On Monday night, James Harden scored 29 points while making just one of his 17 three-point attempts. Those 16 misses tied an NBA record that had been accomplished by Harden two other times. As the Rockets blew a 17-point fourth-quarter lead to the Thunder, he showed how extreme and entertaining his style of play can be, even when it’s not operating anywhere close to peak efficiency.
Even James Harden’s worst games are showcases for his brilliance
This is why James Harden is so entertaining even when he’s shooting bricks.
Harden is widely disliked for the way he plays. Though he is known as one of the hardest players to guard in the NBA, he lacks aesthetic appeal, and frustrates fans with his penchant for buying fouls. He is hated in a way players of his stature rarely are, maligned less because of tribal allegiances, and more because he’s considered not much fun to watch.
The point about aesthetics can be argued forever; I find Harden entertaining for another reason. He is a player of wide variance who seems fated, for good or ill, to the way he plays. The experience of watching Harden is enhanced by the fact he doesn’t change. A 60-point Harden game looks the same as a game in which he misses an absurd number of shots. He can never stop being himself.
If Harden misses 10 threes in a row, he will get the ball again on the next possession, isolate, dribble down the clock, and likely shoot another three even if a defender is within reach. If he misses that shot, there’s a high chance he will come back down the court on offense and take it again. When he doesn’t, it’s likely because he is driving to the rim to attempt a layup while drawing a foul. Then he will go back to shooting threes.
Harden never gives up. When other players realize they are having a bad shooting night, they accept that luck is not with them and find other ways to contribute. Some focus harder on defense, or give up the ball and work to get easier shots. The closest comparison I can think of for Harden’s dogged insistence on shooting out of slumps is Kobe Bryant. Unsurprisingly, Bryant also once missed 16 shots in a game, and has the most missed shots in NBA history.
The biggest difference between them is Bryant would miss in different ways. He would try other ways to score, other angles and methods. If he couldn’t make one type of shot, he moved on to another. If that failed, he tried something else, even if that something else was guarded by three defenders. He was a gunslinger, but a creative one.
Harden, however, never seems to deviate from the blueprint. There is no surprise to what he will do next. He will not suddenly start using the ball less and making backdoor cuts, or running around looking for space. The question is never whether he will catch his opponents off-guard, but whether his shot will fall.
Harden’s success is entirely in his hands. He can be unguardable and entirely guardable from one day to the next, and little of that has to do with the defender or scheme created to stop him. His style has shaped the game of basketball to his particular set of skills so much that he doesn’t have to change it for anyone. Then when team collapse on him, he creates opportunities for his teammates.
When Harden is having an incredible day, it truly does feel like the peak of individualistic basketball. He reestablishes and elevates the game’s inherent one-on-one battles, which defenses are supposed to make irrelevant, but which also contain the core principle of any sport: besting one’s competition. Harden takes that principle to a beautiful and profound space. He gets his man one-on-one and continually proves his superiority to them. Over and over, Harden is better at what he does than defenders. Every game he plays is a statement of dominance.
Except when he’s having a bad day, he becomes a pitiful figure. Or maybe “pitiful” isn’t the right word. Nor is he sympathetic, because there’s no sadness in a bad Harden night. There’s no inescapable misfortune. He’s not exactly trapped within himself or the scheme. The way he plays is a choice he makes. Over and over.
Maybe it’s better to say Harden is a tragic figure. He is a man who is complete within himself, whose greatest strength is also his weakness. He knows his fate and walks courageously into it, regardless of the frustration that may lay ahead — for him, the team, and fans. He has a way he plays the game, and he will play that way. Some days he misses 16 shots, others he may score 62 points. All the same, he remains Harden in the purest form, the only way he seems to know to exist.
