[Media Conspiracy] Who ordered the hit on James harden?

Harden should use a #hat3M3Mor3 tag. If this is getting clicks he should use them in his favor.

Also, I prefer to be hated and hear my name all over than being ignored, Lillard is a good example.

 

Lillard isnt on the same level as the other guys and Lillard (also Adidas guy fyi) complains a ton about being ignored. He was talking about all-star snubs etc like he had never made the team before. Honestly he somehow made all-nba first team last season which made NO sense to me whatsoever.

 

Had a relative over for Christmas who's a big LeBron fan. Watching the game, in the first minute he makes a crack about Harden's defense. I point out that Harden is statistically one of the best paint defenders, especially among guards. Relative laughs is off like I'm just inventing stuff.

People have become conditioned to hate Harden. I don't see it ending anytime soon.

Harden could probably mitigate the hatred somewhat if he just pretended to be playing tough defense all the time. Kobe did that and made a bunch of All-Defense teams.

 

National consensus is what the guy parrots who is opposite of KOC on the ringer podcast: Harden and CP3 are the same in that when they drive to the hoop, they aren’t “really” driving to score. They’re just looking to draw fouls.

KOC being the basketball-watching guy he is, always tries to refute this with hard numbers (Harden’s FT/game rates are just the same as guys like Kobe, MJ, WB, Wade, and when you account for his fouls per drive actually a bit lower).

But no one listens. It’s like politics a thing this point. No one agrees on facts and everything is fake news all of a sudden.

 

So we are trying to come up with a theory of this conspiracy theory?

 

That is exactly my point. He complains about being ignored.

While he’s not on Harden’s level, he’s still top 50? 30? And totally ignored. Begging for some attention.

 

Harden actually was a decent defender during his OKC days but as soon as he took a much greater offensive load he couldnt expend the same energy on defense. Now Kobe is the better defender by far, but Kobe made those all defensive teams earlier in his career by merit and then later in his career made a few more on rep then actual merit (seriously i think he made one in 2011 or 2010 which was a total joke) The years when Kobe did legit make it IMO he had Shaq and other offensive guys to help shoulder the offensive load.

At this point its the perception that has become "Reality" and if Harden did become all-world defense he would still be not on any of the teams and said to be a poor defender. At this point I would say Harden is an average on ball defender, above average post defender and a way below average off ball defender. He does make some critical defensive plays but they are often overlook or purposefully ignored.

Add in Kobe was in LA - the league desperately would prop its stars in LA, NY, Chicago more than they probably should be.

 

Harden really doesn’t make more defensive mistakes than the average all star. It just gets highlighted more because who he is and because he’s hated.

I see kyrie, curry, etc all have lapses defensively but it gets swept under the rug because nba twitter and the media like them so much.

The only perimeter player that had that much of an offensive load while playing above average defensive historically was Jordan. And if that’s the barometer for harden, that’s a pretty good place to be.

 

Going off of that, it's always seemed to me that Harden isn't what people think an NBA superstar should look or play like. The guys who get all the hype tend to be lean, hoppy athletic freaks who play like NBA Jam characters in real life - Lebron, KD, Giannis, Westbrook. It's exciting. Harden looks like a stonefaced bulldog - not exceptional in height, wingspan, jumping ability, etc. - and despite having a few highlight dunks, he's not a guy who pulls off a lot of "OMG did you see him jump over the other team and posterize everyone?!" plays. He has to play crafty because he can't "cheat" with athleticism, at least not the kind NBA players are "supposed" to have, but people HATE crafty players because sports is supposed to be about one guy out-athleting everyone else, not some guy using meticulous footwork or something. It's made worse that the Rockets in general have this reputation for trying to break the game by exploiting math (even though, again, every team now uses analytics), so Harden is like Morey's NBA cheat code in human form and the resentment against Morey's "gimmickry" comes down most on Harden.

 

but still the question is who decides to hate on a player or to praise him?the NBA? the players environnment..

 

EXCELLENT analysis
i think people also hate him because of his beard

 

Harden is overall a terrible defender. When the media attacks our guy, it makes you feel like you have to overcompensate. Don't.

He is not just terrible off the ball.. he is without a doubt one of the worst in the NBA, and you could reasonably say that any player in Europe you pick out of a hat would be better off the ball than Harden. One on one when on the perimeter, he is below average at best, you never want to be in that situation. One on one in the paint he is very good, but that's largely irrelevant as it is literally the least likely position he will be in - over 90% of the time he'll be guarding someone without the ball or guarding someone on the perimeter. If you're a fan, you don't even need numbers to verify this. He is who he is.

