Has James Harden Accepted His Ideal Role?
In an ESPN interview, Rachel Nichols asked James Harden how he feels about the way his tenure in Houston ended. Harden offered the quintessential non-apology apology for his poor conduct, saying that he regrets how things happened--as if things happened to him, as opposed to him throwing his teammates under the bus before abandoning ship--but that he did not like the burden of having to score 40 points for his team to have a chance to win. Harden declared that he prefers to be on a team that does not need him to score so much, enabling him to showcase other facets of his game, such as playmaking.
I wrote it eight years ago when Harden went to Houston, and I have been repeating it ever since: if Harden were willing to
accept a Manu Ginobili role instead of chasing scoring titles and
individual honors then he could be the second option on a championship team.
It is hilarious to see Harden tell Nichols with a straight face what his ideal playing situation would be, because what Harden described is the role he had as the third option in Oklahoma City eight years ago before he fled town seeking a max contract plus the opportunity to shoot the ball as often as he wants. Now, after winning three scoring titles and one MVP, perhaps Harden has satiated his quest for individual glory and he may be ready to focus on accepting the role he has always needed to accept in order to win a championship--but instead of coming to this realization when he, Kevin Durant, and Russell Westbrook were about to enter their prime years in Oklahoma City, Harden has only figured this out when he and Durant are both in their 30s.
Despite all of the hype about Brooklyn supposedly fielding the deadliest offensive team ever, an objective assessment must concede that the Durant-Westbrook-Harden trio circa 2012 is better than the Durant-Irving-Harden trio in 2021. The 2012 Thunder were also much stronger defensively and had much greater paint presence than the 2021 Nets; the 2012 Thunder ranked first in the NBA in blocked shots, fourth in defensive field goal percentage, and sixth in rebounding, with Serge Ibaka leading the league in blocked shots and Kendrick Perkins providing physical play at both ends of the court. In contrast, the Nets currently rank third in blocked shots, 14th in defensive field goal percentage, and 15th in rebounding. The Nets traded away their leading rebounder and shot blocker (Jarrett Allen) to acquire Harden, so all of those rankings figure to decline as the season progresses.
Durant's legacy is secure, as he has already won two championships and two Finals MVPs, outdueling LeBron James on both occasions. Irving's legacy is secure to the extent that he proved he could be the second best player on a championship team--but if he aspires to more than that then he has work to do.
Harden is the player who has the most to gain if Brooklyn wins a championship, and the most to lose if this trio fails to live up to the hype.
The Nichols interview aired previously, but was shown again tonight prior to the Nets defeating the Golden State Warriors, 134-117. Durant scored 20 points in his first game at Golden State since he left the Warriors (the Nets routed the Warriors in Brooklyn on opening night). He shot just 8-19 from the field while also contributing six assists and five rebounds. Irving led the Nets with 23 points on 10-17 field goal shooting; he made some dazzling moves, prompting the ABC crew to note that his godfather--former NBA player Rod Strickland--claimed that Irving is the most skilled player in NBA history. That kind of foolishness needs no comment, but Mark Jackson calmly pointed out that Kevin Durant can do everything that Irving does and Durant is seven feet tall. Enough said about that.
Harden scored 19 points on 6-11 field goal shooting, and he had a game-high 16 assists plus eight rebounds. During this game Harden did not flop/flail, he did not dribble endlessly for no purpose, and he made some outstanding passes. His defense was not great, but no one put on a defensive clinic: after one play early in the game, ABC's Jeff Van Gundy called the Nets' defense "god-awful" and that description could accurately be applied to both teams' defense for most of the game. The defensive intensity, effort, and attention to detail resembled a summer league game.
Stephen Curry led the Warriors with 27 points on 10-17 field goal shooting. He was involved in a defensive sequence that epitomized the level of play in this game. After the Warriors scored inside, Curry jogged back on defense absentmindedly as Bruce Brown streaked by him, caught a full court pass and converted a layup. Curry fouled Brown, who completed the three point play. An observation that Van Gundy made earlier in the game applied to this play as well: Van Gundy noted that the great Hubie Brown used to say, "If you aren't on the boards and you aren't back on defense then where are you?" Both teams spent most of this game in that no man's land described by Brown.
The injury-riddled Warriors are struggling to hold on to eighth place in the tough Western Conference, so this game does not tell us much about the Nets' championship aspirations. It is obvious that the Nets can score a lot of points, and it is obvious that they will need to score a lot of points because individually and collectively they lack the mindset/focus to consistently play even average-level defense. One encouraging sign for Nets' fans is that, at least on offense, Harden appears to be willing to accept the role that he should have accepted eight years ago. It remains to be seen if he and the Nets will figure out that agreeing on the offensive pecking order is only part of the championship recipe.
