ruruland: It’s kind of interesting to note that the Rockets are about 2.8 points per 100 possessions better with him on the bench:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/HOU/2013/on-off/

Think this has something to do with the Houston coaches not having any idea how to utilize Lin and Harden properly (why not stagger their minutes?!?!?! Toney Douglas has been ok recently but he was the worst player in the league not too long ago) It would be like if instead of trying to maybe separate Chandler and Amar’e a bit to have an excellent roll man in at all times and to allow them both to play stretches where they are best, Woody decided that Amar’e was ONLY going to play when Melo and Chandler are in the game. And that instead of making Amar’e spot up outside the paint, he was going to stand Chandler outside and hope his mid range game improved over the summer. Fucking mind blowing, not to mention Harden plays so many minutes that On/off numbers just aren’t as meaningful

johnno: Are you saying that you think that he is erratic, but we should not point it out because, on average, he’s been very good?If so, I couldn’t disagree more.Consistency is important.If on the other hand, you are trying to say that he hasn’t been erratic, your manipulation of statistics is, in this particular case, ridiculous.He has been bouncing up and down like a yo-yo. Stars don’t regularly swing between scoring 40 points and scoring in single digits.

Agree with this, Harden’s average is literally less meaningful than guys like Kobe and Carmelo who actually tend to play around the level of their average. If someone plays 20 games, scores 2 points in ten games and 18 the other ten, you don’t say he averaged 10 points per game and act like that means anything. Almost half his games have been outright bad in terms of scoring, that doesn’t disappear just because the good games were incredible.

10 games above 0.585
4 games against teams above 500
6 games against teams below 500.

So yes Harden has been very bipolar. Either he shooting in elite range or shooting below average to terrible. I guessing its related to dealing with elite Long defenders more, but I’m not going to research that.

Again based on eye test, I don’t believe Harden has elite quickness to crossover or blow by his man. What he does very well is the PNR and then euro step to basket. He also does this in transition also. He does this low to high show the ball move which leads the defender to try to strip the ball. This leads to contact and many foul calls. Both his bad shooting nights and good shooting he seem to be able to get double digit FT attempts. So what happens during his bad shooting night? Obvious you cannot get foul call all the time so he just not finishing at the rim. One thing is for sure he doesn’t stop trying. I believe in OKC game got his shot block like 8 times, but continues to try the same move. To me the question is will he develop a counter move. Does the shoot always have to be at the rim or can he developed some kind of tear drop or pull up in the 3ft – 9ft range.

One other thing he does have ability to find cutter when he does Euro step to the rim. But with the scorer mentality he does look for his own shot majority of the time.

johnno: Are you saying that you think that he is erratic, but we should not point it out because, on average, he’s been very good? If so, I couldn’t disagree more. Consistency is important. If on the other hand, you are trying to say that he hasn’t been erratic, your manipulation of statistics is, in this particular case, ridiculous. He has been bouncing up and down like a yo-yo. Stars don’t regularly swing between scoring 40 points and scoring in single digits.

It’s kind of interesting to note that the Rockets are about 2.8 points per 100 possessions better with him on the bench:

http://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/HOU/2013/on-off/

flossy: Hell yes it’s nitpicking,

Are you saying that you think that he is erratic, but we should not point it out because, on average, he’s been very good? If so, I couldn’t disagree more. Consistency is important. If on the other hand, you are trying to say that he hasn’t been erratic, your manipulation of statistics is, in this particular case, ridiculous. He has been bouncing up and down like a yo-yo. Stars don’t regularly swing between scoring 40 points and scoring in single digits.

The Honorable Cock Jowles: I don’t disavow interaction effects. I just think they’re much smaller than ruruland and co. would like to think.

You know I’ve never gotten a clear answer from you on this, but what exactly do you think assists are then? When Chris Paul gets an assist, doesn’t that mean he was credited for value when his teammate made a shot? Me and Ruruland are basically saying that the concept of assists are valuable but that the box score measure is a laughably stupid and invalid stat for what it claims to measure. You can’t put a value on assists and then say you think interaction effects are really small. Just like with your positional adjustment, Berri entirely admits that there are heavy interaction effects in basketball, doesn’t understand basketball (or logic really) well enough to realize what he’s admitted to, and then tries to account for those interaction effects in the most childish way possible.

Assists are crap, and the PG-SG-SF-PF-C positional model for basketball responsibilities is crap. For someone who wants to fight against the conventional fan wisdom, you use a lot of data only a casual fan would find meaningful.

However Flossy, you should understand that when people argue that Harden is being “exposed”, it’s because more than one person on this board (and the general statistics community) has been calling Harden the clear best cut SG in the league, and almost everyone said the Thunder would be noticeably worse after trading Harden for Martin. Instead they’re arguably better, despite getting zero production from 2 lottery picks they got for Harden in the next 2 years (Lamb and Toronto’s pick) and nothing from their very talented first round pick this year (Perry Jones).

So I agree with your assessment of Harden as one of the top scoring wings in the league, but his efficiency from last year did get “exposed” in the sense that it gave very little indication of what would happen this year. Now obviously you understood that it would change, but that actually means you knew Harden would be “exposed” by THCJ/Berri’s definition.

ruruland:
Except, I think you’re understating the guys around him a bit.

Parsons is a stud. The other guys aren’t totally atrocious, especially if Lin found his shot. 120 last night in regulation without Harden.

I wouldn’t say stud but maybe a semi-stud in the making. He has a ways to go but Danny Granger type player I think so. I have followed the guy since H.S. and think he is a nice young piece but needs to shoot better and keep developing his body. He is a late bloomer but improved every year of high school(growth spurt helped) and every year of college.