Houston Rockets 2019 Offseason Report

INTRODUCTION

Another year, another loss to the Golden State Warriors.What could have been a breakout year for James Harden ends in yet another playoff defeat. We’ve seen this happen too many times; losing to a KD-less Warriors team in 2016, a Kawhi-less Spurs team in 2017, and another KD-less Warriors team in 2019. Something is fundamentally wrong with the blueprint. Golden State has had our number for the past 4 out of 5 years. The coaching has changed, the lineup has changed, hell we even brought in Chris Paul, yet the result remains the same. Is James Harden truly a leader on the court?

The good news is, we are really good. Denying Harden’s obvious talent is disrespecting the game of basketball in it of itself. We’ve made the playoffs virtually every season in the harder conference. We have the 2017-2018 MVP entering his prime. We aren’t struggling to find a rhythm throughout the regular season. But when the going gets tough in the playoffs, we often find a way of throwing it all away on the court. I’m going to go over the Harden years and review the coach, the starting 5 management surrounded him with, along with a season review. Maybe looking at the past and seeing what James Harden has worked with will provide us a better picture of what, and who, he needs to go all the way to bring another championship to Clutch City.

THE HARDEN YEARS

2012 – 2013

Coach – Kevin McHale

Record – 45-37

Starting 5 – Jeremy Lin, James Harden, Chandler Parsons, Patrick Patterson, Omer Asik

Season Review – Truthfully, this squad never had a chance. Sneaking in to the 8th seed and getting matched up against the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Rockets dropped the first 3 games, won 2, and then dropped the last to end a poor season. Jeremy Lin and Chandler Parsons were both useful in their supporting roles, but in the end their talents were not enough to stop a catastrophic takeover of the season by a certain fellow named Kevin Durant. Omer Asik is now out of the league, and Patrick Patterson is a non-factor. Parsons is known as a joke of a contract, and Jeremy Lin is a benchwarmer on the Toronto Raptors. Basically, this team had no shot beating a well defined Thunder team, much less going all the way and beating the eventual NBA champions; Lebron & Wade in Miami.

2013 – 2014

Coach – Kevin McHale

Record – 54-28

Starting 5 – Patrick Beverly, James Harden, Chandler Parsons, Terrence Jones, Dwight Howard

Season Review – Damian Lillard.

2014 – 2015

Coach – Kevin McHale

Record – 56-26

Starting 5 – Patrick Beverly, James Harden, Trevor Ariza, Donatas Motijuenas, Dwight Howard

Season Review – This season wasn’t much to be disappointed about. Cruising through a 5-game series against the Dallas Mavericks, the team somehow initiated a 3-1 comeback against the CP3-Blake-DeAndre Clippers. Unfortunately, this momentum was stopped by a rising Warriors machine that wiped us out in 5 games led by Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson.

Harden was surrounded by a more than competent 3 in Trevor Ariza, who also had playoff and championship experience along with Patrick Beverly, a strong-willed and in your nose defender, as well as Dwight Howard, a useful big man on the pick and roll. Dwight’s rebounding proved useless as defensive lapses gave the Warriors easy points, and our offense wasn’t enough to beat them.

2015 – 2016

Coach – J.B Bickerstaff

Record – 41-41

Starting 5 - Patrick Beverly, James Harden, Trevor Ariza, Donatas Motijuenas, Dwight Howard

Season Review – This season we regressed and clinched the 8th seed, barely beating out the Utah Jazz by one game. Unfortunately, this 8th seed meant we matched up against… yep, the Golden State Warriors. This time, Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green all proved to be too much as the Warriors took us down in 5. Luckily, with a few favorable calls, the Cleveland Cavaliers managed to take revenge for the city of Houston. Overall a disappointing season, but the Cavaliers won when they should have lost, so I like to think of it as a moral victory.

2016-2017

Coach – Mike D’Antoni

Record – 55-27

Starting 5 – Patrick Beverly, James Harden, Trevor Ariza, Ryan Anderson, Clint Capela

Season Review – This was a terrible season to be blunt. Dwight Howard was replaced by a young Clint Capela, and we were running Ryan Anderson at the 4. Signing the Coach of the Season, Mike Dan and Tony changed the whole outlook for the team, as we focused even more on stimulating an offense no team could match.

