Alright listen yall.. Harden really wanted to prove he can be the system that wins only during the regular season. Playoffs he needs help, team mates haven't ever been good enough. Durant used to have the same issue with how he approached the regular season and the playoffs, when he couldn't push all the way to the finals he joined the prime GSW. Let's see the Clippers are all healthy in the playoffs, I'm still not convinced the Nets would have won the year Irving/Durant/Harden. None of them seemed to want to hold anyone accountable
Thus the reason Udoka did not want James here. I don't blame James for having an inflated ego, he is a great basketball player. Sure, he has playoffs short comings but he also had great moments in the playoffs last year. James will have a great year, he just really needs that player that can help carry him during the big moments in the playoffs. Kawhi can be that player if he stays healthy. I'm still a James fan and hope he gets a ring.
Meh, James never liked moving much after DAntoni became our HC. He believes his way works, and who can blame him, he was never some empty stats player. Sure he fell apart when teams could hone in on his style of play, but his style worked. Rockets advanced many times with James here. I know his haters will never recognize the playoff success the Rockets had since he never made it to the finals with us, but we had a damn good run during his years here. It sucked being his fan when he laid a pile of **** during big games, but no matter what, that was a fun era to be a part of.
Harden is a top 3 Rocket of all time but my comment still stands and still is a contributing factor of why he wouldn't be a great role model here.
ehhh... he may have gotten those calls - if he werent known as a flopper... if he werent known for hooking defenders and pulling them into him...
I said it right after we sent Hardens whiny ass to the Nets. He will never win a championship because he creates too much drama. He isn't about winning and it turns into being about Harden. I was told by so many of you the Nets are an All Time super team. I said it won't work and he will end up in Los Angles because that's where he is from and truly wants to be. Not surprised he ruined 76ers. Now Clippers gonna pull a Clippers Thanks to JH. Suck it fan boyzzz. Harden still trash.
True, but these were blatant missed calls. He wasn't hooking, or pulling anyone into him - 1-2 missed calls - ok, fine, it happens. But we wouldn't sitting here 6 years later talking about "CP3 hammy" or "0-27" Again... with all that being said, i'm glad Harden is not back in Houston lol
There is no logical basketball explanation for Harden's issues, other than he's a QUITTER. Don't compare him to anyone else because nobody's quit on multiple teams like Harden did. I'm glad Stone didn't bring this clown back
"I'm a system" is such an instant classic, and not in a good way. I've gone from a James fan to just kind of cringing but still enjoying the PR carnage he generates month to month. Poor guy simply did not surround himself with enough smart people. Oh well. Here's hoping they have at least two fun months in Clipper-land, but we all know how this will end. At least one WC team will be headed downhill by year's end. Makes watching the Spurs ascension just a tiny bit more tolerable, I guess.
There is a difference between having a bad game and quitting. Harden didn't just play bad, he didn't even compete in big playoff games
"Captain, we've entered the Harden system. While the star has plenty of mass, it's surprisingly dim. And we detect no signs of playoff life."
Kawhi and George about to become the very best-paid spot-up shooters in NBA history. Just play defense, guys, and let Harden take care of the offense. Don't worry your pretty little heads about that.
The Clippers feel so much like a failure -- having traded so much for three playoff series wins in four seasons -- you sometimes forget the evidence is emphatic that for at least the first two seasons of the Paul George-Kawhi Leonard era, this was a championship-level team with both stars healthy. Scoff if you'd like. The "if healthy" qualification applies to every team, and the Clippers wagered everything on two players whose bodies have betrayed them over and over. George's injuries in L.A. have been more nagging and unconnected, but most of Leonard's were isolated to his right leg and knee. Both look healthy now as the Clippers have started 3-2 -- with Harden yet to play a game. George is operating at peak boss levels: 29 points on 56% shooting and menacing defense all over the floor. Leonard doesn't look quite as physically dominant, but he has been very good -- even rushing up the floor more often as the Clippers take on Russell Westbrook's end-to-end ferocity. They could have won the title in both 2020 and 2021. They were healthy in the Orlando, Florida, bubble. Some teams thrived in that environment. Some teams wilted. The Clippers disintegrated, melting away against a Denver Nuggets team that was tougher and more resilient. The Clippers at that point had never made the conference finals, but they surrendered against Denver with the half-hearted arrogance of a team that assumed long playoff runs were its birthright. We'll have other chances. The next year might have been their best shot. The Clippers rallied to defeat both the Dallas Mavericks and Utah Jazz in the playoffs. The untested Phoenix Suns and sometimes jittery Milwaukee Bucks awaited. But Leonard tore his right ACL midway through the Utah series. He missed the next season; the Clippers missed the playoffs. Last season was the first in which the evidence wavered that the Clippers were stone-cold contenders as long as George and Leonard were healthy. Leonard missed most of the first six weeks but roared to life over the final 45-plus games -- looking like a top-five player again. Still: George and Leonard played only 38 games together. The Clippers in their shared minutes outscored opponents by 8.9 points per 100 possessions -- very good, but not as otherworldly as that margin in their first two seasons. Other superstar duos -- including Denver's --
