As the Brooklyn Nets were decorating the Golden State Warriors on Saturday, I went back and forth in our NBA chat room with my editor, who at one point asked a question I hadn’t thought much about: Why did James not Harden got the same kind of vitriol because he jumped on a superteam wagon like Kevin Durant did when he went to the Warriors?
This is an interesting question. People put a lot of effort into plucking legs with Harden while he was in Houston, where he actually traveled on the harder road and tried to kill the superteams, a seemingly admirable quest. It would be obvious if he was such a bright target while struggling against the NBA fights, he would be an even brighter one if he joined they.
But it did not work out that way.
Harden – who posted a triple-double double with 29 points, 14 assists and 13 rebounds in Brooklyn’s win over Sacramento on Monday – became one of the more celebrated players in the league last month. Tereg. He was brilliant with Brooklyn. But Durant was brilliant with Golden State, and four years later he is still being dragged for his decision, and his rugby player final MVPs are considered by many to be footnotes in a sold-out NBA story.
The difference, of course, is that Harden did not join a 73-win team that had already won a championship without him. When Durant joined the Warriors, there was nothing that could go wrong. He was an almost perfect player in an almost perfect team. We do not like security in our sports.
The Nets are not a perfect team, and not even the title favorite in most people’s eyes, and Harden would not be sure. I would then perhaps argue that our collective fascination with everything that can go wrong in Brooklyn – however badly grounded – has suppressed the typical annoyance we retain for deck stackers. How would all this moody dude share one locker room, let alone one ball? Was defense even a consideration?
One month after the experiment, defense is still a big question. Since Harden’s arrival, the Nets have the fourth worst defensive rating in the league on Monday. But the offense is magical. The “only ball” crowd was silenced by Harden, who so naturally moved into the role of a facilitator that it makes you wonder how anyone could ever question his ability or willingness to question it in the first place.
Sure, Harden was probably the most one-sided isolation goal scorer in NBA history with the Rockets, but if you think he was not one of the best predecessors in the world either, you did not pay attention to that. We make sure this Harden role shift is a romantic sacrifice, and it’s true that Harden was willing to swallow some of his pride. But mostly it’s just what makes the best basketball sense.
Durant and Irving are better shooters, naturally suited for, and very experienced, off-ball roles. Durant co-starred with Russell Westbrook in OKC, then Stephen Curry with Golden State. Irving played LeBron James, and then burned out in Boston because he could never master the delicate balance between points.
Harden took the burden off Irving without completely sacrificing his own aggression. He still scores more than 23 points per game. On Monday, he moved up 29 points on 18 shots with Durant out. Irving got 22 shots for 40 points. This slight respect for Irving as a goal scorer makes Harden look like the generous hero in a way we could never look at him in Houston – even if Harden only works according to the ethos of Daryl Morey, who leads the Rockets in a way that claimed to function as a solo artist.
“I feel like he did an excellent job of just handling the point guard role,” Irving said of Harden on Saturday. “It simply came to our notice then. I just looked at him and said, ‘You’re the point guard, and I’m going to play shooting guard. “And it was as simple as that. ‘
It really felt that simple, but in reality, this role clarity to which Irving alludes, at least from the outside, was achieved much earlier than four (now six) days ago. Harden had 14 strokes in his Brooklyn debut. In fifteen games with Brooklyn, Harden had overall double-digit assistants in addition to two, and he averaged twelve cents over that time.
Against the Warriors, Harden dished out 16 assists while taking just 11 shots, hitting six of them, including five of his eight three-pointers (one of the three times was an end to the end of the quarter). It was the third time Harden had completed a game with more assists than shots attempted by the Nets. Meanwhile, Irving and Durant rose 36 strokes. They scored 43 points to Harden’s 19, while Harden led the team with a plus-28.
People like to talk about ‘chemistry’ with newly formed teams. ‘It’s going to take time’, is the starting point if a team does not meet the early expectations. But there is no need for such excuses with the Nets. Irving and Durant have been great all season, and Harden has improved their efficiency, rather than just interrupting it.
Nor is it just about sacrificing shots. Yes, Harden tries eight fewer shots per game than last season in Houston, and ten less than he took in 2018-19, but that does not cost his aggression. If he overdoes the generosity, it will hinder his rhythm and transgression in general. but it is his shot choice and his overall determination that is the most important proof for Brooklyn’s offensive flow.
In short, Harden does not dominate possessions so extremely. He does not drip the air out of the ball while his teammates are rooting for him. With Houston, Harden would climb into his suitcase and stay there until he found something. In Brooklyn, he’s in and out, realizing that excessive creation in an environment of creators is accompanied by declining returns, squeezing his possession time by almost one second per touch from last season in Houston (a direct product of him who less drip), which is much more than it sounds.
* Numbers per NBA.com, starting Monday
|
2020-21 (with nets) |
5.3 |
4.7 |
|
2019-20 |
6.0 |
5.7 |
|
2018-19 |
6.3 |
5.9 |
|
2017-18 |
6.3 |
5.8 |
As for Harden’s improved shot selection, we’m mainly talking about its distinctive 3-indicator. So far with Brooklyn, Harden is taking four of the shots per game, significantly lower than the 7.2 rebound 3s he averaged per 2018-20 game with the Rockets.
To be honest, Harden has made a solid rate in Houston (38 percent from 2018-20), but at similar volumes it will not stand the efficiency test in Brooklyn, with efforts from Durant and Irving representing the opportunity cost – especially again, if you count in all the time, Harden tends to dribble before he starts the shot.
|
2020-21 (with nets) |
3.5 |
3.7 |
|
2019-20 |
5.8 |
6.7 |
|
2018-19 |
6.7 |
8.1 |
All of this is the quantifiable proof of Harden’s commitment to change, which should come as no surprise. Think of the alternative: Harden catches fire in Brooklyn rifles while Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, who were glowing hot before his arrival, hang out by the side? Facilitation would always be Harden’s smartest path, not to mention the easiest path, to immediate acceptance, both in the team and in the public eye.
Suddenly, Harden feels like a completely different player, a truly fun player to watch as his most aesthetic talent – his passing – is now displayed every night, a welcome departure from his often paint-drying possessions in Houston. And that, in my opinion, is the big reason why Harden avoided the backlash from the super team. Because he is humble. A willingness to work outside his own conditions.
Maybe it should never have been questioned in the first place, but it was nonetheless. People really believed that Harden had become so accustomed to playing in one way that at this stage of his career he was unable to adapt. The fact that he made the adaptation so effortless speaks to his incredible talent, which the masses may or may not fully appreciate.