Labels: Brooklyn Nets, Golden State Warriors, James Harden, Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, Oklahoma City Thunder, Russell Westbrook, Stephen Curry
posted by David Friedman @ 11:43 PM
Los Angeles Legend Joe Caldwell
I interviewed Joe Caldwell several times many years ago, and I included his insights in an article about his life and career and also in an article about the art and science of NBA defense. Those articles focused primarily on the ABA and the NBA, with some discussion about Caldwell's achievements in college and as a member of the gold-medal winning Team USA squad in the 1964 Olympics.
Caldwell also had a decorated high school career as one of the top athletes from the Los Angeles area. Caldwell attended Fremont High School, which was affiliated with The Southern League, a high school athletic conference of L.A. city schools from the 1950s through the 1980s. Caldwell is a member of the California Interscholastic Section (CIF)-Los Angeles Hall of Fame.
The CIF-L.A. Hall of Fame video tribute to Caldwell notes that he won
the 1960 City of Los Angeles Player of the Year award after averaging
24.8 ppg while leading Fremont to the city championship, and that
Caldwell was a champion high jumper in high school.
Dennis Love, who has put together a website about The Southern League, informed me that Caldwell was inducted in the Southern League Hall of Fame in 2007. Love also stated that the Los Angeles Unified School District is putting together a district-wide Hall of Fame booklet that will recognize the Southern League Hall of Fame members.
Love is trying to find a copy of Caldwell's autobiography Banned From Basketball. My understanding is that the book is out of print, but if anyone has an extra copy or knows where to buy one you can contact me or leave a message in the comments section of this article.
Labels: ABA, Arizona State, Carolina Cougars, Dennis Love, Fremont, Joe Caldwell, Southern League Hall of Fame, St. Louis Hawks
posted by David Friedman @ 2:27 PM
The NBA Tries to Figure Out How to Best Monetize the National Anthem
The NBA requires teams to play the National Anthem before each game, and the NBA requires team employees to stand respectfully while the National Anthem is played. These rules are not new. Over 20 years ago, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf (formerly known as Chris Jackson) found those rules objectionable and he decided to remain in the locker room while the National Anthem was played. The NBA did not ban him, but the league suspended him without pay for one game before he and the league agreed to a compromise stipulating that Abdul-Rauf would stand with his eyes closed during the playing of the National Anthem. After fulfilling his part of the compromise for a few seasons, Abdul-Rauf ultimately pursued career options other than being an NBA player, though he did return to the NBA for the 2000-01 season.
During the COVID-19 "bubble" last season, the league permitted players and team employees to kneel during the National Anthem, but that was more about granting some leeway during unusual circumstances than actually changing the rules. This season, everything was supposed to return to normal. Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban apparently did not get that memo. His team did not play the National Anthem before home games this season, and this supposedly went unnoticed by the league until Cuban made some public statements drawing attention to how he flouted the league's rules, whereupon the league informed him that the rules have not been changed. The Mavericks have resumed playing the National Anthem prior to games, with some commentators praising Cuban's initial actions and other commentators praising the league for enforcing its longstanding rules.
It is difficult to believe that the NBA did not know about Cuban's National Anthem policy until he publicly spoke about it. No, the league was willing to let things go if no one complained--but as soon as this became a public issue, the NBA did some back of the envelope math and figured out that the NBA's declining ratings would decline further if other teams followed Cuban's example. So, Cuban issued some weak statement about his new policy not really being a policy but rather just some kind of experiment, the NBA stated that its rules had not been changed, and everything has returned to normal.
The NBA's hypocrisy would be laughable were it not so self-righteous and absurd. The league breaks its collective arms patting itself on the back for being progressive: "The NBA Cares," we have been told ad nauseam.
What a farce. The NBA cares primarily about profits. If the NBA thought that it could make more money by having someone read excerpts from The Communist Manifesto before each game then the NBA would do it in a heartbeat; if the NBA thought that paying customers did not care about the National Anthem then the NBA would drop the National Anthem in a heartbeat.
For now, playing the National Anthem is a better financial decision than not playing the National Anthem.
There is no principle at work here other than maximizing profits. There is nothing inherently wrong with maximizing profits--provided that no laws are broken and no people are harmed--but it is obnoxious when a multi-billion dollar business repeatedly makes money-centered decisions while at the same time touting how progressive it is.
