There is no denying the fact that James Harden is a superstar. He has averaged 27-6-5 in four seasons since joining the Rockets and has undoubtedly been the NBA’s best shooting guard (at least offensively) since joining the Rockets and being given the keys to the franchise.
His unique ability to utilize his strong frame and top-notch foot work to create separation for jump shots or get to the rim at will, combined with his basketball I.Q. and ability to create contact (whether real or perceived) has made Harden one of the most dangerous offense forces in the league. Combine that with his size and vision and he is a triple-double threat on a nightly basis.
So why do I say that Harden is the anti-Steve Nash and what do I mean by that? Well Nash was always known to be the consummate professional and teammate. His incredible ability to play to his teammates strengths and put them in their ideal positions to score made him one of the greater point guards in NBA history and led to a number of his teammates banking on his ability to maximize their abilities.
Here is a list of the players who received the biggest contracts of their careers after playing with Steve Nash:
Amar’e Stoudemire 5 years, $100 million in 2010
Shawn Marion 6 years, $86 million in 2004
Boris Diaw, 5 years, $45 million in 2007
Raja Bell 5 years, $20 million
Channing Frye 4 years, $32 million in 2014
Steve Nash helped spark or rejuvenate the careers of all of the players above as well as Jason Richardson, Jared Dudley, Tim Thomas, Marcin Gortat, Grant Hill, Leandro Barbosa and Goran Dragic.
He universally was adored by his teammates and made many of them much better players. Many careers were on an upward swing after playing with Steve Nash. The exact opposite seems true of James Harden in Houston.
With the exception of Chandler Parsons, who will be making an obscene amount of money to play basketball in Memphis for the next four seasons, here is a list of the players who’s value or perception around the league have dwindled since playing with “The Beard”:
Dwight Howard
Ty Lawson
Terrance Jones
Jeremy Lin
Donatas Montejunas
Trevor Ariza
The Rockets have made Trevor Ariza and Patrick Beverly very available this offseason. Both were dangled in the pursuit of a 1st round pick in the 2016 NBA Draft and have been available since, but as we have seen no teams have really bitten. Ariza was seen as a very valuable commodity in 2014 after rejuvenating his career alongside John Wall in Washington. HE signed a four-year, $32 million deal with Houston that offseason. That contract is extremely cheap at the moment and teamS still don’t want to give up anything of value for him.
Ty Lawson is currently still in search for an NBA job, obviously his personal issues are a big part of that as well, but he was seen as a mid-tier starting point guard before joining the Rockets last season. Dwight Howard ended up cashing in, but his value diminished much more in his three seasons in Houston than it did in his injury-ridden season in Los Angeles. There were many GMs around the NBA who weren’t willing to pay Howard $15 million per year in a market where Ian Mahinmi got $16 million and Evan Turner got $18 million. Terrance Jones has had a number of injury issues but his inability to progress as a player led to him essentially signing a veteran’s minimum deal with the Pelicans. Jeremy Lin came to Houston as a potential breakout star and left as a fringe starter that has been an NBA vagabond ever since. Montejunas has received little interest from NBA teams and has not been offered any contract from another team as a restricted free agent.
The only player that has left the Rockets since the 2012-13 season when Harden arrived and seen an increase in salary directly after leaving the Rockets besides Chandler Parsons was Patrick Patterson who signed a three-year, $18 million contract with the Raptors in 2014.
Although there is no tangible way to measure how much better a player makes his teammates, you can see that many players careers improved as a result of playing with Nash while many players careers have crated while playing alongside Harden. Nash’s Suns teammates were well-known for having some of the most fun and best chemistry in the NBA while Harden’s Rockets teammates have had some serious body language issues and never seemed to gel from a chemistry perspective. Who can forget this classic reaction to Harden’s game winner in Game 4 of the western conference 1st round this season when the Rockets avoided the sweep of the Golden State Warriors:
https://twitter.com/AnthonyAikenJr/status/723652031483928576
There is no denying Harden’s talent, but there is also no denying his inability to lead and how his style of play and personality on and off the court is not conducive to build the camaraderie needed to become a top-notch organization.
Harden will now be led by the coach who helped take Nash to his greatest heights as an NBA player and vice versa. He will be cast in the role that Nash played eloquently in Mike D’Antoni’s seven seconds or less offense from 2004 to 2007.
Will Harden flourish or struggle? History tells us regardless of how much individual successes he has, he won’t come close to matching the level of team success Nash did with D’Antoni as his coach.
