I would never trade for that flopper. WTF for? I hate his game. And he hasn't done shit in the playoffs. I'm good.
He has handles. They're very fundamental. It's about being stronger. He needs to get in the weight room.
So what is 'less than sh!t' that describes what we have done? I'm not advocating for Harden, just wondering where the Blazers playoff record ranks on the excrement scale.
He plays terrible in the playoff every year. This is no secret. Secondly, the subject a James Harden. Focus. Seems like you're arguing for the sake of arguing.
Not sure there is a good comp for Simons among active PGs. An athletic, wiry, taller point guard that can also shoot? Good luck. Maybe Simons is what the 76ers thought they were getting with Fultz.
Gotta say, IF Simons is legitimately able to run the point for 15 mpg next season, that will address one of our major weaknesses from this year. Y'all getting me excited for next year when this year's playoffs haven't even started.
Admittedly I didn't watch a ton of Clippers games, AND it was quite a while ago so I don't have clear memories. But the length, passing, smoothness, and ability to shoot - not necessarily 3s, but I have (potentially false) memories of Shaun shooting mid-range nicely. I'm not saying they're identical, just that I saw similarities to a player I didn't watch a whole lot of.
Then I think you underrate Nurk and underestimate the negatives that come with overlapping roles of Harden & Dame. Harden + Dame - Nurk - CJ wins fewer games than what we have now. Nurk, assuming he heals well, has more room for improvement than AD or Harden. Also, it's not that I would reject an upgrade to a top 5 AD, it's that I think we can, in principal, get more bang for the buck upgrading our weakest link than upgrading our 2nd strongest link. If nothing else is available then yeah, whenever you can improve your team you do.
Where I think your argument goes off the rails is that it's not Dame/Harden vs. Dame/Nurk/CJ. Because someone is going to take Nurk's place. Look at the production we've gotten out of the 5 post Nurk. So what if you wind up with Dame/Harden/Enes? Or Dame/Harden/Boogie? You have two guards who can play either guard spot to open the floor. Harden is unquestionably an upgrade over CJ in every possible way except defense. They are the same TYPE of player, but Harden is one of the best of all time. Heck, I think you could argue that playing with Dame and Harden in the backcourt would make almost any 5-man better simply because they'd have so much space on which to operate and little attention from opposing teams.
Yes, Harden is a huge upgrade over CJ. But Enes is a huge downgrade from Nurk, almost exclusively because of defense. You get diminishing returns when you have two elite creators. Adding Dame OR Harden to a team with no creator would more than offset losing an elite defender like Nurk. But adding a second creator (adding Harden over CJ to Dame) wouldn't.
On offense. On defense we'd need to have three rotation Centers because two of them would foul out every game. Also, fuck Harden.
Our production from the 5 since Nurk went down is mostly against crap teams. We'll see what happens now that the playoffs have arrived. I hope we still get it done, but we are going to miss Nurk.
Statistically, Enes and Nurk are almost a wash. Nurk is the better passer and defender. Nurk also gets into foul trouble and sometimes gets himself tossed from games, which means he can't help you offensively or defensively. And both Dame and Harden are creators. It's almost like you are saying CJ is the creator on the floor right now, but he's not. If anything, a Dame/Harden backcourt is more creative.
Yeah. I know Nurk only played against the good teams. And your post is off on a tangent, which is you would have a much harder time replacing James Harden with anybody than replacing Jusuf Nurkic.
