Harden: I'm The Best All-Around Player In The NBA

[damecurry]

Who cares.. It's call confidence people. Does him being humble/honest make him a better player? If you are a professional athlete, you should have a ton of confidence in yourself. Even if it is slightly deluded.

In the end I want my players to believe they are the best.. You can't be the best if you don't believe you are the best. People making a big deal of this just need something to be upset about lol

This (common) philosophy is very stupid on a multitude of levels.

What's stupid about it? If you don't agree it's stupid?

1. There is a difference between confidence and arrogance
2. "you can't be the best if you don't believe you are the best." Is a completely non-sensical statement. You must be confident and driven but you thinking your the best or not actually has nothing to do with your being the best.
3. Deluded confidence, hubris, typically only leads to bad things, to overextension, feelings of invulnerability, over-reaching. You know what you actually need to be the best? A sense of self-recognition, of being able to look out there and say "I'm clearly not the bests scorer cause I don't score the most, I'm clearly not the best all-around offensive player because every aspect of my production lags behind LBJ/KD and I'm clearly a mediocre at best defender so I've clearly got plenty of work to do to be amongst the true elite."
4. Even if you believe this, what is the benefit of broadcasting it to the world when there's no clear evidence to support it? At best it makes you look arrogant, at worst stupid and downright delusional. There's just no call for such a claim from Harden. Let the pundits/media/viewers decided subjective pointless bs about rank and whatnot, just go out and work your hardest at being your best and keep arrogant unfounded beliefs to yourself.

[Roseventyfour]

Wow!

[BallerTalk]

alright dude, you're the bomb. Can't aspire to your basketball IQ. I'm just delusional, lets move on the next post..look forward to more of your enlightenment.

Anything to help the less fortunate.

[bakesale]

Who cares.. It's call confidence people. Does him being humble/honest make him a better player? If you are a professional athlete, you should have a ton of confidence in yourself. Even if it is slightly deluded.

Slightly deluded? LOL are you kidding me? He's extremely deluded!

The sheer fact that he's deluded at all; therein lies the problem. Enough said.

But how is it a problem? Is it affecting his game? The guy just believes highly in himself. I'm not saying he is right but so what? Does his attitude is affect is work ethic? He still works hard on his game.

It's a problem because he's flat out wrong. If he said something that's definitely true, you can say he's confident, but when you're flat out wrong and still think so highly of yourself you come across as arrogant.

Do I have to explain the fallacies of being arrogant?
If he really believes he's the best all around player in the NBA it means he probably won't work on things like defence which he's atrocious at. He's lazy and slow on defence, so yes I do question his work ethic/work rate.
Here's a video that shows how awful he is on defence (the title of the video is deliberately ironic):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVYJULACcao

At the very least he makes himself look like a stupid and arrogant douchebag which has put me and I'm sure many other basketball fans off him. It's actually laughable to think He would think that highly of himself.

[Embiid P]

Now we all know why Bosh chose to stay in Miami rather than sign with Houston. Harden's a great scorer no doubt, but his defense is below average. Best all-around player in the NBA? Hardly.

[2thehoopand1]

I guess defense doesn't count for anything anymore. I'm starting to see why people don't like harden.

[eksessiv]

The mere fact that he has to say versus other people saying it for him is all that he needs to know.

[eksessiv]

It's spelled defense. Not defence.

[delsol650]

Can't wait to see this chump get torched on Defense by opposing SG every game this coming season.

[TrueStoryGSW]

That's what she said.

[mj_shoefanatic]

Too bad the rockettes are not the best all-around team in the West.

LOL

[TheBallDoLie]

This (common) philosophy is very stupid on a multitude of levels.

What's stupid about it? If you don't agree it's stupid?

1. There is a difference between confidence and arrogance
2. "you can't be the best if you don't believe you are the best." Is a completely non-sensical statement. You must be confident and driven but you thinking your the best or not actually has nothing to do with your being the best.
3. Deluded confidence, hubris, typically only leads to bad things, to overextension, feelings of invulnerability, over-reaching. You know what you actually need to be the best? A sense of self-recognition, of being able to look out there and say "I'm clearly not the bests scorer cause I don't score the most, I'm clearly not the best all-around offensive player because every aspect of my production lags behind LBJ/KD and I'm clearly a mediocre at best defender so I've clearly got plenty of work to do to be amongst the true elite."
4. Even if you believe this, what is the benefit of broadcasting it to the world when there's no clear evidence to support it? At best it makes you look arrogant, at worst stupid and downright delusional. There's just no call for such a claim from Harden. Let the pundits/media/viewers decided subjective pointless bs about rank and whatnot, just go out and work your hardest at being your best and keep arrogant unfounded beliefs to yourself.

You make fair points. I didn't literally mean to be the best you only have to believe you are the best. Obviously a lot more goes into it. It's just a mentality most professional athletes have. It was a mentality I had as an athlete and I was taught to have as an athlete. Now obviously I didn't have the skills to make it to the NBA. But every time I walked out on the court, as a team we believed we were always better than the other team. Even if they were better than us record wise and obviously talent wise. I was taught as an athlete the minute you think your opponent is better is the minute you lost the game. Yes it was deluded confidence ant times, but so what. I felt it helped us play with a strong mentality. Which is what the coaches wanted. Maybe that is wrong, but it was just a mentality created when I was young. And obviously there are others ways to extract maximum effort from your players.

