Is harden top 5 player in the NBA? First take quarantine shares its thoughts

I refuse to believe there has been a season in NBA history where the league leader in win shares wasn’t considered a top 5 player.

Harden making history again?

Edit... I see you are likely referring to the calendar year of 2020. For which I would agree

 

Yes in top 5.
Top four if you want to swap him around with LeBron, Kawhai, or Giannis interchangeablly.

Steph and KD on pause because lack of games played this season.

Harden's Sept - Dec games this season were unreal.

The next group of guys are good but are in a tier below.

Embid, AD, Jokic, Donicic, PG13, KaT, Kemba, Booker, Beal, Siakim, Tatum.

This season I can make a case for Russ being in top ten, he bounced back nicely from injury and fitting into a new team.

 

He's tired.
He's concussed.
He went to the club.
He's drunk.
He doesn't have enough help.

He quit.

Spoiler

Kinda have to agree with Max.

Also true. Much like Jordan didn't only play 6 years and go 6-6, Harden didn't only play the last 5 years and lose to the Warriors.

vs Heat in the Finals where he came up small?
vs Thunder?
vs Blazers?
vs Spurs?


Lost 4-2


Lost 4-1
G5 2-11, 14 points 12 turnovers ... is that good?


Lost 4-1
Was this the DMo butt sweat year? Curry only played 2 games


Lost 4-2
Harden was concussed, tired, drunk, went to the club or only God knows what to explain G6
No Kawhi, no Tony;
2-11, 10 points, 6 turnovers, fouled out, Rockets lose by 39 at home!


Lost 4-3
Rockets up 3-2, Chris Paul gets hurt, the rest is history.


Lost 4-2
No Durant, no Cousins, no problem
G5: Harden takes one shot in the final 7 minutes
G6: Curry/Green in foul trouble; And the flip side of Harden, Curry(scoreless at half) goes nuclear for 33 second half points(23 in 4th) as the Warriors win

In conclusion, Harden is a top 5 regular season player; Harden is not a top 5 postseason player

 

Yup that’s fair. People need to wake the tuck up here

 

You haven't the foggiest about what is fair. Your hatred fro Harden (and MDA) makes you the proverbial hostile witness.

Harden has not had the same cast around him as KD, Steph, Lebron or even Kawhi during their championship seasons so stop blowing chum out of your ass.

 

i'm not trying to convince anyone harden is a good playoff performer. he clearly isn't. and i would say worse early in his career than lately. but he's not as horrible as people make him out to be. people like bird, curry, stockton, malone, drob all show similar dropoffs. probably more that i haven't looked up. obviously you don't want to be some of those guys, but he's not off the charts in a category by himself either. some of the greatest ever have fallen pretty hard in the playoffs.

he's also seemingly got the worst narrative luck. what does everyone remember from 2015 gsw? turnovers! except who cares if he broke a record or had something less awful like 8 while losing in 5. based on what you posted, in game score he led both teams for the series. because his games 1 and 4 were literally some of the best in the whole last decade of the playoffs. but those get ignored for turnovers. and if game 4 was meaningless because we were down 3-0, i don't see how game 5 was meaningful.

in 2018, he basically ties curry in game score (durant led both teams), somehow leads 3-2 before paul's injury, and averages good numbers for the series, but all he gets is 0-27!! i get why people think it's funny, but it's not like it matters if we go 7-44 by spacing out our misses or bunch them all together. and it's not like harden missed all 27.

last year he massively outplays curry and possibly even durant (ahead in game score by a decent amount), but the world talks about him like he averaged 15 and 5 while missing all his shots.

i'll admit i have no answer for 2017, other than i can't imagine harden played huge minutes for 82 games, almost accounted for the most points in nba history, had a good series against okc, was cooking the spurs for 4.9 games (including in that game 5), saw kawhi get injured a few minutes earlier, then got an accidental elbow from pau gasol that didn't affect him at all, but also right at that moment he completely decided he didn't care about the season and just quit and started playing like he didn't know he was on a basketball court. maybe he wasn't concussed, but it seems hard to believe you go through all that and just say "nah, i'm good for this season." it did keep us from losing to the warriors 5 out of 5 years, so there's that.

