Over the course of his 17-year NBA career, James Harden has called many different cities home. It was in his three seasons with the Oklahoma City Thunder that Harden won the Sixth Man of the Year award and notched his sole NBA Finals appearance. After his trade to the Houston Rockets, Harden proved himself to be one of the NBA’s most phenomenal isolation players, as well as someone capable of running an offense.
Despite his lack of playoff success after leaving Houston, Harden has still put up great numbers in the regular season. The Cleveland Cavaliers are Harden’s fourth team in roughly six years, potentially Harden’s only hope to retire with a championship ring to his name.
James Harden Is An Off-Court Game-Changer For Cleveland
Despite a non-displaced fracture in his non-dominant thumb, Harden’s on-court impact is undeniable. Just this season, Harden averaged 23.6 points, 4.8 rebounds, and 8.0 assists while playing 33.8 minutes a game. The Cavaliers are 19-7 with Harden this season, heading into a first-round series against the Toronto Raptors.
However, what about his off-court impact?
Post Trade Tremors
Many believed that pairing Harden with another ball-dominant player — in this case, Donovan Mitchell — would not be wise. With both being players who work in isolation, they thought the fit would not translate well in games.
Head coach Kenny Atkinson’s offense, however, is far from reliant on just a single player. Movement, cutting, and passing are commonplace in Cleveland’s motion offense.
The 11-time All-Star is a proficient playmaker and can get big men Jarrett Allen and Evan Mobley involved in the pick-and-roll with ease. Harden is also lethal from three-point range, having made the second most threes in NBA history.
The former MVP has extensive playoff experience under his belt, not missing the postseason in all 17 of his years in the NBA.
“He’s completely adapted to our style of play, which is pretty, I would assume, rare,” Atkinson told The Athletic when discussing Harden’s adjustment Cleveland’s style of play.
According to Atkinson, Cleveland is now a “better team.” This refers to not just Harden, but other trade deadline acquisitions such as Dennis Schröder and Keon Ellis.
The Unusual Request
Once arriving in Cleveland, Harden had one unusual request of Atkinson and his coaching staff. He asked them to stage walk-throughs in hotel ballrooms during game days on the road, where there were no shootarounds.
When asked about this unconventional practice, Harden told The Athletic:
“It’s just preparation, detail, you get ready for the game. Physically you get out and move around, and mentally, you have to be prepared. It’s just preparation, man, especially going into this run that we are about to go into. I think the focus is making sure we know who we’re playing against and individual guys and what they like to do with their tendencies. Just going to give us an advantage and hopefully we can play better.”
Once he gave the method a chance, Atkinson became a believer as well.
“I was like, a little skeptical. I think film [is enough]. And then we did it, and we went through it. So we’re like communicating through it and talking through coverages and I’m like, hey, this could be a good thing.”
Using athletic tape, low-level assistants recreate the boundaries of a basketball court on the hotel ballroom’s floor. This allows players and coaches to discuss the game plan and their opponents, albeit with a more practical twist than studying film. This was a practice that Harden experienced in his time across the NBA, notably used by current Los Angeles Clippers head coach, Tyronn Lue.
The Cavaliers have had some postseason disappointments. Despite being touted as contenders in recent years, the farthest Cleveland has managed to reach is the second round of the playoffs. Injuries to key stars have negatively affected the team over the past few postseasons. There is talk about Mitchell opting out of his player option to become a free agent in 2027. And the pressure is mounting for both Mitchell and the Cavs to prove their commitment to contending for a title.
Could Harden be the trump card that Cleveland was missing all this time?
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