- lapped them. Just as Leonard amped it up to playoff gear, he got hurt -- the right knee again. Key supporting players aged to the fringes of the rotation: Nicolas Batum, Marcus Morris Sr., Robert Covington. The Clippers suddenly looked weaker at both the top and bottom of the roster. This is why they showed interest in Harden from the moment he requested a trade on June 29, and why they eventually parted with three valuable draft assets -- one unprotected pick and two swaps -- and three rotation players for him when no other team would even return the Philadelphia 76ers' calls. The Clippers' brass was telling you what it thought about the team: We aren't good enough to win four playoff series anymore, no matter what. Are they now, with three of the highest-usage ball-pounders in the league in Leonard, Harden and Westbrook? Harden is the ace shooter-playmaker the Leonard-George tandem has never had. He is a regular-season innings-eater who might insulate LA from play-in-tournament vulnerability if and when Leonard and George miss games. Leonard is the icy playoff terminator who can take over in the moments that have overwhelmed Harden. P.J. Tucker is not an afterthought. He has a history of defending both Kevin Durant and Nikola Jokic at least credibly. He loves the postseason, when referees permit more grabbing and holding. Tucker might unlock the five-out, center-less lineups that have worked before for both the Clippers and some of Harden's old teams. Norman Powell remains; he has hit at least 40% on catch-and-shoot 3s in five straight seasons and provides some downhill zip. It is a jumble of talent, all Southern California basketball royalty, but there is so much to sort through. Welcome to the Last Chance Saloon -- maybe for this iteration of the Clippers with every star on an expiring contract, Harden's playoff legacy and more. Does Westbrook come off the bench again after outperforming all reasonable expectations in a starting role? That seems the smarter move -- to go with Harden, George, Terance Mann, Leonard and Ivica Zubac. It splits up the ball handlers, boasts more shooting and includes a practiced screen-and-dive option in Mann. (In fairness, Westbrook has set more ball screens as a Clipper.) Will Clippers coach Tyronn Lue go that route? Will Westbrook buy in? (Tucker has been a starter for most of the past decade -- the cleanest way to match his minutes with those of the No. 1 options he is tasked with guarding. But starting him now would mean two of Westbrook, Zubac and Mann coming off the bench -- and that seems untenable. In George and Leonard, the Clippers already have two starters capable of taking the toughest defensive jobs.) Westbrook has pushed the Clippers to play more at his pace. Harden is a slowpoke. Harden and Leonard will both have to sacrifice some degree of control over the ball, the offense, and the pace when they share the floor. (Lue should stagger their minutes, but the team will rise or fall with them together.) Leonard has quietly tilted a little in that direction over the past two seasons, playing more off the ball at times. Both will have to take more catch-and-shoot 3s and screen for each other when matchups dictate it -- when Harden screening for Leonard, or vice versa, might gift Leonard a mismatch. Smart defenses will play with matchups in ways designed to tempt Harden into seizing the offense -- into siphoning shots and plays away from Leonard and George. The Clippers can't beat Denver and other top rivals with a bunch of 30-somethings playing your turn, my turn every possession. Done right, this can work. It is very hard to hide weak or undersized defenders against three perimeter-oriented All-Stars. This revamped LA lineup -- and that of the Phoenix Suns -- is aimed squarely at Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. (Murray has built himself into a solid defender in most matchups. Porter has improved off the ball but is still vulnerable one-on-one in space.) The Clippers might still have one more move in them, having held on to their 2030 first-round pick. But they have so much to iron out. One Leonard injury -- even a two-week absence at the wrong moment -- unravels the whole thing. George and Harden are no longer enough to carry the Clippers through a tough series without Leonard. Even at full health, the Clips cannot survive Harden quaking in the biggest games. Harden has to give effort on defense, too. The Clippers have to find their identity -- again. The Nuggets have absorbed theirs into their marrow. They play in winks and nods and raised eyebrows, orbiting the world's best player -- an unmatched offensive force -- in knowing concert. Their new-look bench is expanding leads. Denver is the clear favorite in the West. The Golden State Warriors look like a team in Game 40, not in Week 2. Bringing Chris Paul off the bench was always the right move. Paul is molding Golden State's new five-man bench mob -- Paul, Moses Moody, Gary Payton II, Jonathan Kuminga, Dario Saric -- in his calculating image. Alongside the key starters, Paul has met Curry and the Warriors at their manic pace -- while infusing some of his precision. The Suns can match the Clippers in pure supernova talent; some of their stars are even under 30! The Los Angeles Lakers will figure themselves out. James always does. The Mavericks are undefeated. Other teams will rise. The Clippers with this trade went from no chance to some puncher's chance. If the goal is a title, I don't think it will work; it just seems too disjointed, with too many questions. But the Clippers are better today than they were a week ago. Does that justify the outlay of assets? The journey will answer that question -- the tenor and feel of it. There are teams that are worth it, win or lose in the end. You know them when you see them by the way they fit -- their spirit, toughness, the way each player lifts and amplifies the other. Will these new-again Clippers be that sort of team? Their journey starts now.
Stephen A. Smith on First Take discussing Harden's sacrifices since leaving Houston: "The bottom line is [Harden's] saying we were all negligent in not really highlighting what the hell he's actually been through.. and he's right"