curry did go nuclear. he also had the luxury of playing pretty horribly for 5.5 games and still leading 3-2 and being within single digits so he could go nuclear in the 2nd half. at halftime of game 6, he was averaging 20 ppg on sub-40%/25% splits for the series. we would have murdered harden for that. we'd probably be mad at eric gordon for that. but that's the nice thing about having 3 other all-stars help you out. he owed the warriors 33 points in the second half.

it's not the end all, be all, but he has been 4th and 5th in playoff PER the last 2 seasons. i suppose YMMV on where that ranks him overall but i don't really see anybody not named kawhi, lebron, durant, or giannis who has any real claim over him based on individual numbers/team success.

 

Well, you have to remember that...he's an idiot.

 

It will be interesting to see if he can be a Top 5 player and Brody being a Top 5 player.

When the lane got open for Russell, he exploited it ruthlessly, Harden had a bad shooting streak, took a backseat which coincided with WB's strong play..... I think there was only 1 game or 2 with WB 30+ and Harden 35+.

Those statement games against Lakers and Celtics had Russell's imprint on them.

At this point, even being older, WB is the more explosive player no matter how much JH works on his quick first step with sports science.

Something's gotta give.

 

First Take's Top 15 players
15. Jimmy Butler
14. Kyrie Irving
13. Paul George
12. Russell Westbrook
11. Joel Embiid
10. Nikola Jokic
9. Damian Lillard
8. Luka Doncic
7. Anthony Davis
6. James Harden
5. Stephen Curry
4.
3.
2.
1.

Steph running away (79%)

 

Max is just trying to be the new Skip Bayless.

Everyone knows Harden is a top 5 player so he's going to say he's not a top 5 player.

Max thinks its MDAs system that makes him better, but Harden been putting up these numbers.

In fact, it's a better argument that it's KERR's system that made Curry, I thought he didn't make an all-star until Kerr took over but he did make it in Jackson's last year but his stats took a considerable jump under Kerr.

While Max has a point that coaches matter (more than most fans think they do in this sport) he's wrong to think that MDA is running some special system here with Harden. He seems to think this is the same kind of thing he's done with Lin and Nash but it isn't.

And the funny thing is that Kerr considers MDA one of his mentors so he's not using this same argument for Curry for a reason.

 

Harden deserves credit for beating timberwolves in 2018. Derrick rose lost a step and his rankings fell after rockets whooped wolves in 2018.

The rockets beat Derrick rose in 2018 only because of the rebounding advantage afforded to the Hem due to dominance of Clint capeala.

 

It's an odd time in basketball history where there really are like 6 players that are toss ups and you wouldn't be wrong in taking them. Harden hate is unreal though. His career trajectory is shaping up to be very Dirk like. Dirk Noringski. Playoff choker. Flopper. Lots of disrespect. Then he busts out an incredible playoff run(along with the rest of the team playing way over their level) to a championship and now Dirk is one of the most respected PF's of all time. In fact, Dirk had WAY bigger choke jobs than Harden's ever had before that ring at 32 years old.

Harden's got to win the big one though. But, Morey and MDA experiments at this point of Hardens career might cost him a legacy or create a new positive narrative.

 

Lmao the angle is both could be Top 5 or Top 4 players.

Steph's allround game is worse than Harden's but his shooting accuracy is much better, also his moving off ball also get teammates more involved in the Offense.

Steph is built like a normal guy, not strong, a little faster than average.

Shooting is so darn important today!

Is it really that important to place JH in front of Curry? Pls do so but one spot doesn't mean the world to me.

 

If Harden doesn't win a ring in the next 2 years, he's going to be out of the top 10 by ESPN's list.

After watching The Last Dance doc and seeing the majority of people's reaction to it, it's basically rings or bust for superstar players. Harden needs to realize if he doesn't win a ring as the team's #1 or 2 player, he will be forgotten in the history books by future fans or maybe he doesn't really care.

Giannis is celebrated now and overrated by every media outlet but fans alike will turn on him if he doesn't win a ring in the next couple years.

