Did Durant take the last like 7 shots for Golden State? I think he only had like 11 attempts going into the 4th, and now he's at 19.
Kyrie typically tries to avoid contact. Harden seeks it. There are indeed sequences where the former doesn't get a call that the latter might get but its largely a function of their different styles of play. You know this because while not old AF like me, you aren't a kid either. You remember Jordan Rules too.
Absolutely. This is what I was talking about earlier when I said they look like the C's on offense at times, when both teams stop moving the ball. They completely went away from what they were doing in the first half. I swear Durant was getting more and more upset in the third quarter every time down the court and he didn't get a shot. He tried to make up for it in the fourth.
lol as a rockets fan you get used to living and dying with his shot selection. I’ll take it. He hit the big 3 to tie.
Capela has one foul. That's what I was talking about when I said the Rockets have been allowed to get really aggressive defensively.
I hate Draymond, but I'd like to know what he did to commit a foul there? He went straight up, and Harden jumped into him, used his off arm to push Draymond away, and Harden got the call.
I mean, imagine having to officiate Harden against Green. The refs must suffer from PTSD.
The WC Finals this year will be all about whether or not Boogie can stop Capela. If he can, Harden might need to score 70 every night to have a chance.
Amazing and he should have went to the line for 3 if it missed too. Harden's taken his game to another level since Paul has been out.
I'm going to say it, I think Houston is a better team without Chris Paul. All he does is take away opportunities from Harden.
I don't know about the NBA MVP race or what this game means in the larger context of the season. All I know is that Harden is appointment viewing every single night this season.
Harden went 13/32 from the field, and 10/23 from deep tonight. It's not like he was shooting well, but it seemed like whenever he missed, Capela would grab a board, or someone else would hit a dagger for them. Golden State gave this one away in the 3rd though.
Nah man, in a 7 game series teams will force harden to give up the ball. We need a second scorer to pace the team when he’s sitting and we need a second scorer to open up the floor for Harden.
Harden is better than he was last year, but Paul is brittle and worse. Don’t know how that adds up in a series against the Warriors.
One thing about Harden is that its not as if he is unnecessarily gunning away. He is relatively inefficient but he *has* to do this to give Houston a chance at winning. There is no second or third scoring banana. I love Capela but he can't carry a team with self generated offense. The Rockets simply are Harden.
Harden hitting the game-winner over Draymond and then talking shit to him as Draymond sat on the floor was a Top 5 NBA moment of the season.
Also that KD out-of-bounds no call is one of the the worst refereeing mistakes I have ever seen. How do you explain this:
Also that KD out-of-bounds no call is one of the the worst refereeing mistakes I have ever seen. How do you explain this:
Harden may have the MOST efficient scoring season in the history of the game this year for an elite scorer. I haven't looked at any other numbers but he's at 34 ppg on less than 22 FGA which I can't imagine has ever come close to being done before. The second most efficient season just may be Harden last year with 30 on 20 per game. I'd be surprised if these weren't 1 and 2 all time with the only coming close off the top of my mind being Curry's year when he was MVP.
Not sure I have seen anything like that. Bird hit some incredible game winners with guys all over him, but they were ten feet closer
Well of course that is a result of Paul and Gordon being out of the lineup but FG% has nothing to do with efficiency. So instead of being the best ever efficiency he's simply among the best of the season while playing 1 on 5 offensively with Austin Rivers as a second option lol.
Harden's incredible (totally ridiculous performance tonight in an amazing game, argh) but you can't really ignore free throw attempts when measuring efficiency, since free throws take up possessions. By true shooting %, Harden this season and last season is right up there on the all-time efficiency list among high-volume scorers, but still well behind the best seasons of Steph, and slightly behind the best of Dantley and Durant.
Top 15 seasons in NBA history by true shooting % (min. 28 pts per 36 minutes, min. 800 minutes played)
Curry 2017-18: 29.7 pts on .675 ts
Curry 2015-16: 31.7 pts on .669 ts
Curry 2018-19: 29.9 pts on .658 ts
Dantley 1983-84: 29.2 pts on .652 ts
Durant 2013-14: 29.9 pts on .635 ts
Durant 2015-16: 28.3 pts on .634 ts
Giannis 2018-19: 28.1 pts on .633 ts
Dantley 1985-86 29.7 pts on .629 ts
KMalone 1989-90 29.3 pts on .626 ts
Durant 2018-19 28.8 pts on .625 ts
IThomas 2016-17 30.8 pts on .625 ts (!)
