You can see Harden’s per-36 numbers in the tweet above. But it also made perfect sense to try other ways and they haven’t done too much of that. It made perfect sense to experiment doing it that way. When the 2018 MVP and team’s other scoring titelist was first available to play for Philly, we learned that the team wanted to mostly tether Harden’s minutes with Tobias Harris,’ while tethering Tyrese Maxey’s with Joel Embiid’s. Philly offense is popping with both of them on the court, but there's a wrinkle in the "Harden is a washed, hamstringless husk of a man" discussion So Is there any way to get James Harden looking bouncy and spry again so he can get buckets?Ĭookies Hoops’ Ben Detrick has pointed out on Twitter, Harden’s scoring splits with and without Embiid are stark: In my opinion, the Sixers do need Harden to be an All-Star caliber scorer if they want to win the title. Harden’s a phenomenal playmaker and passer. Option 2: stagger Harden and Embiid so that one of them is always on the floor, and maybe spark Harden’s scoring chops along the way Photo by Mitchell Leff/Getty Images Maybe Tyrese Maxey, Tobias Harris, Danny Green and perhaps BBall Paul can keep things afloat. The downsides get accentuated in hostile environments without savvy veteran stars anchoring already dicey lineups.Īnd maybe that’s the best way to go. Well, that dichotomy likely gets accentuated to the max if we dial up the Beard-Process two-man game. You’ve probably heard a bit about how good the Sixers’ starters are and how bad their bench units can be. And that means both of them sit at the same time and you’re intentionally inserting this terrifying life-support moment into every ballgame. Here you’re looking to mate their minutes. April 4, 2022īut you may have already thought about the cons. If you want to put a guard on Thybulle, he goes to the dunker and your low man help doesn't have the same height. Also you see Embiid developing the pop/late roll. 4 in late Jazz legend Jerry Sloan, don’t you think Sloan might say this is the right idea? You can almost hear him say Doc, every time we didn’t run a John Stockton-to-Karl-Malone screen-and-roll was a major, major win for the defense. 9 on the all-time winningest coaches list, was able to talk to No. With this in mind, perhaps Doc Rivers and his staff should do anything and everything to maximize the total number of times they can run this play, from here on in. The Embiid/Harden pick-and-roll might be just unstoppable enough for the Sixers to have a chance, despite their myriad of flaws.” They just need an unstoppable player, or unstoppable play, that can be enough to scratch out wins four times out of seven, propelling them to a series victory despite their weaknesses. “Sometimes in the playoffs, teams don’t need to be perfect. That would lead all high-volume screeners.”Īnd here is what Derek Bodner of The Daily Six Newsletter wrote: The Philadelphia 76ers are averaging 1.17 points per possession when Embiid rolls after screening for Harden, catches the ball, and finishes the play, per Second Spectrum. James Harden is broken right now as a scorer, but the Harden-Embiid pick-and-roll is as dominant as advertised. The James Harden-Joel Embiid pick-and-roll has been a seismic weapon for Philadelphia. Option one: jam as many Harden-Embiid pick-and-rolls as humanly possible into every single playoff game, tapping point-Beard’s brilliance Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images I think there’s two key options in front of Philly right now. Now we have this current version of James Harden, a masterful passer, a brilliant playmaker, but a dude coming up way short as a scorer, leaving fans scratching their heads. In this case, if he is, it might have rather grim implications for his long-term outlook, especially facing a possible $270M five-year contract extension.īut never mind all that for now. Normally, fans would be hoping their favorite stars are totally healthy. Whether Harden is in fact limited by an injury (and MRI’s conducted around the NBA trade deadline did reveal tightness which presented a strength deficit at one point) or not is an interesting puzzle. well the guy he did 13 months ago before any hamstring issues cropped up in March 2021: You can see in the replies to Austin Krell’s update that fans are trying to figure out why Harden doesn’t look like. But on April 9, Rivers said Harden is not limited by the troublesome soft tissue injury at all. We’ve reached the end of the 2022 regular season and (largely because the team made a major change at the NBA Trade Deadline) we still have a fair amount of questions left to be answered.īack on March 25, Doc Rivers said James Harden’s hamstring just wasn’t there yet.
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