Can James Harden have the highest PER of ALL TIME this season?

He could but then Hollinger would be seen as a joke in the NBA because media would be like "this is a worthless stat if someone like James Harden is all time leader in PER"

RIP PER if Harden achieves it

 

PER means nothing to basketball. It's always been about scoring PPG. Quick, when Jordan won 8 straight scoring titles, was he the PER leader every season?

 

Yes

 

Lmao..
Just look at top PER players this season. which one is not playing out of their minds on the court?
Look at all time PER leaders, Chamberlain, MJ, LBJ, Curry, Shaq. Which one did not play great basketball in those seasons? Means nothing to basketball?

 

Harden will lead the league in PPG and APG and still not make all-nba.

 

Harden will be MVP and be left off the all-NBA list. That's how being good and being from Houston just ..is.

 

In his championship seasons, Jordan was 1st, 1st, 1st, 4th, 4th, and 2nd in PER.

 

I am also thinking Morey and Les are also responsible for not building a good enough team around Harden.

As good as Harden is he is still flawed.

 

Every player is flawed. I'm sure that wasn't what you meant. Care to explain a little further?

 

I do not need to explain everything because I am not 'officially' as smart as Morey or Alexander. Far from it actually.

I do not know how exactly the power hierarchy, power structure is constructed.
(I know Les is boss but how much of a say Morey has in this chapter ?)

Fact is Harden is a very talented player on Offense, people called him 'Lil Lebron', the next SG/PG combo guard after Kobe, the greats, a more efficient guard than Kobe.

That is fine with me. I am no Harden fan but I choose to root for him because he is on the Rockets.

But there are question marks to what he needs to succeed.

We skip to chapter Howard which did not work out, the team shifted back to a Harden centric team again.

I stand by my statement that Harden is no vocal leader, he cannot lead by rallying everyone together, and I am not sure Mike the coach can too.

Something is always missing with this team, either there is no talent, or there is no glue or there is no competent coach.

How good is Harden really or how good can Harden become to lead us to the WCF consistently year after year because that WC appearance felt nothing like automatic or it should not be taken for granted.

Sadly there is not a definite answer out in the world that I can tell you other than that Harden will die trying in the process.

The basketball forces and the FO force might not always be with him.

I am sure he will accept one or two regular season MVP honors when he retires but one championship? Not so sure. (A better career than Derrick Rose should be guaranteed though)

 

Usually fans of inefficient players hate PER (Kobe fans for example). We know PER is heavily dependent on usage and doesn't put everything into perspective (no single stat does), but it is a very indicative advanced stat. You won't be able to find scrubs with 25-31 PER through 70-80 games who also play 20-40 minutes/game. It is way better than just looking at simple stats, like PPG & FG%.

With an appropriate sample size of minutes/games player, give me a team of players with 20-30 PER and I'll be very happy. Don't care if people hate the stat.

 

Harden is hardly " inefficient" this season. Dude is shooting over 50% from the field and has a insane per game

 

Don't think anyone is saying he is. James should always be a top TS% player because he is great at 1) shooting, 2) getting to the rim, 3) drawing fouls, 4) making free throws.

The only problem with Harden's style of play is in the playoffs against great teams w/ more favorable NBA stars (Curry, Durant, LBJ). Refs may hesitate to give him his 10-20 FTs and the Rockets will look like fools.

That said, it feels like the Rockets are wasting Harden's prime years. He is at the point where he can play 40MPG at an elite level.

 

While it's possible, I don't think he'll maintain his FG% or 3PT%.

If he does, he'll have a serious chance for #1 PER All-Time

 

I actually think Harden is becoming better scorer each passing year, and my impression is that he's more willing to score through normal means rather than through drawing fouls (because he absolutely can), not that I have problem with Harden's uncanny ability to get to the line, actually it is a great asset to have when you're having an off shooting night. Klay can't score 20 when his shots aren't falling, whereas Harden absolutely can which is why he's a top 3 scorer in the league (along with Curry & Durant.) Also, if you look at his average FT attempts in the playoffs, there is no difference with that of regular season. FT attempts is not the issue for Harden, it's just that sometimes he gets into shooting slump during the playoffs. But as I mentioned, I'm sensing that Harden is a much better scorer now even compared to 3 years ago so I think he'll do fine.

 

As of now Harden is leading the league with 35.5 PER. I don't know how long this will last, but he legitimately has a shot at becoming the league leader in many of the advanced stats category.