massive:
On the other side of that coin:
Russell Westbrook through 5 games: 45.3 TS%, 97 FGA, 13 TOs, .124 WS/48
Kevin Durant through 5 games: 57.2 TS%, 79 FGA, 26 TOs, .163 WS/48
James Harden through 4 games: 60.1 TS%, 83 FGA, 20 TOs, .232 WS/48

Harden has played the best basketball out of all 3 so far, even with his 20 TOs per game. There are still 75+ games left to play, but I think Harden’s stats are going to crush Westbrook’s this season and for the rest of their careers.

Kevin Martin through 5 games: 76.6 TS%, 46 FGA 11 TOs, .313 WS/48

Guess OKC won the trade then.

Why even bring up early season averages when Harden has 2 clear outlier games out of his 4? So far in this season he’s had 2 amazing games and 2 bad games, if that ratio keeps up the Rockets will be lucky to get to .500, it’s not like the extra points from Harden’s 40 point destruction is going to get transferred over to the next game. I will agree that Harden will be noticeably more efficient than Westbrook for the rest of his career, I just don’t think it’ll mean anything if he’s getting shut down by elite defenders one on one, while Westbrook requires an entire team working together to stop (when he’s not stopping himself lmao!)

Harden has played the best basketball out of all 3 so far, even with his 20 TOs per game. There are still 75+ games left to play, but I think Harden’s stats are going to crush Westbrook’s this season and for the rest of their careers.

unsurprisingly his turnovers are way up as the primary option, 20 total in the first 4 games. last year he didn’t have his 20th turnover of the year until his 13th game.

the Knicks beat a Miami team that clearly wasn’t fully motivated and then a Sixers team missing their best and maybe their second best player. Miami, Boston, Chicago (Thibodeau doesn’t seem to actually need players to win games), whoever emerges as the best of the rest, a top 4 finish is hardly a gimme at this point. again, let’s see it for a few more weeks and I’ll be a lot more impressed.

http://www.nba.com/2012/news/powerrankings/11/05/week1/index.html

http://espn.go.com/nba/powerrankings/_/year/2013/week/1

anyway, we’ll know a lot more in another week or two, I think.

jon abbey:
I don’t think anyone is treating them like a laughingstock, just not a genuine title contender. SI had them losing in the Conference Finals coming into the season, and the majority of opinions I’ve seen on this starts (besides Mike K, heh) seem to regard it as pretty legit.

Go read NBA.com’s piece. No one I’ve read is buying the Knicks start as an indicator of its potential. It’s a fluke.