The Clippers are now 4-7 since trading for Harden, or 0-1 in his “ready” state.
Memes aside, he was okay this game, but okay isn’t good enough when you’re with a fully healthy Clippers vs a Reggie Jackson-led Nuggets.
Harden isn’t exactly playing terribly as a Clippers, but at this point in his career, it’s hard to justify an offence-first player on a team as offensively stacked as the Clippers when they’re in desperate need of some more off-ball movement.
Harden is looking to secure a max extension, we’ll have to see what kind of contract he can muster as he gets more into game shape as the season progresses.
He turned down a 200 million dollar max extension from nets didn’t he
I wonder which team will sign him to a max this offseason given how ass he is right now.
My hot take: Russ and Harden will be bought out and will never see the court again.
Russ and Westbrook will both end up at the Carmelo Anthony School of Not Knowing When to Hang It up. Russ will, and already has, adjust more gracefully than Westbrook.
Your comment is confusing as fuck lol.
Russ isn’t bad for a $3+m contract. He’s a solid high energy sparkplug off the bench.
Wasn’t he doing just fine before Harden got there? Lmao
The chemistry looked good with Russ as a hustle guy to start the season, doing all of the untangeables. I can’t even watch now.
Sure, but that’s because they’d really only played the Blazers and Spurs before Harden showed up.
He also played some with clips last season. Was he an all star? No. But he was still a positive contributor to them overall.
They had a worse record once he arrived tho; he makes too many mistakes
Yep. His record with Kawhi and PG last year was only 5-5, and the Clippers had a worse record after getting WB than they had before they signed him. Plus for all the talk about the “great playoffs” he had, he led them to a 5 game 1st round exit. He was stuffing the stat sheet with empty stats that just led to losses. It wasn’t much different than what he did in Washington.
They can’t play together so its funny they’ve ended up together so often. Russ needs the ball in his hands because he can’t play off ball, and Harden gives zero effort and doesn’t care unless he’s the primary ball handler
He’s a lot better than “not bad” with that contract. He was a legitimate starter on a playoff team before the trade.
At this point, Russ is just a net negative. Not having him on the court is better than having him on the court.
Lmao Russ is a steal rn
I don’t think it’s right to lump Russ and Harden into the same category. Russ has done basically everything right in the past year or so. Got bought out, signed with a team, came in and played his ass off in the playoffs, and accepted a modest contract. Accepted the third fiddle role to PG and Kawhi, accepted the 4th fiddle role with Harden, and accepted a bench role.
On the flip side, I could genuinely see Harden just retiring or going overseas or something if he doesn’t get his way. I really can’t see him taking a contract close to what Russ accepted this offseason.
Well said. Honestly annoys me seeing casuals teeing off on Russ. He was the only Clipper who played with any sort of passion or intensity yesterday. He also notched a double double in 26 minutes. Would’ve been close to a triple double if shots were falling and Harden was willing to take an open shot. If you watch the games he is so clearly not the issue.
It was a 3y/$161m Max Exentsion on top of his 2 years of Player Options which were another $80m. So roughly $250m in total when added together.
Main reason he held off is because the following Offseason the Max Extension available to Harden would have been 4y/$223m + $47m Player Option which is $270m.
Instead once Harden forced his way to Philly he declined that $47m Player Option to help Philly open more Cap Space for Free Agents and signed a 2y/$68m deal with a Player Option.
Kyrie West did a similar thing when he went Anti-Vax.
Nets offered the “Big 3” Max Extensions at the same time and fortunately for Brooklyn only Durant locked in his $.
Kyrie was offered a 4y/$187m Max Extension on top of his $37m Player Option so $224m in total.
Nets pulled the offer once he decided against the vaccination so he couldn’t lock in the guaranteed $.
Kyrie followed that by promoting an antisemitic film and then demanding the Nets either Trade or give him a 4-5y/$200-250m Fully Guaranteed Contract with no strings attached.
Still amazed that reddit calls you anti Vax if you are against being forced to take medicine that doesn’t actually cure you or prevent transmission of a virus that has less than a percentage point of a chance of killing you. But go ahead and down vote me
Sir, this is a Wendy’s
What else would that be called?
Those Nets were such a clown show
And it all could’ve been avoided for the most part if Kyrie wasn’t such an ignorant idiot
In hindsight I feel like Morey really got Harden to tank the Nets Negotiations as a way to weaken one of the teams they might’ve had to go against in the playoffs especially with how close Harden was to going straight to the Sixers from the Rockets. I think that’s where the biggest part of the issue came from when it was time to pay Harden after he took less money. The NBA contracts always increase as your years increase except when you sign for less or a minimum. It’s hard to think of times when a someone went from a max contract to a minimum then back to a max. Most times when a person’s contract changes so much it’s because of change of team
You guys wouidve been better off if kyrie accepted tho it was fortunate about harden . Not just cos if kd n kyrie competing together but you’d get more assets from the Mavs if he wasn’t ah expiring .