Harden 2018-19 32.5 pts on .623 ts
Harden 2017-18 30.9 pts on .623 ts
Vandeweghe 1983-84 30.2 pts on .618 ts
Jordan 1988-89 29.1 pts on .614 ts
(Points are per 36 minutes).
Of course if you filter for volume > 30 pts per 36, it leaves just Curry 2015-16, IT 2016-17, and the last two Harden seasons at #1-4. And if you filter for volume > 32 pts per 36, it leaves ... just this season's Harden at #1 (but isn't very sporting, since Steph did put up 31.7 pts per 36 in 2015-16).
So, totally insane, but not "most efficient in history" if we're just talking about efficiency at reasonably elite volume.
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I think we’re one of maybe 3 teams that truly believes that the Warriors can be beaten. Last year we won a tough away game early in the season - really similar to this game - and then we came really close in the playoffs. Today was a statement win, I’m still so pumped. We’re 2-0 against them.
I mean, I know the Warriors will come into shape soon and will be much better with Cousins. But today was fun and hopefully we play them in the playoffs. It’ll be another tight series.
I mean, I know the Warriors will come into shape soon and will be much better with Cousins. But today was fun and hopefully we play them in the playoffs. It’ll be another tight series.
I have no idea how this might change your list, but establishing the cutoff for “reasonably elite volume” at 28 (or 30!) points per 36 minutes is pretty insane, and entirely ignores the different scoring environments from era to era. For example, by this definition, Allen Iverson never scored at “reasonably elite volume” during a single season of his entire career, despite winning four scoring titles.
Nitpick, but both were on the board when the Celtics pick came up, Ainge passed on Bell to take Semi, Golden State then took Bell with the next pick.
Agreed with the overall point that we can’t be too upset with how it turned out, Semi is rounding into a decent 3 and D role player.
Most important stat of Houston and Harden’s current run: they’re 10-1-1 against the spread over their last dozen games. Vegas still expecting them to return to earth, but visiting some family over the holidays in a state with newly legalized online sports gambling (thanks SCOTUS!) allowed for some nice opportunities to cash in on the Harden’s video game-like play.
No one has scored over 33 Pts/G in under 23 FGA/G so yes Harden would be the first.
MJ scored 32.5 Pts/G on 22.2 FGA/G once. KD scored 32.0 Pts/G on 20.8 FGA/G, which might be seen asmore efficient than what Harden is doing.
There are a bunch players scoring 31.x Pts/G on 22.x FGA/G.
http://bkref.com/tiny/xw5ge
I mean, you have to set the cut-off somewhere. I picked 28 points per 36 as it seems in the same ballpark of "elite volume" as Harden's 32.3 and Steph's 31.7, but you could also look at 25 or 20, and/or use the more traditional PPG.
Either way, Iverson is — rightly — never going to be anywhere near the top of any list of efficient scorers. He's one of the least efficient high-volume scorers ever, with a career TS of .518, and only one season out of 12 where he broke .550. In his highest scoring season (2001-02), he rocked an atrocious .489 TS.
Fwiw, here's the all-time TS% list if we make it an even 20 PPG minimum (and a minimum 1500 minutes played). First thing that jumps out is more appearances by Barkley and McHale.
@wade boggs chicken dinner As noted above to HRB, "points per fga" is really dubious measure of scoring efficiency. It basically assumes that getting fouled and hitting one of two free throws is a more efficient use of a possession than, say, a four-point play. Or put another way: it assumes that if you get fouled when shooting, it's more efficient to miss the shot than hit it. ;-P
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Change 20 to 16 and see which two sometime Celtics players grab the top five positions. Any guesses?
Capela was a beast last night, but both his raw +/- and RPM numbers are pretty bad this year. Any ideas on what's up with that?
He was awful to start the year, and there were lots of reports that he basically spent the summer partying and getting fat after signing his new deal.
Understood but was just responding to the question and the list generated brings up some interesting names. Kind of amazing that West and the Big O were able to do it without the 3 point shot, and MJ's season was basically without the 3P shot as well.
TS% really tilts the field towards 3P shooters so depending on what anyone is looking for, it's not all that accurate of a stat from a historical perspective as well.
BTW, from your list, Kiki Vanderweghe had an amazing season given that he only shot 30 3Ps all season. The only guys with over 1500 FGA and a 2p% of greater than .560 in NBA history are him, Dantley, Malone, Steph, and LBJ (twice).
I find it unfathomable that someone can watch James Harden drop 40+ points for his 5th straight game (all wins) and/or drop 30+ in every game but one over his past 12 (11 wins and 1 loss) and the takeaway is to complain that he gets too many free throw attempts. The guy is a fucking magician and a god damn joy to watch. And anyone who disagrees with my hot take is wrong! 