 

Seriously F everyone. Harden is a an all time Great. It isn’t just his scoring (which is absolutely insane) but also his iq, playmaking, and handle on the ball. So effing what if he has come up short in the playoffs against a team that was absolutely stacked which no one else even came close to beating. The Cavs team in 2017 with Kyrie, LeBron, Love, and co pretty much got swept by them. But James Harden loses a game 7 without CP3 to a team with 4 all NBAers and it’s considered a choke job? Yes that’s quite logical...

 

Curry is just not a better all around player than Harden. If Curry manned up this year and returned from that minor injury he had he knew he would have been exposed for what he really is. Harden as a Warrior instead of Curry this year takes the Warriors to the playoffs.

 

It's not about the spot for me. It is for Max though, Max is just being a contrarian. He does this with everything, he knows what gets clicks and attention (as evident here) and what gets views. First Take was built on one guy saying crazy things and that guy used to be Skip, but now it has to be Max. So, most people know Harden is a top 5 player and Max will just say the opposite to get headlines.

For me it's about the disrespect that it is all about MDA and how illogical the whole argument is.

I actually agree with Max that MDA had a positive influence on Harden...but Kerr also had a positive influence on Curry and no one brings that up. Pop had a positive influence on Kawhi...Coaches DO matter.

Is Curry even a top 5 player without Kerr? I'd say no. Know why though? Because of how Kerr brought the best out of all of his players. He started Green (who was projected to be a nobody until Kerr came along) he made a system that showcased the talents of his best players and he made sure to instill a strong defensive mentality for that entire team. The results of that were championships. I think the Warriors have 0 championships without Kerr. I mean that. I think coaches don't ever get enough credit

If Mark Jackson is still the coach of that team they go nowhere. Green never plays (as they didn't like each other...) so their dynasty never even starts. Mark Jackson...hilariously enough (he was not a good coach) thought Draymond Green was a wing player...imagine that. Green himself said he thought he'd be out of the league with Mark Jackson as coach.

So really, Curry owes his career to Kerr and I have no doubt he'd still put up his numbers but Kerr realized the shooters he had, realized the effectiveness of small ball, and made sure the team understood defense wins in the end and I don't think any old regular coach like Jackson gets that out of them. No championships for Curry means no one putting him in the top 5. The only reason he's in there is because of his team accomplishments and I don't take that away from him.

By all accounts Curry seems like a great leader that deserves his rings. I'm not hating on Curry at all. Just that the truth is he fell into a right situation. I always believe teams like that Warriors team also had a lot of luck to it as well.

 

I'm genuinely shocked this thread is even a question being asked...

The only question worth asking is: "who is legitimately better than Harden?"
Give Harden the Bucks supporting cast, and championship.
Give him a bunch of cut price retreads, and he still makes the conference finals.

Just wow to BSPN.

 

No doubt, a very thought out comment.

I agree about Curry but would add he might have still cracked the Top 30 AT just because he is the best shooter of them all.

Couple of points.

1) I do think another coach could at least get the Warriors to contend other than Kerr but he must be someone in that mold.

Someone like a Brad Stevens on Offense, someone analytical and innovative for sure. Someone young and hungry.

2) MDA is an innovator on O and a player's guy meaning he knows concepts and he lets players roam free and putting them in a free flowing Offense.
In Harden's case he also lets him Iso.

He did that in Phoenix with the 7 seconds, in New York with Lin and then David Lee, now here in Houston.

I do not think he is a great in-game tactician/coach in the Conference Finals though, he was usually outsmarted by the likes of Popovich, Zen master or Kerr.

Kerr just took his stuff and ran his team out of the gym.

He is also no Rudy T with them 'Heart of champion' quotes, he doesn't motivate with his quotes or inspire in interviews, didn't dazzle.
Seems rather wanting to be at home with wife and kids during pressers.

There is a good reason he was always on the verge of great success but failed due to his own stubbornness.

Couple that with a GM that hasn't won anything, Harden and CP3 never been able to make the Finals as 1st bananas, obnoxious owners, and it is easy to see why it's always been close but no cigar.
(No championship DNA other than Ariza, and it's really tough to win the 1st one.)