As we all know, James Harden passed Sleepy Floyd last night as the Rockets 7th all-time leader in assists, with 2,384. At 11.8 per game, this season he will theoretically pass: - Steve Francis for 6th all-time in 3 games. - Kenny Smith for 5th all-time in 6-7 games. - Mike Newlin for 4th all-time in 16-17 games. - Hakeem Olajuwon for 3rd all-time in 51-52 games. If somehow he keeps that up for the next two seasons, he will pass Calvin Murphy for #1 all-time at some point during the 2018-19 season. Even crazier, it took Calvin 13 seasons to hit 4,402 assists. If Harden does it at this pace, he will pass him in only 7 seasons.
That is what happens when you give an offensive savant the ball with all the picks and spacing he desires with a mad scientist of offense and a bunch of players who can shoot the three. Spoiler alert, good things happen.
Harden is amazing. I can imagine that those will discredit for the modern rules but he encounters some violent physical play with no foul call in many situations.
man, we are in the midst of greatness. i really hope james can bring us a title, because when he's done, i don't know if another player like him will fall into our laps again. **** the superteams.
Morey and MDA are like "Hey Harden, we are going to get you a lot of shooters this year and bigs who who set hard picks and roll even harder to the rim, all without b****ing." My guess of Harden's response was "Yes please!"
he has a chance to be the second best rocket of all time, but numbers alone wont be enough. he'll have to lock it in with a championship (like clyde), or a pair of MVP awards (like moses). other than that i think he can reach as high as #4 best rocket of all time based on numbers alone, if he hasn't earned that spot already.
Even Olajuwon had Thorpe, Horry, Maxwell, and Cassell. He later had Drexler too. Harden has Ego, Ryno, Bev, Capela, and Dekker.
We've had some good players since Hakeem but IMO this is the first time since Hakeem were I honestly feel like we have the best player in basketball and he should be league MVP. Harden is special man people don't give him enough credit. Maybe I'm out of line but if he keeps this up and gets a ring or 2 he'll be a top 10 offensive player off all time. The stuff he does on offensive is amazing. It's one thing to do it with bad effecincy but harden is constantly over 60% true shooting the guy is pure brilliance on that end of the court. What's crazy is if harden came along 20 years ago he prob would have won 3-5 rings by now and we'd be asking ourselves if he's top 5 or top 10 player off all time. He's really good Enjoy it folks.
People hand-checked back then and most players played at least solid D, at least as well as their physiques allowed.
You could make an argument that McGrady passed Drexler, and now Harden has passed them both. I don't know if he'll ever touch Hakeem, but I think he's already a top 3-5 player in Rockets history. He was built for this era of basketball, and with his style of play, he should last another 10 years in the league. I like to say he has an old man's game, not in a negative connotation, but in a way where he doesn't use athleticism to beat guys, he uses his intelligence and skill (with a little bit of pure strength built in).
Absolutely. He is an amazing player, underrated nationally. I love comparing stats between Harden and Kobe side by side based on their years in the league. Harden has basically been ahead of Kobe in terms of averages as a starter year by year. This was about the time in Kobe's career when he carried the Lakers and scored 30+ year after year and kept banging heads with Steve Nash and the Suns. I'm really looking forward to seeing what Harden ultimately becomes. Even if Harden can't get a ring this year, DM will get him Anthony Davis to play alongside him and the duo will bring a title to Houston.
As a Blazer, sure. But he only spent 3.5 years in Houston and averaged 19 points, 6 rebounds, 5.5 assists with a 20.2 PER. T-Mac was here for 6 years and averaged 23 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 6 assists with a 21.1 PER. Clyde did win a ring here, but he didn't carry the team like T-Mac did for 6 years.
RobKsports: do you think Drexler would have had lower numbers if he was carrying the team (to first round exits) every year?? You also kind of round those stats in McGrady's favour... the assists are 5.4 vs 5.6. Basically the same - except one guy didn't have to keep dumping it into Hakeem (not an assist)! Drexler's shooting numbers were better across the board, he had 1.9 steals per game as a Rocket, he had greater win shares per game, has a larger gap between the offensive and defensive ratings (etc). And Drexler did it all on a much lower usage %. There is no way McGrady passed Drexler as a Rocket. And Harden passed McGrady in his 2nd season here. Sorry, but TMax just wasn't that good (don't get me wrong, excellent NBA player, but not in the Drexler/ Harden conversation)
Remember when MDA was telling everyone James could average 12-14 assists a game and GARM layed into the man? I do.
You can make arguments for either side. Their stats are a wash, with T-Mac in a slight lead. I just think T-Mac carrying the team for 6 years surpasses Clyde being here for about half the time. But you could also say Clyde winning a ring surpasses T-Mac and his stats. Either way, they're 1A and 1B as the best SG's in Rockets history (considering Harden as a PG). I wouldn't say that T-Mac isn't even in the same category as Clyde, because if Clyde is superior, T-Mac is right behind him.