Brick by Brick: James Harden (Part 1)
The Good
Isaac: Harden is the definition of unguardable. He is likely the greatest iso player ever. You can throw any defence at him, and he’s able to digest it, break it down, and still score. He is too big for most guards, and too fast for forwards. His body might not be the definition of a pro athlete, but he is more athletic than most give him credit for.
He has continually developed new elements to his game — improved passing, floaters, stepbacks, ripping through screens, etc. He is so good at judging in milliseconds his best option on drives: layup, lob, dishing to the corner, or now, just pulling up mid-drive and dribbling it back out to the arc to reset. He can mesmerize the defence to a confusing degree, without the balletic dribble moves of players like Kyrie or Curry. His offence has arguably improved every year of his career, despite being in the league for over a decade(!).
This development continues in spite of teams spending their entire game plan around trying to guard him. This is part of what makes all superstars so impressive, but there are few players in league history that have occupied so much space in opponents’ heads. Coaches are innovative, risky, physical; they can’t stop him. The amount of prep time coaching staffs are forced to spend on Harden no doubt means they have less time to prepare for the Rockets’ other threats, meaning his impact on the game is mental as well as physical.
I think a sneaky element of Harden’s game is opposing teams thinking they should be able to stop him, and wearing down mentally when they are unable to do so; Larry Bird is a prime example of this. Players have admitted they are resigned to the fact that you can’t stop guys like LeBron or Durant. They’re too skilled, too physically imposing, too good at shooting over top of others.They’re going to get theirs, and as long as you make them work for it, your team has a chance. With Harden, players see his body, see his somewhat basic skill set, and think they have a chance. But they don’t. And that grates on players over the course of a game, a season, a playoff series, etc.
He is system proof and matchup proof. What player is known as the Harden stopper, in the way CP3 is versus Curry, Beverley versus Westbrook, or LeBron versus JJ Barea? Nobody has come close to achieving that label.
If there are arguments against Harden, it’s that he came into the league at the perfect time, ahead of the curve on how valuable threes are, and with a team that was willing to give him the green light. It is hard to imagine any team would give him that much leash. And he was still an MVP runner-up under Kevin McHale, but D’Antoni unlocked something greater in him; they are arguably the most symbiotic coach-player duo ever. We can knock Harden for being in a perfect situation, but you have to credit him for buying in, knowing who he is, what shots it takes to win, etc. if we are going to knock Westbrook for being stubborn. Harden doesn’t do anything out of his abilities, and he exploits rules and skills in the most efficient way possible. If all players, despite their ability, played this way, imagine how much better guys like Westbrook, Dwight, or Melo would be historically.
Chris: For me, perhaps the most underrated element of Harden’s playstyle is his efficiency. Personally, I’m probably a stronger proponent of efficient scoring than the average fan, or even the average stats nerd. In my book, inefficient scoring is actively detrimental to your team. You can argue the level of talent surrounding someone like Allen Iverson in 2001 when he carried his team to the Finals averaging 33 points per game. But it’s hard to argue that a .480 TS% shooter shooting at an obscenely high volume is beneficial for any team. During the 01 playoff run, Iverson averaged 33 points on 30 shot attempts and 9.5 free throw attempts. During the 18–19 season, Harden averaged 36 points on 24.5 shot attempts and 11 free throw attempts.
Yes, a significant portion of Harden’s scoring comes from free throw attempts. But those who raise this as a mark against Harden seem to imply that this somehow cheapens Harden’s achievements, as if Harden was the first player to ever discover how to draw fouls. Harden’s prolific free throw shooting is what makes him the most efficient volume scorer in NBA history. Harden is already 2nd all time in both 25 and 30 PPG seasons with a .600+ TS%, trailing Kevin Durant and Michael Jordan respectively. Up the bar to 35 points per game, and Harden stands alone; his 18–19 season stands as the most efficient 35 PPG season of all time by a wide margin, with his 19–20 season just under 35 PPG on identical shooting numbers.
Setting the Bar
- * Series in the first 2 rounds where the player’s team lost as the higher-seeded team
- **97–98 4-seed Suns lost to 5-seed Spurs in 1st round, teams had same record.