The NBA does not care about genocide in China, because doing business with China is a significant revenue source that the NBA is determined to maintain and grow.
The NBA does not care about the health and safety of its players, as demonstrated last week with the ludicrous scene of Kevin Durant being told that he could not play, then being permitted to play, and then being told that he could not play and that he would have to isolate for a week. If he has to isolate due to contact tracing and "an abundance of caution" then why doesn't every player--every NBA employee-who came in contact with him also have to isolate? Follow the money: if the NBA did that, then the season would collapse, and the league would lose hundreds of millions--if not billions--of dollars. So, instead we have a charade that is less about health and safety, and much more about acting like the league cares about health and safety.
The NBA dragged its feet for decades while players who retired prior to 1965 struggled in their old age without having an NBA pension. After many of those players passed away, the NBA finally threw a small amount of cash to the survivors. The ABA-NBA merger stipulated that the combined league would honor the pensions of ABA players, but the NBA is apparently waiting for a few more of those guys to pass away before helping out the survivors. The total amount of money that it would take to help the remaining ABA players who do not have pensions has been estimated at less than $2 million. That is pocket change for the NBA. The NBA loudly proclaims "Black Lives Matter" but is unwilling to commit even a relatively small amount of money to help the players--most of whom are Black--who helped build the league into the multi-billion dollar business it is today.
Commissioner Adam Silver gets a lot of credit for how he dealt with racist owner Donald Sterling. Sterling was a racist owner for decades, but the league never did anything until it was clear that Sterling's racism had become a public scandal that could cost the league money (and possibly lead to a player boycott).
A 43 page report detailed an institutional culture of sexual harassment that lasted for over 20 years in the Dallas Mavericks' organization. Cuban was not directly implicated in any improper conduct, but the report stated that "significant errors in judgment" and "institutional failures" had happened on his watch. Cuban and the Mavericks received no discipline from the NBA. Media members who cover the NBA regularly praise Cuban for being a
progressive and innovative thinker. Remember all of this the next time
you hear about how much the NBA is doing to empower women and girls.
The NBA should be ashamed of all of this, but as long as the cash keeps coming in the league's attitude is, in the vernacular, "Money talks and BS walks." Murdered people in China, destitute basketball pioneers, a racist owner, female employees enduring sexual harassment while Cuban looked the other way--it is all BS to the NBA.
Do not take this to mean that other leagues are better. MLB is a joke, and I have written about that before; it is ridiculous that Bud Selig is in the Baseball Hall of Fame, and that the PED cheater Alex Rodriguez is a celebrated baseball commentator. The NFL, like the NBA, has also not done right for many of its retired players, and the league is trying to figure out how much crowd-pleasing violence it can get away with allowing while giving lip service to being concerned about brain injuries. How many NFL Hall of Famers have died as a result of brain injuries? How many ex-NFL players have ended up homeless due at least in part to their brain injuries severely impacting their ability to function? How many ex-NFL players have committed suicide by shooting themselves in the torso so that their brains can be preserved for study?
I know more about the NBA than I do about the other leagues, and I have covered the NBA in person, so it is only natural that I write more about the NBA both in terms of the greatness of its athletes and the hypocrisy of its organizational policies.
The National Anthem "controversy" stems in part from non-lawyers and non-scholars struggling to understand what the Constitutional right to free speech entails. The right to free speech means that the government cannot restrict your right to free speech; the right to free speech does not mean that you can say whatever you want whenever and wherever you want without facing any consequences. A private employer has the legal right to restrict its employees' speech in many ways: it can contractually prevent employees from revealing proprietary information, it can determine what employees may or may not do with company-owned computers/internet access, and so forth, provided that such restrictions are spelled out as terms of employment and do not violate federal or state laws. Thus, the NBA can set as a condition of employment that its teams play the National Anthem prior to each game, and that each team employee shall stand respectfully while the National Anthem is played. Anyone who does not accept that condition of employment is subject to discipline, up to and possibly including termination of employment.
The United States' history and flaws are well-documented, and seemingly discussed in the media on a daily basis now. There is a tendency to forget that this country was founded by people who fled tyranny, and that this country's significant efforts in World War I and World War II (to cite just two examples) did much to preserve and extend freedom around the world. This country, for all of its shortcomings, is a place where a person who has no college education can accumulate generational wealth--tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars--on the basis of athletic skill. Anyone who does not want to stand for the National Anthem has plenty of other employment options: there are basketball leagues all over the world that do not play the U.S.National Anthem before their games, and players have the opportunity to offer their services to the highest bidder in any of those leagues.