Also, we often try to hide him on the worst guard/forward the opponent has on the floor, which helps him. There's no reason he should be amazing defensively. We play for wins, not for defensive wins. He just has to be good enough for his teammates to help him and for his offense to make up for it.

This should not detract from acknowledging his legendary offense and his MVP-calibre impact on the floor. Also important to note he does turn up the defense in important games and playoffs, which matters. The other thing that matters is how many wins a guy gets you when he's doing what the team asks of him. He has never lost a playoff series for us that he should have won. He has won every playoff series he was favored to win. Even if you stretch it, the worst assessment you can give him is that he hasn't exceeded expectations in the playoffs, but that's not why we've lost. We've lost because our team has not been good enough even with MVP calibre production from Harden.

 

Great post.

Harden did flop earlier in his career (so did Chris Paul, Wade, and some other stars). The reputation lingers. And the few times he "choked" in the playoffs also didn't help. It is really difficult to defend Harden from his detractors unless you go deep into basketball, which most casual fans do not understand.

I have been saying this for a long time and a lot of fans here do not take note. Harden is generally hated outside of his team's fanbase. Those of us not live in the Houston area know this very well first hand.

It does seem to intensify lately in the media. The Nike conspiracy might have some merit. But I kind of doubt it. I think the simple truth is that he is continuing to be at the top of the league. The only guy who can compete with him at that top spot is LeBron. He is getting the attention. And if the attention isn't positive, it goes the other way. That's the nature of sports media. You have to have heroes and villains. If a guy is not cut out to be a hero, he has to be a bad guy.

 

First Take this morning while they were commentating on Rockets vs OKC highlights.

"Why don't they double Harden?" "Why doesn't Billy Donovan throw different looks at Harden?" "OKC just has bad defense against Harden"

None of them were crediting Harden about his performance last night, unless it's about mentioning free throws because they know Laker fans love ******** on Harden and his free throws.

Seriously, where do they find these garbage analysts? It's obvious Harden is completely unguardable when he's on his game and you don't double team him because he's smart enough to pass to the open man most of the time.

Undisputed this morning

"Harden will NEVER be an efficient player" - Shannon Sharpe
Not surprising though because Sharpe and Bayless love to crap on Harden like it's a circlejerk. The only time Skip has ever said anything positive about Harden was to downplay Lebron.

Why should we care? because it's people like this that have a huge influence over the majority of the NBA fans that don't actually watch the Rockets. If they come out and say Harden is an inefficient chucker and he flops while playing selfish, many people will believe that bullshit.

 

I would love to see a sports journalist with some degree of credibility tackle this subject for a feature.

The reigning MVP not only doesn't get much credit from the national media, he gets mostly ridicule and has his MVP title questioned -- as Clyde would put it -- night in and night out.

@KellyDwyer and @KellyUnchained, here's a chance to further set yourselves apart from the standard-issue sportswriter sheep.

 

Just looked it up. The host was referencing a game against the Memphis Grizzlies which we won 100-92 on December 26, 2013. It was his 2nd year with the Rockets and we had just acquired Jeremy Lin who had a really good 4th quarter to put out the Griz. Also in this game, Howard was riddled with foul trouble in the 3rd and his back stiffened up so he didn't play the remainder of the game. Post-game comments included Zach Randolph claiming it was 8v5 against them which garnered him a $25,000 fine the next day.

Here's James' statline;
FG: 2/9
3PG: 1/5
FT: 22/25
PTS: 27
Team FTA Disparity: Rox 40 - 20 Mem

The host has really good memory.

 

Oh, look. Anthony Davis scored 32 points on 26 shots, but at an awesome 54%.

Yet, that’s only scoring 1.23 Points per Shot versus Harden’s 1.22 on his terribly inefficient XMas day win vs the NBA’s best defense. Not even a 54% shooting night by Davis puts a dent in Harden’s inefficient nights.

Lulz

And Davis lost to Mavs with a -12 contribution, too. But he’s a better player than Harden.

 

Harden is a better defender than Curry, because Harden can actually switch onto guys much bigger than him. Yet Curry never gets docked for poor defense. In fact, ppl actually claim he’s good, which is laughable.

Put it this way, if Harden was worse than Curry, GSW has the weapons to exploit it. They didn’t in the playoffs, yet we exploited Curry. Paul dropped him to the floor more than once, and Curry wants no part of Harden.

I don’t think it is “overcompensating” to say the media treats the Golden Boy differently, but rather protect him from ALL criticism.

 

Here's another one we forgot, from a few days ago. This is a very common photo for NBA action, but Harden gets a caption contest from ESPN.

 

keep the hate coming