Beating the Thunder in 5, without Kevin Durant, wasn’t much of a victory especially when considering the lineup surrounding Russell Westbrook. Matched up against the 2 seed, the San Antonio Spurs, it was a toss- up going into the Western Conference semi-finals. After splitting the first 4 games apiece, luck seemed to be on our side when Tony Parker was out indefinitely with a torn quad. Then, in Game 5, star player Kawhi Leonard twisted his ankle, leaving a lone James Harden free to do what he willed on the court. Even with both Parker and Kawhi out, Game 5 was barely lost due to a Manu Ginobili block on a potential game-tying James Harden 3 -pointer. Alright well we still have Game 6 right?

10 pts on 2-11 shooting with 6 turnovers and 6 fouls. If there is defining moment when Rockets fans lost faith in James Harden, this was it. 114 – 75 in an elimination game with no Kawhi Leonard or Tony Parker? Wow. Their starting 5 was: Patty Mills, Danny Green, Jonathan Simmons, Pau Gasol, and Lamarcus Aldridge. A truly pathetic end to a season. Maybe Harden was more focused on getting an MVP award, but the effort in an elimination game against a depleted San Antonio Spurs team was lackluster and embarrassing to say the least.

Onto the next season, I suppose.

2017 – 2018

Coach – Mike D’Antoni

Record – 65-17

Starting 5 – Chris Paul, James Harden, Trevor Ariza, PJ Tucker, Clint Capela

Season Review – Getting Chris Paul in a blockbuster trade was supposed to push us over the top. And it did. We were elite the entire season coasting into the 1 seed. Harden, Capela and Paul had a distinct understanding of everything going on during the game. ISO shots were falling, the Harden- Capela lob looked unstoppable, and a motion offense was working. Trevor Ariza and PJ Tucker held a defensive fort on the other end.

Beating the Timberwolves and Jazz were quick easy series. Matching up against the Warriors again, we looked poised for victory. After a Chris Paul injury in Game 6, James Harden could have singlehandedly pushed the Rockets over the Warriors in either Game 6 or 7 with a 3-2 lead. It was yet another moment for James Harden to define himself as the best player in the world.

Neither happened as dubious, yes very fucking dubious calls gave Golden State just enough of an edge to beat us *cough* moving screens *cough*. The chemistry was there, the team was there, but the superstar could not get it done. Luckily, James Harden got an MVP so at least there was something accomplished. Sure 27 missed threes sealed our fate but I still believe this was a series so poorly officiated, Tim Donaghy should have come out of retirement.

Yes, you can call me salty. I'll take it.

2018 – 2019

Coach – Mike D’Antoni

Record – 53-29

Starting 5 – Chris Paul, James Harden, Eric Gordon, PJ Tucker, Clint Capela

Season Review – Abysmal but many saw it coming. Putting Eric Gordon at the 3 doesn’t seem like a good idea for one thing but we are playing small ball so I can see the reasoning. Letting go of the defensive anchor Trevor Ariza and replacing him with James Ennis and Danuel House Jr. evidently didn’t work out. We were missing a competent 3&D player the whole season. This didn’t affect our regular season games, but it hurt us in the playoffs. We gave Chris Paul a mega-contract, and he didn’t deliver. Clint Capela disappeared. Kevin Durant was injured but we still couldn’t get enough offensive firepower to beat a reigning championship-caliber team. Losing to the Warriors in 6 was predictable enough looking back. Posting #RunItBack doesn’t mean anything when the other team on the court outhustles, outrebounds, and outscores you. Signing Iman Shumpert and Kenneth Faried felt like impulsive decisions to try and fill a gaping hole, and Faried didn’t even play the Warriors series so there isn’t much to say.

A decent season, but the adjustments we made to beat the Warriors were pretty much nonexistent when the teams actually played. We can still crown ourselves as one of the best teams in the leagues but when it comes down to it, we were unable to match the scoring and defensive ability the reigning champions had.

