bondom34 wrote:Tritodian wrote:1. Harden has been a much better outside shooter than Westbrook throughout his career - just not this season. Westbrook has improved his 3PT shooting while Harden's shooting has been declining, so the gap is closed quite a bit if we only look at the 3PT shooting ability. But overall, Harden is still much efficient scorer and not just because of his ability to get to the free throw line.
There is a stat called eFG% which strictly measures players' shooting efficiency (2PT+3PT combined.) It doesn't take into account FTs and if you look at the numbers, Harden is actually pretty good scorer even without the help of FTs. In fact, it's actually Westbrook who begins to look pedestrian once you take away all the free gimmes he accumulates throughout the whole game.
eFG% (League average : 50%)
Harden 53.1%
Westbrook 46.8%
The reason why Harden has far superior TS% despite Westbrook averaging similar free throw attempts and making them at similar rates is because Harden is far better scorer inside the arc (53.4 2PT% vs Westbrook's 45.2 2PT%). In fact, if Harden didn't take so many threes - which hurts any player's overall FG% - the gap in FG% between him and Westbrook would be much bigger than it is now.
In the end, Harden is scoring 29 PPG on 62 TS% and 53 eFG%. That is pretty god damn impressive, and has only been achieved 8 times before in NBA (
https://tinyurl.com/k38vq7g), while putting up near triple-double average himself. Westbrook is doing some great things too, but he's nowhere as efficient as Harden is when it comes to pure scoring.
2. Even if we go by overall impact on the offensive side of the ball, Harden still has better ORPM and OWS. Westbrook has better OBPM, but BPM is notoriously skewed by rebounding figures and collinearity, so I think it's fair to say Harden is having a better offensive season than Westbrook in general.
3. Harden is very turnover prone, but so is Westbrook. FWIW, Harden has slightly better AST/TOV ratio than Russ, but I agree that when it comes to play-making ability, Westbrook is not that far behind. I used to regard Westbrook as a mediocre passer, but he's changed my mind lately.
4. One strong argument for Russ is the sheer impact he's having on his team. While I still think Harden should win the MVP award over Westbrook, OKC does really suck when Westbrook sits out unlike Houston, and that's a fair point to make. But this can't be the sole argument since traditionally MVP award is not necessarily given to the most impactful player in the league. By that measure, Bill Russell or Tim Duncan should have never gotten any, and Harden should've been the MVP over Curry in the 14-15 season. It may be not fair, but team success is and always will be a huge factor in these kinds of awards.
5. One final point : People forget that Harden is just two rebounds per game short from averaging triple-double himself. And given that we're comparing two players in the guard position where rebounding is the least of anyone's concern, and given Westbrook's well-documented tendency to inflate his rebounding numbers, this gap of 2 rebounds per game is nowhere enough to justify the discrepancy in team success between the two. On top of that, Harden has been a much efficient scorer as well as slightly better passer.
Yes, OKC does have worse roster, but not as much as people think. If it weren't for Lou Williams acquisition (who brings similar value as Taj Gibson + McDermott combined IMO), Houston would be in serious trouble right now because guys like Gordon, Ariza, and Dekker have been laying bricks for months since the beginning of the new year. If people still think Eric Gordon is much better than Oladipo, just have a look at their numbers now because they're pretty much identical, and that's with Oladipo being a much better defender.
1. I never said Westbrook was having the better offensive season, I said it was close (it is) and his overall impact is greater (it is). He's the better player, having a better season. Again I'm not alone on this, though apparently this thread seems to live on it's island apart from the rest of the NBA world. As well, OWS is biased more toward efficiency and scoring, so discounting BPM and counting OWS is a bit disingenuous.
2. I agree both turn it over a lot, but Harden moreso. Using TO's as a measure against Westbrook and not Harden is my gripe. Or simply ignoring TOs from Harden like they don't exist.
3. I'm not arguing even Russ getting votes, I've accepted he's not winning. But it's a poor criteria when a better player having a better season is punished because his team is worse. I've aways felt that way, always will.
4. This is fine. But Harden's rebounds are equally inflated and he's pulling in nearly identical "contested" rebounds. This gap doesn't matter, what does is the impact each has on the team and the simple fact that Westbrook having a better overall season is enough reason that he should win the award (though won't).
5. As for rosters, this doesn't at all account for why when Harden sits, his team still rolls around a 112 O rating. If I change that to "since January 1", the offense is BETTER with Harden on the bench.
http://stats.nba.com/team/#!/1610612745/onoffcourt-advanced/?Season=2016-17&SeasonType=Regular%20Season&DateFrom=01%2F01%2F2017&DateTo=03%2F24%2F2017So if you'd explain why the cast isn't vastly better, it should take into account how Harden's team can literally improve it's offensive output when he's sat, while Westbrook's is about the worst in the NBA. People keep saying there's not a big difference, sorry, but the numbers don't at all bear this out and just repeating there's not a difference isn't showing there's not. There is.
Now I'll let everyone alone to post their normal reasons Westbrook doesn't deserve the award and Harden does.
