Refs probably coming back down to earth. People on the youtubes say this happens all the time after a rule change; refs go nuts trying to enforce new rules early, then it goes back to normal again.
it's one of the great myths. there were tons of fouls in the 80's and 90's. some of that is that players/coaches had clearly not realized that fouling everyone going to the basket (no layups) was way worse than actually contesting. and i don't mean flagrants and hard fouls. just so...much...reaching. watch any 80's games and they hack constantly. it's probably what kept offensive efficiency so high despite them not taking 3's. and today's free throw totals are even more extreme in the context of how fast the pace has gotten the last couple of years. highest pace and lowest free throws show how far it has gone. i honestly think it's just a response to the streaming world where we have gotten used to no commercials/no stops. in that world, free throws are excruciating. i don't really like them either. i had to start fast forwarding past all of the free throws in a 1984 lakers/celtics game and i never do that. so i think the idea that there are so many stoppages are clearly just perception. on the other hand, offense has gotten way out of hand so any move to reduce offense is fine with me.
playoff whistles are a myth. there are more free throws basically every year in the playoffs (i think 11 of the last 12). most players actually get more calls, so the fact harden gets less is certainly the refs breaking trend seemingly just for him.
why do guys like steph and durant drop off just as much in the playoffs if it's just about free throws?
wade should have gotten 4 free throws every time he pump faked someone and jumped into them. how defenders could watch wade brick outside shots for like 2 decades and still think "damn, i gotta block this off the dribble 18 footer or else" is beyond me.
if your bet is that harden will get injured that might be a good bet. but if your bet is that he just won't play well because he's out of shape, then harden was fat last season and was the in the mvp conversation before his injury and then put up spectacular numbers against boston when healthy. a healthy harden not playing well just hasn't been a good bet.
It’s a self discipline thing. Guys just can’t help themselves that’s what made Shane battier so dang effective and smart as a defender. He never bit. He didn’t care about going for block highlights… he just cared about contesting the shot
Steph and Durant have been the best player on a championship team and a team that has made it to the finals. I don’t remember Steph or Durant being questioned about possibly having a concussion because they played so bad. I don’t remember Steph or Durant being on the bench while their teams came back and saved their seasons in an elimination game. I don’t remember Steph or Durant setting turnover records in the playoffs either. I’m pretty sure when you’re talking about save level of drop off you got that from a stat sheet or somewhere when there’s not a sane person who watches these guys play and would say that Harden plays at the same level that these guys play at when it counts.
You have a lot of venom for Harden LOL. Most of us know he’ll be fine because he’s shown us how good he is for 8 straight years. If you still don’t get that, then I guess you weren’t watching that closely
Perfect example of bad statistics. Free throws in the playoffs SHOULD be higher even if the refs are perfectly consistent, because teams that make the playoffs are better at drawing fouls than teams that don't. Regardless, Harden was clearly a hack job by the refs.
I guess you forgot about klay Thompson saving Stephs ass in game 6 elimination game against the thunder then....
