On Friday, the Toronto Raptors visit Houston to take on the Rockets and their majestically bearded superstar James Harden.
The reigning NBA MVP, Harden is the frontrunner to win the league’s top individual honour for a second consecutive year with averages of 36.3 points, 8.3 assists and 6.6 rebounds on 44 per cent shooting from the field and 37.4 per cent from deep.
He’s currently on a 21-game streak that’s seen him score at least 30 points – the longest such streak by any player in history other than Wilt Chamberlain – and astonishingly has put up four 50-point-plus performances during this run, including a 61-point evisceration of the Knicks at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday.
Now, coming on the heels of this masterclass outing against New York, next up on Harden’s tour of destruction will be the visiting Raptors.
The eye-popping numbers alone will tell you the Raptors will be in tough trying to do something – anything – to slow Harden down. But more pertinent to Toronto heading into Friday night will be understanding how he’s burning teams and finding possible ways to limit those opportunities.
We endeavoured to crack the Harden code, and came up with this scouting report for ways in which the Raptors may overcome some of the fear that comes from playing against The Beard.
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1) Try to force him to the mid-range areas
What you see above is Harden’s shot chart this season, and looking at this can give you a good indication of why Harden is so difficult to defend.
Like many prolific scorers, Harden is very much a volume shooter – his 1,052 field-goal attempts leads the league by just under a 100-shot margin – but what makes him so unique is the fact he isn’t just quantity. He’s devastating quality as well.
Harden is the shining poster boy of basketball’s analytical revolution. He has attempted 114 more three-pointers (583) than two-point looks (469), gets to the free-throw line more than anybody (11.9 per game) and boasts a scoring ratio where 40.9 per cent of his points scored come from outside, 28 per cent from inside the paint, 28.3 per cent from the charity stripe, meaning a measly 2.8 per cent of his scoring comes from the mid-range area.
A 2.8 per cent that the Raptors should try to exploit.
Look at that shot chart again. The reason why Harden is so efficient in his volume shooting is because he so rarely takes the mid-range shot – A.K.A., the worst shot in basketball. If the Raptors want to slow him down, a good starting point would be to try to keep him caged between the three-point line and the paint.
2) Stay with him in isolation
Understanding you should probably limit Harden to the mid-range area is one thing. Actually trying to do it is something different altogether and that’s because he is a great isolation player.
At six-foot-five and 220 pounds, Harden is among the game’s biggest and strongest guards, in addition to the most skillful. And by combining his size with his ability, he’s virtually unguardable in one-on-one situations.
Looking back at the 61 points he dropped on the Knicks, Harden did a lot of his work in isolation, breaking down his man and easing into the paint for a layup or a trip to the free-throw line because he’ll often be surrounded by four shooters that guys have to stay with.
And even when the Knicks managed to keep him in front of them and prevent access to the paint, his strong handle and quick release allows him to take and make step-back threes over just about anybody.
It’s in these two plays that you find the very basis of Harden’s offensive attack. He’s so good one-on-one and is so good at taking threes and getting into the paint that “Iso James” is a real, valid strategy the Rockets employ a lot.
To make matters even tougher is the fact Harden will operate from either the top of the key or by the left wing, spots where he happens to also be his most accurate from three.
Stopping isolation really does just come down to being able to stay in front of your man and contesting without fouling, but schematically, a way that the Raptors can slow Harden down in this respect is by trying to deny him the ball or force him to get the ball on the right side, where he’s a less accurate shooter.
Better yet, if the Raptors could somehow keep Harden in the left corner, they’ll be in very good standing as he’s just a 15.8 per cent shooter from that three-point spot.
Again, this is all much easier said than done, but with a one-on-one defender like Kawhi Leonard on Toronto’s side, it just might be possible.
3) Limit his playmaking opportunities
Of course, even if you manage to slow down a little of Harden’s own scoring, he becomes that much more of a nightmare to keep in check because he’s such an advanced and willing passer.
Tied for fourth in the league with a 8.3-assist average, Harden can beat you just as badly with his playmaking as he can with his scoring. More important than the assist figures is that he creates so much offence from his passing, averaging 20.2 assist points created on the season.
It’s unfair how good Harden’s vision and passing ability is. He already puts so much pressure on the defence with all the ways he can score, but when you also can’t even send a double team or help his way because he’ll pick you apart with his passing it basically makes him impossible to stop.
From the Raptors’ perspective, this might be more of a “pick your poison” situation. Harden’s going to impact the game some way offensively, and it might be more prudent of the Raptors to see if the other guys can beat them, especially with Harden-favoured pick-and-roll partner Clint Capela still out with injury and Chris Paul not a guarantee to play.
Harden has proven time and again he can bury teams by himself if given license to do so. It might be best for the Raptors to see if the James Gang can do the same.