Enjoy the thread, if you want to discredit Westbrook to prop Harden that's great (not you specifically but the trend itt) it shows how weak you think his case must be.
No, it's not because of 2 rebounds Westbrook is better. It's because of literally everything else. I totally get voting for Harden, he's entirely deserving, but trying to make it sound so by either saying it's because of 2 rebounds (which isn't true) or simply discrediting Westbrook is just showing a poor case being made.
Remembering why I stick on the PC board. If people think 2 rebounds is the reason someone is MVP, that's probably an opinion to ignore. 2 rebounds do matter, but anyone basing MVP solely on a box score isn't doing anything right.
1. The reason why I specifically separated out offense is because defensive stats are notoriously unreliable and has too many flaws to be used in a discussion like this, so lumping them altogether to make a case for 'overall impact' is disingenuous. Also, Harden and Westbrook both are not really good defenders to begin with, so it's really not a relevant subject anyway. Offensively, the only measures in which Westbrook seems to edge out Harden are PPG, OBPM and offensive net rating. That's it. Harden edges out Westbrook in APG, FG%, 3PT%, FT%, TS%, eFG%, OWS, ORPM, AST/TOV ratio, etc. Sorry, Harden is simply the better offensive player.
2. I'm very critical of Harden's TOs so your point doesn't apply to me. That being said, Harden's AST/TOV ratio is still a little better than Westbrook's, and Harden does make more pass attempts per game, so to suggest that Harden has bigger turnover issues than Westbrook is misleading. Harden does commit more turnovers, but he also dishes out more assists and makes more pass attempts in general.
3. You keep saying Russ is the better player and not just this season, but how so? If anything, Harden has accomplished more than Westbrook up to this point.
- Harden has higher MVP shares than Westbrook (
http://www.basketball-reference.com/leaders/nba_mvp_shares.html)
- Harden has two All-NBA First team selections vs Westbrook's one. Remember, they've been competing for the same spot throughout their whole career.
- Ever since joining Houston, Harden has had five playoff appearances (including this year) and advanced to WCF once. In the same time span, Westbrook has had four playoff appearances (including this year) and advanced to WCF once, and that's with playing with Durant.
The fact that Westbrook has not had a better career than Harden despite having shared majority of his minutes and burden with Kevin Durant as his teammate is kind of damning. Westbrook might be more fun to watch, but he's not the better player and certainly is not having better career up to this point.
4. Harden's rebounds are not equally inflated. Westbrook leads the league in uncontested rebounds category with 8.4 vs Harden's 6.4. If we just focus on contested rebounds, Westbrook barely edges out Harden (2.1 vs 1.7), and Harden has higher Contested REB% (21.2 vs 20.3)
http://stats.nba.com/players/rebounding/#!?sort=REB_UNCONTEST&dir=15. You keep referencing on/off net rating without mentioning its limitations. There's a reason why people have come up with stats like RPM or BPM, because just looking at raw net rating numbers doesn't tell you that much about a player's true impact. Harden and Kawhi's net rating is low because Houston and San Antonio consciously tries to maintain balance between their starting five and bench members, whereas OKC just goes full out with their starting group. Players like Capela, Ryan Anderson, Ariza and Beverley are not significantly better than Gordon, Lou Williams, Nene and Sam Dekker. Houston's starting five is nothing special and actually lacks offensive talent for a 3rd seed team in WC. It should come as no surprise that Houston's bench is performing well offensively without Harden because it was purposefully designed that way. With the exception of Ryan Anderson, Harden primarily shares his playing time with defensive role players with no particular offensive skill set. Switch Capela, Ariza, and Beverely's place with Gordon, Lou, and Nene and then see what happens. There will be a significant drop off between the starting five and the bench performance on the offensive side of the floor, and Harden's raw net rating will instantly increase.
If a good player is on a weaker team, his impact is inevitably elevated above his peers. A same player performing at the same level can have zero impact on a team like San Antonio, while could be +20 in Brooklyn. There's nothing about his individual performance that has changed, just his surroundings. Even the Bulls manged to win 55 games without Micheal Jordan, as opposed to 57 games in the previous season with Jordan playing. Does that mean Jordan's overall value was equal to just two more additional wins? There will always be some good players who will have the opportunity to leave more mark in the game, so to speak, than others just because he's playing for one of the worst teams in the league. Should we reward those guys MVP every year even though their team is lottery bound? If that's your take, then fine, but it's just wishful thinking on your part and will never happen realistically.
Anyways, I've already conceded that Westbrook is having bigger impact on his team this season, not because of raw net rating figures, but on the basis of Russ having slightly higher RPM. But as with all other stats, RPM tracks offense much more accurately than defense, and by that measure Harden's offensive impact (ORPM) has been greater than Westbrook's this season. But as I've said before, MVP doesn't necessarily mean the most impactful player in the league. And going by traditional criteria by which we crown MVPs of this league, Harden should win the award.
http://static.bkref.com/friv/mvp.html