Top 50 NBA players from last 50 years: James Harden ranks No. 25
Editor's Note: As part of a new series for his podcast, "What’s Wright with Nick Wright," FOX Sports commentator Nick Wright is ranking the 50 best NBA players of the last 50 years. The countdown continues today with player No. 25, James Harden.
James Harden’s career highlights:
- 2018 MVP
- 10-time All-Star
- Six-time first-team All-NBA, one-time third team
- Three-time scoring champion
- One-time assists champion
- 2012 Sixth Man of the Year
- 2010 All-Rookie team
James Harden is an offensive savant.
Philadelphia 76ers president and former Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey went so far as to say he is a better scorer than Michael Jordan. Morey, in fact, called Harden "by far" the best scorer ever. His logic is rooted in advanced metrics like true shooting percentage and points per possession.
Harden does top Jordan in those stats, though he’s not alone given that such formulas reward efficient, high-volume 3-point shooting that wasn’t prioritized in previous eras. Debates involving "His Airness" aside, Harden’s traditional numbers are pretty spectacular, too.
"His regular-season résumé is that of one of the greatest players of all time," Wright said.
This browser does not support the Video element.
James Harden has always been known to score in various ways, but he's most recognized for his patented step-back jumper and Euro step. He averages just under 25 points per game for his career and ranks fifth on the all-time 3-pointers list with 2,445. Now with the Philadelphia 76ers, he's still chasing one thing: an NBA Finals ring.
Just 32 years of age, the sturdy combo guard has already punched his Hall of Fame ticket. His MVP, three scoring titles, seven All-NBA selections and 10 All-Star nods ensure that. Over eight full seasons in Houston, he averaged roughly 30 points, six rebounds and eight assists while placing in the top 10 of the MVP race each year, including three runner-up finishes. He led the league in free-throw attempts seven times.
Harden also became one of five players to ever lead the league in scoring and assists. His 23 50-point games and four 60-point games put him in the company of Wilt Chamberlain, Kobe Bryant and Jordan. Only Chamberlain, Jordan and Harden have averaged more than 34 points in multiple seasons.
His current career stat line of 25-6-7 closely resembles Jerry West’s.
But while historical turnover rates and defensive indifference have surely undermined some of Harden’s offensive excellence over the years, frequent playoff flameouts have done more damage to his reputation.
"If you watch him, you know the biggest moments have not been kind to him," Wright said. "He’s one of the hardest guys to rank."
His polarizing postseason journey starts in Oklahoma City, where a 22-year-old Harden came off the bench and ignited a conference finals comeback against the Spurs. He then had a dreadful Finals against the Heat and was dealt soon after as part of a cost-cutting move by the Thunder.
It’s undeniably one of the worst trades in league history. Harden instantly catapulted Houston from a middling franchise to a perennial playoff participant and, eventually, a title contender. His playoff inconsistency, however, short-circuited some of his team’s runs.
Following consecutive first-round exits, the Rockets advanced to the 2015 West finals. And they did it with Harden benched for an entire fourth quarter of a Game 6 rally against the Clippers. His shooting cratered in the last two games of the series, all while his team came back from a 3-1 deficit. With a Finals berth on the line against the Warriors, Harden oscillated between brilliant (45-9-5 in Game 4) and bad (2-for-11 shooting, 12 turnovers in Game 5).
In 2017, Harden averaged 33-6-7 in a win over the Thunder, but shot 41.1% from the field and tallied nearly six turnovers per game. He was in the midst of one of his better series against the Spurs until the clincher. With an injured Kawhi Leonard watching from the sideline, Harden went 2-for-11, committed six turnovers and fouled out as the Rockets lost by 39.
"He had one of the most bizarre games I’ve ever seen," Wright said.
The trend only continued with fellow maestro Chris Paul at his side.
Harden’s first two playoff games of 2018 featured a 44-point outburst and a 2-for-18 night. Still, Houston skated through the first two rounds before engaging in an epic showdown with the defending-champion Warriors. The Rockets built a 3-2 lead, despite Harden performing worse in victory than in defeat, before leaning on their primary star to deliver with Paul unavailable to finish the series. Harden scored 32 points in Games 6 and 7 but combined to go 6-for-25 from downtown and committed 14 turnovers as Houston blew huge leads in both contests.
The 2019 postseason saw Harden put together his most consistent stretch, but he was unable to lead the Rockets past the Warriors in the conference semifinals, this time despite Kevin Durant going down with the series tied. Friction between Harden and Paul led to the latter's dismissal and an inconsequential last season in Houston alongside Russell Westbrook.
The past two years have produced two more chaotic chapters for Harden. In 2021, he sought a reunion with Durant and successfully demanded a trade to Brooklyn, where he briefly regained his MVP form until a nagging hamstring injury compromised him in the postseason. In February, amid budding tension with Kyrie Irving, the Nets granted Harden his wish to reunite with Morey in Philadelphia.
The aging guard closed out the regular season with career-low percentages from the field (40.2) and from 3 (32.6). Over two disappointing playoff rounds, his scoring, rebounding, assists, shot attempts and field-goal percentage decreased, and his turnovers increased. Over 149 playoff games, Harden has averaged 23-6-6 with 42.6/33.5/86.9 shooting splits and 3.5 turnovers.
This offseason, he’s expected to exercise a $47.4 million player option as Philly weighs offering him an extension. Of course, discerning between giving Harden the bag versus how long the 32-year-old will be in his bag is just the latest conundrum in a career full of them.
"That’s an all-time transcendently great regular-season player," Wright said. "So why is he only the 25th-best player of the last 50 years? Because the postseason stuff is, let’s call it a mixed bag."