, he’ll drive at you and rifle a pass to the weak side. The most dangerous part? With Harden at point, it’s normally a big/rim runner, and 3 shooters out there with him, so even if you take away the first, second, and third options, the Rockets will still find a way to make you pay.
*I would like to point out that Nylon Calculus projected them to win somewhere around 47 games, and that’s worth noting: nyloncalculus.com/2016/10/18/2...
**Bleacher Report’s featured NBA columnist actually predicted that they would finish 38-44, as the 11th best team in West. Below Denver, Dallas, and the 8th seeded Minnesota Timberwolves: bleacherreport.com/articles/26...
8 апр 2017