And same thing when I played one on one with somebody. If I played someone better than me I would always carry the mentality I was better than him at the time. Maybe it's stupid and dumb in your eyes but that's just how I feel. And with professional athletes I'm sure some of them carry this mentality all the time. As basketball is now not only just a game for them but their way of life.

Is James Harden the best all around player in the NBA. Hell no. But in my eyes I have no problem with him saying that. When Derrick Rose won MVP, he told everyone before that season he felt he could win MVP. "Why can't I win MVP of the league?", he said. In his mind he was the best player in the NBA. Now I'm not saying it was cause of that he won MVP. Cause it was mainly all the hard work he put in all summer long. But I have no doubt his deluded confidence helped him play at the high level he did all season, cause in his mind he was the best player on the court every night. And to be fair most nights he played like it.

James Harden is just carrying a high confidence about himself. If you see it as arrogant fine, I get that. And it is a little arrogant. And if you don't like or respect that well fine, that's your opinion. From everything I read about Harden he is a hard worker. He might think he is the best all around player, but it doesn't prevent him from working hard on his game. If I truly felt it affected his game I would feel different. I don't think this way of thinking is "STUPID" like you said. Even if you don't agree.

[damecurry]

What's stupid about it? If you don't agree it's stupid?

1. There is a difference between confidence and arrogance
2. "you can't be the best if you don't believe you are the best." Is a completely non-sensical statement. You must be confident and driven but you thinking your the best or not actually has nothing to do with your being the best.
3. Deluded confidence, hubris, typically only leads to bad things, to overextension, feelings of invulnerability, over-reaching. You know what you actually need to be the best? A sense of self-recognition, of being able to look out there and say "I'm clearly not the bests scorer cause I don't score the most, I'm clearly not the best all-around offensive player because every aspect of my production lags behind LBJ/KD and I'm clearly a mediocre at best defender so I've clearly got plenty of work to do to be amongst the true elite."
4. Even if you believe this, what is the benefit of broadcasting it to the world when there's no clear evidence to support it? At best it makes you look arrogant, at worst stupid and downright delusional. There's just no call for such a claim from Harden. Let the pundits/media/viewers decided subjective pointless bs about rank and whatnot, just go out and work your hardest at being your best and keep arrogant unfounded beliefs to yourself.

You make fair points. I didn't literally mean to be the best you only have to believe you are the best. Obviously a lot more goes into it. It's just a mentality most professional athletes have. It was a mentality I had as an athlete and I was taught to have as an athlete. Now obviously I didn't have the skills to make it to the NBA. But every time I walked out on the court, as a team we believed we were always better than the other team. Even if they were better than us record wise and obviously talent wise. I was taught as an athlete the minute you think your opponent is better is the minute you lost the game. Yes it was deluded confidence ant times, but so what. I felt it helped us play with a strong mentality. Which is what the coaches wanted. Maybe that is wrong, but it was just a mentality created when I was young. And obviously there are others ways to extract maximum effort from your players.

And same thing when I played one on one with somebody. If I played someone better than me I would always carry the mentality I was better than him at the time. Maybe it's stupid and dumb in your eyes but that's just how I feel. And with professional athletes I'm sure some of them carry this mentality all the time. As basketball is now not only just a game for them but their way of life.

Is James Harden the best all around player in the NBA. Hell no. But in my eyes I have no problem with him saying that. When Derrick Rose won MVP, he told everyone before that season he felt he could win MVP. "Why can't I win MVP of the league?", he said. In his mind he was the best player in the NBA. Now I'm not saying it was cause of that he won MVP. Cause it was mainly all the hard work he put in all summer long. But I have no doubt his deluded confidence helped him play at the high level he did all season, cause in his mind he was the best player on the court every night. And to be fair most nights he played like it.

James Harden is just carrying a high confidence about himself. If you see it as arrogant fine, I get that. And it is a little arrogant. And if you don't like or respect that well fine, that's your opinion. From everything I read about Harden he is a hard worker. He might think he is the best all around player, but it doesn't prevent him from working hard on his game. If I truly felt it affected his game I would feel different. I don't think this way of thinking is "STUPID" like you said. Even if you don't agree.

My problem is that Harden does not appear to be giving his full effort on the court and goes off claiming he's better than guys like Lebron who give 98% all the time and 100% when it counts (in the playoffs) while Harden may have just been off, from what I saw he seemed to be on about 70% effort mode, he was not all in it and his team lost. That's the last effect he's left on the game, than a few months later he comes out and publicly states he's the best in the game? If he'd lit up the playoffs and gone down to the Spurs/Thunder/Heat in a blaze of glory that'd be one thing. But he got crushed when "playing defense" by Lillard/Matthews and he got shut down by pretty solid-but-unspectacular defenders in Matthews/Batum, his team lost in the first round and there's just no evidence for the statement so why say it to the press? Keep believing it fine, keep the mentality the confidence project that about yourself through your effort/game/training and us it as your life philisophy, I don't give a sh**. But why come declaring it to anyone who cares to listen? It just screams "celebrity" not "athlete" or "professional" to me.

You know who would never make a statement like this, ever, no matter what evidence existed to back it up? Damian Lillard, who knocked down the shot to take Harden out of the playoffs this year. He'll just continue to say "I always do the best I can" or some corny bs and knock down clutch shots, like a truly elite player.

[bakesale]

It's spelled defense. Not defence.

Defence is the original, correct spelling. America has bastardised the English language by changing the spelling of words for inscrutable reasons.