I am not deeply offended by people who kneel for the National Anthem, but I am puzzled by what they think they are accomplishing. The National Anthem is not the Confederate flag; it is not a symbol of oppression, unless you believe that this country is fundamentally evil. I believe that this country has done wrong and must do better, but that this country is also, in President Abraham Lincoln's heartfelt, eloquent words, "the last best hope of Earth." I believe that there are other, better ways to protest injustice, and/or call attention to specific situations than not standing for the National Anthem. The playing of the National Anthem is a moment when all of us can stand together in gratitude for what this country has accomplished, and in hope for what this country will accomplish in terms of righting past wrongs/doing better in the future.
Although I stand for the National Anthem, I can respect someone who peacefully decides to kneel--but only if that person is also willing to accept the potential consequences of that action. If the National Anthem is that offensive to one's ears, then the political and economic systems that enable the NBA to exist and thrive are also offensive.
It really is simple. The NBA, as a private employer, has a right to play the National Anthem before games with the expectation that its employees will stand respectfully while the National Anthem is played. Each person has a right to decide what terms of employment are acceptable financially, morally, and otherwise--and each person has a right to decide to seek employment from an employer whose rules and policies align with behaviors that are are palatable to that person.
Labels: ABA, Adam Silver, China, Dallas Mavericks, Donald Sterling, Mark Cuban, National Anthem, NBA, Pre-1965ers
posted by David Friedman @ 10:00 PM
Kevin Durant's Absence Reveals Nets' Flaws and Clarifies the Team's Pecking Order
The Brooklyn Nets--featuring what has prematurely, if not absurdly, been called the greatest offensive trio ever (apparently, current NBA commentators are unaware that Wilt Chamberlain, Elgin Baylor, and Jerry West were teammates at at time when they ranked 1-2-3 in career playoff scoring)--lost 122-111 to the Detroit Pistons, the worst team in the Eastern Conference. This is the seventh straight game that the Nets have given up at least 120 points, and that is not what commentators had in mind when they predicted that the Nets would set records.
The Nets are now 0-3 since losing Kevin Durant to the NBA's health and safety protocols, and he will be out of action until at least Friday as the NBA pretends to care more about health and safety than money. The one positive about Durant's absence is that it should put to rest any debate about who is the team's best player or who should be running the offense down the stretch in close games, a debate that made about as much sense as the debate over whether the Miami Heat were LeBron James' team or Dwyane Wade's team. After the Heat figured out that the best player must lead the way--and that James was clearly the team's best player--the Heat won back to back NBA titles.
The only chance that the Nets have to win is if they understand that Durant is clearly the team's best player. Maybe a steady diet of losing will help crystalize that understanding for everyone on the team, and for outside observers as well.
Kyrie Irving's track record demonstrates that he is a crafty ballhandler and a good clutch scorer, but he is not well suited to being the top option on a championship contender. James Harden's track record is even more well-documented, and--unlike Irving--he has yet to win a championship in any role. Prior to whining his way out of Houston earlier this season, Harden led the Rockets to a 2-6
record (they also won a game when he was on the roster but did not
play). The Rockets are 8-7 since Harden left. The Nets are 7-5 with Harden in the lineup (they also lost one game when he did not play). As usual, the James Harden effect is quite evident on defense, but much less so in the win column.
At least two things have to happen for the Nets to fulfill the championship expectations that exist both inside and outside of the organization: (1) Kevin Durant must be established as the clear number one option, with Harden and Irving playing supporting roles, and (2) the Nets must collectively commit to consistently putting forth effort on defense.
The Nets will face the Indiana Pacers tomorrow night without Durant, who is slated to return to action for the Nets' trip to Golden State for Durant's reunion with his former team on Saturday night. That will be the first game of a five game road trip that also includes games against the L.A. Lakers, L.A. Clippers, and Phoenix Suns. If the Nets continue to give up more than 120 points per game they could return home as a sub-.500 team; the Detroit loss dropped the Nets to 14-12.
As noted above, it took a little while for the Heat to figure things out, and then they won two championships--but the Heat both understood the correct pecking order and they committed to playing defense. Also, the Heat's trio was more talented than the Nets' trio: LeBron James is better than Kevin Durant, Dwyane Wade is better than Kyrie Irving, and Chris Bosh is better than James Harden.
Labels: Brooklyn Nets, James Harden, Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving
posted by David Friedman @ 11:44 PM
