Harden’s outstanding regular season was respected so much by his peers that he was named the MVP at the monstrosity that was the inaugural NBPA’s Players’ Awards. Carrying a team that was plagued with injuries all season, he played in 81 games and led all players in minutes played. In a time where more and more players are taking time off for rest, Harden did the exact opposite during the 2014-15 season. While he has made a concentrated effort to improve on defense, there are still too many nights where he takes off on that end of the floor to take him seriously as a defender. Frequently falling asleep and losing his man on backdoor or baseline cuts, no other player in the NBA benefits more from having a premiere defensive big man having his back like he does. On the defensive end, Harden is often abhorrent. Some will knock him for living at the line (he led the League in both free-throw attempts and makes) but in a League that welcomes high scoring, you can’t hate on someone trying to get buckets by any means necessary. The Los Angeles native’s rise from complementary piece on a stacked Oklahoma City Thunder to carrying a banged up Rockets team to within a few games of the NBA Finals has been one of the more spectacular runs in recent memory.įew players have been able to make the transition from sixth man to face of the franchise as seamlessly as Harden, and at only 25-years-old, his best days of basketball are still ahead of him.Īrmed with one of the illest crossovers in the L, a lethal stepback jumper, excellent court vision and the ability to get to the rack and dunk on someone’s head, Harden is easily one of the best offensive players in the game. 2 seed in a loaded Western Conference and finishing second in MVP voting, Harden’s final game ended with a whimper that leaves him with the burden of proving that he is worthy of his new found superstardom in 2015-16. The last time we saw James Harden on an NBA court, he was capping off an otherwise tremendous season with a game-ending turnover in Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals against the Golden State Warriors.ĭribbling the ball off his foot in the waning seconds of regulation was the low point of a 14-point, 12-turnover performance that sent the Rockets home and ended a strange Playoff run that saw Harden play both hero and goat.įollowing a season where he averaged 27.4 points, 7.0 assists and 5.7 rebounds while leading the Rockets to a No.
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