[ad_1]
James Harden and Kyrie Irving determined who’s the Brooklyn Nets’ level guard.
When James Harden joined a Brooklyn Nets roster that already had loads of celebrity firepower between Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, many questioned how the offense would work.
Sure, there was an unbelievable quantity of expertise on show, however with just one ball to go round and each Kyrie and Harden being ball-dominant gamers, it was solely honest to marvel how there’d be sufficient touches to go round (particularly since KD ought to arguably get extra of these touches than anybody).
Nonetheless, offense hasn’t been an issue to date for the Nets, and a part of the reason being each Harden and Kyrie are embracing their true roles on this league — the technical “capturing guard” because the staff’s precise facilitator, and the technical “level guard” because the scoring guard.
In response to ESPN’s Malika Andrews, the 2 agreed that Harden must be Brooklyn’s de facto level guard:
“I simply checked out him and stated, ‘You’re the purpose guard, and I’m going to play capturing guard,’” Irving defined. “That’s it.”
James Harden and Kyrie Irving agreed immediately
Andrews added that this wasn’t a proper dialog, however somewhat, a pure dialogue that got here up at observe the place each gamers had been on the identical web page.
It’s not shocking {that a} visionary passer like Harden is taking up that playmaking function whereas Irving embraces his innate scoring prowess, however on a staff with three licensed superstars, it’s an excellent signal for the Nets that everybody’s on the identical web page and that egos aren’t getting in the way in which.
Harden is at present main the league with a career-high 11.2 assists per sport, and his help numbers have truly jumped as much as 11.6 per sport since he joined the Nets. Whereas he’s now not the 30-points-per-game scorer he was with the Houston Rockets, he doesn’t have to be; so long as he’s creating for others, his 23.0 factors and eight.1 rebounds per sport are greater than ample.
Irving, in the meantime, is the NBA‘s ninth-leading scorer at a career-high 27.6 factors per sport — not far off from Durant, who’s fifth within the affiliation at 29.0 factors per sport. Kyrie has been extremely environment friendly too, placing up .525/.409/.951 capturing splits which have him on tempo to hitch the 50-40-90 membership.
Between all of that and the Nets’ unbelievable offensive score of 119.1 since Harden entered the fold, it’s clear that Harden functioning as this staff’s level guard is greatest for everybody concerned.
[ad_2]
Source link