Goal of the offense. Dame looks to defer early usually... unless it's dictated. Dame is a much, much, much more willing passer than CJ... Dame is a willing passer in general... so I don't understand why Dame is being questioned when it's CJ that needs to be questioned.
That is likely because Dame is a PG and CJ is a SG. I agree CJ is mostly a black hole on offense and is much more guilty of missing open teammates. Watch how many times teammates will role/flash/cut and CJ won't even look at them. However, that doesn't let Dame off the hook. As a PG who handle the ball as much as he does. to be averaging under 5 assists per game does seem quite low.
In the pre season he said don't call him a point guard......call him a pointS guard. I love it. He was my number 1 pick, 4th overall in our fantasy league and is averaging the most fantasy points. Hate his flopping, but that dude just gets it done.
Steve Nash was generally thought of as the best PG when he was at his peak, despite being a worse defender than Harden. And he averaged half the points and half the rebounds Harden is averaging, and never broke 12 APG. Soooo, if you thought Nash was the best PG (I didn't) then you should probably think Harden is the current best. The numbers he's putting up are unreal. Of course, following that line of thinking, Westbrook has to be in the conversation, and would be my pick due to playing on both ends of the floor.
So he's so ball dominant he gets 12 assists per game Theres a matter of sample size and him having the ball an historically high amount.
Bro, if you have a player on your team that can get you 12 dimes a game and STILL gets 30+ points......he can have the ball in his hands EVERY possession! Don't let your hate of a player cloud your common sense about the game itself.
Yeah, we'll see if he's able to maintain this. But if we're talking about Dame's efficiency being off the charts on a small sample size then that courtesy has to be extended to other players as well. As of this moment, Harden is blasting Nash's numbers out of the water.
Har_en? He's a one-way player. Based on every argument you've ever made about one-way players (and there have been many), you've negated and answered your own question.
At the same time - Harden won't have as high an assist number... again, low sample sizes for both people. I wonder what Dame had this time last year? 2nd - I'm only talking about when CJ is the PG for the 2nd unit.
Yes, the sample size is small in both cases. Harden's scoring is only up 2.6 ppg from last season. So, that shouldn't surprise anyone for such a small sample size. What is surprising is that HOUs pace isn't up under D'Antoni (they are 16th in the league, right smack in the middle of the pack) and Harden isn't taking any more shots this year (19.1 FGA/G) than last (19.7 FGA/G). Like Dame, Harden's increase in scoring is due to better shooting percentages. Harden is shooting significantly better from both 2-point range and 3-point range compared to last year and his FG%, 3FG% and TS% are all carer highs. In Dame's case, we can clearly see how he has improved his scoring efficiency. He's driving more and finishing much better at the rim. He has clearly improved in this area and this is a new skill that should prove sustainable. He's not just going through an early season hot shooting streak. In Harden's case, why is he shooting the ball so much better than he has in years past? Are his career best shooting percentages sustainable for an entire season, or will he regress to the norm? It will be interesting to see. One thing that I don't think is sustainable is HOU's won-loss record. They are currently the same 4-3 as we are, but their four wins are: 2 wins over DAL who is 1-5, 1 win over NYK who are 2-4 and 1 win over WAS who are 1-5. Their defense is ranked 27th in the league. They won't be able to stay about .500 with such a porous defense. BNM
I don't get how some of these posters put so many asterisks next to some of these players like Westbrook and now Harden.. "Ohh he averages great assists numbers because he has the ball a lot.. " "Oh well YEA he has great assists numbers because of THIS.." "Oh well YEA he has great assists numbers because of THAT.." Like seriously?? My goodness I hate Harden and Westbrook can be annoying as fuck but my god stop hating on their skills.
Well, Dame was 10th in total assists last year and 8th in assists per game, so it's not like he's bad at distributing the ball. I think our offense is out of sync right now, and that's giving us lower assist numbers.
