The Rockets aren’t going anywhere until James Harden gets it together
The Beard is playing the worst basketball of his career. Why has he played so poorly?
Then, there are the Houston Rockets, who have lost each of their first three games by 20 points, the first time that's happened in NBA history. Two of those losses came at home, one of which was to the lowly Denver Nuggets. Houston has the league's second-worst offensive rating (87.2) and and fifth-worst defensive rating (109).
The Rockets were supposed to be one of the league’s best teams and they have instead been embarrassing and terrible. If they haven’t been the NBA’s worst team so far, they’ve certainly been its most disappointing.
Yes, it’s early. Very early. But championship contenders aren’t supposed to be blown out in three straight games at any point, much less at the beginning of the season.
The Rockets aren’t irrevocably broken, but clearly something is wrong. That something is James Harden.
The Numbers
Be wary, you might want to cover your eyes.
Through three games, Harden is shooting 22 percent from the field. He's taking nearly 11 three-pointers per game and connecting on less than one per contest -- a total of 3-of-32 from deep. His shot chart looks like a horrible Nick Young performance.
“I’m just shooting my shots that I normally shoot,” Harden said Sunday, via ESPN. “I’m not really trying to think about it too much. As good of a shooter as I am, I’m still going to have struggles throughout the season. This is the first couple games, so it’s tough. But just stay with it.”
But Harden isn’t really just shooting his shots. Only 17 percent of his attempts are in the restricted area this season compared with 35 percent last year. By contrast, a whopping 59 percent of Harden’s field goal attempts are from downtown this season, compared with just 38 percent last year. We all know that shooting three-pointers is what the Rockets want to do, but given his struggles, it might not be a bad idea for Harden to take a few dribbles in just to get his rhythm going.
But the following numbers are the most shocking of all. With Harden on the floor, the Rockets are scoring just 82.4 points per 100 possessions. In the 32 minutes he’s been off the floor, that number has jumped to 105.1. The numbers on defense are, not surprisingly, also bad. Opponents are scoring 111.4 points per 100 possessions when Harden plays and just 99.6 when he doesn’t.
All this comes out to Houston being nearly 35 points better points per 100 possession without James Harden, last year’s MVP runner-up. This is in a tiny sample, but it shows just how ineffective Harden has been in the very early part of this season.
Breaking down the struggles
Why has Harden been so terrible through three games? Here’s his explanation:
“We haven’t had a rhythm yet, from training camp or preseason at all,” Harden said Sunday. “We have guys in and out the lineup, bigs, guards, whatever. We’ll find a rhythm, we’ll catch a rhythm. We just have to continue to play hard, continue to stick with it, continue to have positive energy. We’ve lost three in a row, but we’re not really worried about it.”
The injuries and changing lineups are a fair point. Dwight Howard has only played in one game, Terrence Jones missed Sunday's loss to Miami and Donatas Motiejunas has yet to play all season. Houston has therefore been forced to use a different starting lineup in each of its three games. Also, the addition of Ty Lawson means Harden must adjust to play off the ball more than he has in the past.
But players shuffling in and out of the lineup has never held Harden or the Rockets back before. They did win 56 games last year despite Howard, Jones, Motiejunas and Patrick Beverley missing significant time. That's why Harden almost stole the MVP trophy from Stephen Curry. He was able to carry an undermanned and constantly changing team much further than he should have.
"It's not James," coach Kevin McHale said Sunday when asked about his team's struggles, via ESPN. "It has nothing to do with James. It has to do with our team. We're 0-3. That's [about] playing better on the defensive end when our shots aren't going."
McHale’s last point makes sense. The Rockets are averaging nearly the same amount of total passes per game as they did last year (per NBA.com), but the team’s assist numbers are all down. That suggests a ton of missed shots.
Yet no Houston player is missing more shots than Harden. He has looked passive, settling for too many long three-pointers and pulling up before he gets to the rim, even if he has a big man switched onto him.
These are the three-pointers that Harden is taking and missing. Harden is leading the NBA in total isolations (per NBA.com), which is no surprise. However, he is averaging less than one point per possession on these plays. He’s not finishing at the rim or even getting to the cup like he did last year.
In pick-and-rolls, Harden has alternated between poor shot selection ...
... and missing rare open looks.
Harden has made just one of the 11 shots he’s attempted following a pick-and-roll. He’s also struggled playing off the ball and at times can’t even figure out where he’s supposed to stand with Lawson also out there.
What does it all mean?
The good news for Rockets fans is that most of these numbers should eventually turn around. Harden is still getting to the foul line, and he won’t spend the season shooting just 22 percent. He should eventually get more comfortable playing with Lawson.
The trend worth watching, though, is Harden’s aggression with the ball. His numbers will eventually begin to revert to the mean, but if he keeps settling for shots the defense wants him to take, he won’t come close to replicating last year’s near-MVP campaign.
Should that be the case, that list of five Western Conference contenders will be trimmed to four.
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SB Nation presents: Rookies do funny impressions of James Harden