Stacking up Harden with Steve Nash is an easy starting point to determine his place on the Pyramid. Both played under Mike D’Antoni, with high-powered, fast-paced offences running through them. As of right now have the same number of championships. And while Harden may win a championship down the line, his 18–19 Rockets stack up with Nash’s 05–06 Suns as two of the greatest teams not to win a ring.
The primary argument Nash stans will cite here is MVPs, a fact that probably induces eye rolls from even the most skeptical Harden fans. Nash could very well only have one MVP, with a questionable win over Kobe in 2005–06. And Harden could (and should, dammit!) have won over Westbrook in 2016–17. So the ratio of MVPs could very well be reversed.This is revisionist I know, and we cannot just go around relitigating every award. Which is why we’re just going to call it even on this matter. They have similar All-NBA resumes, but Harden has two more first teams, in a much harder era.
The modern game has unlocked a level of offence for Harden that was unimaginable in Nash’s day. Nash and D’antoni have both admitted they were scared to push the limits of their 7 Seconds or Less offence as far as they could have. It’s easy to imagine how Nash could flourish in today’s game, likely shooting far more 3s, particularly off the dribble. He is a better all around shooter than Harden. But he would get physically worn down, and it’s hard to imagine him carrying as much of a scoring load as Harden does night to night for a whole season. Part of that is that Harden is a pure workhorse, playing less than 70 games only once in his career (not including the 2019–20 season). Part of that is the inflated pace of this era increasing the numbers players put up. But a large part of it is simply that if you need a bucket at the end of the game, Harden is a much better option than Nash. It’s not a knock on Nash, but a reality of the evolution of the D’Antoni system and the game as a whole.
The numbers are simply too overwhelming; what Harden has done is better. He is not an all time great passer like Nash, but he has the ability to create off the dribble in the iso-heavy system the Rockets have tailored to him. His decision making on drives — to dish to the corner, lob, or to take it the hoop — is near perfect. His 3 point percentage is not elite, but the volume at which he shoots them and the ease with which he can get his shot off makes his stepback perhaps the deadliest move in the league. He has two scoring titles, and it feels like he should have more; over the last five seasons he has averaged 31.6 points/game, the best 5-year stretch by any player since Jordan circa his first threepeat. Nash did not have the size or versatility of scoring moves to be able to achieve this. He never finished top 5 in the league in scoring. In fact he never even eclipsed 1500 points in a season, and only reached 1400 four times. Harden, on the other hand, has not scored fewer than 1800 since 2012–13, his last season in OKC (where he scored over 1000 coming off the bench). Granted, Nash was never asked to play this role, but the gap between the two as scorers is massive. Harden is even one of the few volume scorers that can equal Nash from an efficiency standpoint
Once a player reaches superstar status, people rightfully tend to look at the whole picture, including their defence, to see if they are valuable to their teams on both ends. Fans like to roast Harden for his brain farts, or criticize Curry for his defensive faults, but the reality is Nash is by far the worst of the three on that end of the floor. Harden when engaged can be solid, and as we addressed, is a very good post defender, especially considering his position. Curry will never be all-defence, but he is always engaged and a good team defender overall. He is active, and rotates great in cohesion with the rest of his team. I do not think he is a liability. He simply gets picked on in tight situations, which is more a product of the rest of his team being so elite. Teams have no one else to exploit, so it stands out more. Curry is still an athletic 6’3”, and has put on a fair amount of muscle since coming into the league. Nash was always undersized, weak, and often tired from orchestrating the Suns’ offense. He was, simply put, a major liability whose offensive prowess was more than enough to make up for his defensive woes. But Harden’s defensive potential alone puts him a notch above Nash in that respect. Though I want to stick up for my fellow Canadian, it’s pretty tough to make a case for Nash over Harden at this point.
Harden has obviously reached heights few others have, but we will see in Part 2 that there are obvious flaws that need to be addressed.
Written by Isaac O’Neill with additional editing and contributions by Chris Howson-Jan