MOVING FORWARD

James Harden is synonymous with Houston Rockets. The title of this is Houston Rockets Offseason Report but in reality, it is “How can we build around James Harden?”.

Over the years, James Harden has enjoyed the company of Chris Paul, Trevor Ariza, Dwight Howard and plenty of other very strong players in the league; Lou Williams, Eric Gordon, Clint Capela. The lineups have been there over the past 5 years, what is James Harden doing wrong?

In my very humble opinion, I notice James Harden doesn’t move off ball. When Klay and Curry are running around screens trying to get an open shot, James Harden is languishing near the half court line waiting for a pass out for an ISO. He isn’t even standing near the 3 point ready to shoot on some possessions, nor is he crashing the boards.

James Harden is absolutely nonexistent during transition defense. Sure, his post defense is above average but watching your key player jog on the court in key possessions can be infuriating. Especially when he is arguing with a referee while the ball is still in play. Our winning and losing often comes down to the difference of 1-6 points against our playoff opponents. Blowouts are rare, and losing key possessions due to a lack of effort or laziness is depressing and infuriating. Regardless, our defense this year was abysmal - even if we ranked 5th, on eye we could've been better - so this defensive issue isn’t purely on James Harden to be fair. But James Harden doesn’t play team basketball. James Harden doesn’t play off-ball, it’s really that simple. As good as his ISO-game is, the off-ball movement, the open layups, the off-ball 3-pointers off a screen, that the Warriors employ is what has killed us 4 times out of the past 5 years.

Another focal area of improvement would be incorporating the mid-range back into Harden’s, and the rest of team’s, game. Dismissing at least 35% of the court makes our offense predictable and inefficient when teams can just clog the lane defend the 3-pt line. Chucking up contested 3’s when a dribble and an open 2 is a surefire way to drop points on limited possessions in the playoffs. 2014-2017 Harden had the mid-range step back down, but I believe D’Antoni’s “3’s only” strategy has pushed Harden into taking inefficient 3’s when he could make better plays with the ball.

Coaching wise, I believe Mike D'Antoni is a good fit. I do think his timeout calling can be terrible at times though; our opponents will go on a run, and he will call a timeout too late to actually stop their momentum. In closeout moments, I want to see him on the line ready to call a timeout and a set play, should we gain possession for a second. Overall, I think his strategy works but he is a coach yet to prove himself on a team yet to prove itself with a star player yet to prove himself worthy of an NBA championship.

So who can we surround James Harden by to build a championship team?

Surround him by a 2 shooters, a 3&D, and a big man, and I think he will have the opportunity to succeed in a way we haven’t seen before. With that being said, here is my ideal lineup.

PG – Chris Paul

SG – James Harden

SF – Tobias Harris

PF – PJ Tucker

C- DeAndre Jordan

Bench – Eric Gordon, Austin Rivers, Clint Capela, Marcus Morris.

I truly think that would be a championship caliber team. Tobias Harris plugs the Ariza hole we were missing this season. DeAndre Jordan clogs the lane and picks up necessary boards in a Dwight Howard role. I believe Harris is going for a super-max so this lineup may not work with the numbers unless we ship Chris Paul out, which I'm not opposed to doing as sad as that may be. Although the numbers don't add up in my hypothetical lineup, I truly believe James Harden would excel in that lineup.

Other offseason pickups could include - Robert Covington, Brandon Ingram, Aaron Gordon, Blake Griffin, Danilo Gallinari.

CONCLUSION

At the end of the day, James Harden has the keys to the city. It is his team, and that means he knows how he plays best, who will play the best next to him, and what kind of play style the Houston Rockets should have. James Harden has a direct link to management and he can single-handedly decide who he wants to play with, and who the coach should be. The lineups he's had over the years have ranged from terrible to phenomenal but at the end of the day, he is still and will continue to be the focal point of the system. Therefore it his system to mold and prune as he sees fit.

As a Rockets supporter since birth though, I must admit that the clock is ticking. The clock has been ticking, and if another year passes with yet another disappointing playoff loss, it might be time for the team to move on.

Until then, it's your move, James.