Pau Gasol, James Harden and All-Star Snubs Who'll Finish Season with a Vengeance

Pau Gasol is among the players not represented in the All-Star game this year. Little brother Marc is in, though. Does that make him a "snub?"

Snubs are the favorite thing to talk about after the All-Star Game reserves are announced. Truthfully, there generally are a lot more "snubs" than there are snubs.

I'm sure you're asking, what in the wide, wide world of sports is he talking about? What I mean is that the "snubs" are usually about 10 names long but the roster is only 12 players deep. You simply can't play every snub and if you did, there would be another list of players who other people called snubs. 

This year there might be one player, Dirk Nowitzki, who doesn't deserve to be there, but if you want to argue what he did in the postseason gives him a reprieve, I'm not going to give you an argument about it's about what happened "this year." 

Here are five players who might feel they are snubbed though, and play the rest of the season with a chip on their shoulder to prove it. 

Jrue Holiday

The Philadelphia 76ers already feel a little slighted with their season and they may be feeling slighted that they only got one All-Star in the game as well. 

Jrue Holiday is the team' most frequent shooter and second leading scorer, though he only attempts 13.7 shots per game. They are a balanced team. 

Holiday got a lot of chatter as a potential All-Star reserve and is the most likely of the team's players to feel the "snub." Look for Holiday to try and prove himself—and his team—and step his game up another notch for the second half of the year. 

James Harden

James Harden is 18th in the NBA in Player Efficiency Rating with a PER of 21.7. He's fifth in the NBA with a true shooting percentage of .646. He's at home watching the All-Star Game, though. 

He should have gotten in on the beard alone, but let's not let that distract us. Seriously though, it's hard to watch the Thunder play without getting mesmerized by that beard. I always wonder if he's hiding things in there. 

Wouldn't it be great if he stopped in the middle of the game to pull his cell phone out of it and answer it?

But I digress. Harden is a shooter and and a snub. At some point he's going to start looking for more shots, it might be coming after this year's All-Star break. 

Josh Smith

Josh Smith deserved to get in based on his improved shot selection. It's actually an inaccurate perception. His shot selection is actually worse. He's shooting fewer midrange shots, fewer shots from three and more from the long two area, where his percentage is also down.

Last year he attempted 4.3 shots per game from long twos making 39 percent of them. This year he is attempting 5.7 shots per game and only making 36 percent of them. 

Also, while he's shooting fewer threes per game his percentage is way down, from an effective field goal percentage of 49.7 percent to 31.7 percent. 

Taking fewer high percentage shots, or more rewarding shots in favor of taking more low percentage shots and making fewer of them is the antithesis of improving shot selection. That's why his scoring is down 1.5 points per game from last year even though he's only taking 0.1 shots fewer per game. 

The rest of his numbers aren't really significantly different, either. 

However Smith is the type that can take this as some sort of denunciation and try to "prove" himself now. Look for him to shoot even more sporadically and get his scoring up, even though it will come at the cost of efficiency. 

Pau Gasol

Pau Gasol has been hovering close to an explosion for a while this year. He was mad that the team wanted to trade him. He's been mad that Kobe Bryant wont pass the ball inside. He's yet to play mad, though. 

That's what Lakers fans are waiting for. If Gasol starts playing with an edge, watch out world, the Lakers will be back. Is the snub enough to do it? Maybe, maybe not. However, the hypothetical phone call from little brother Marc that goes in my head something like "Ha ha ha ha I made the All-Star game and you didn't" might be enough to do it. 

Only he'd be saying it in Spanish. 

Monta Ellis

Monta Ellis is the one most likely to feel snubbed. Part of the reason is he's been snubbed for a couple of years running now. 

He's also the type of player to play snubbed. Only three players—Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant and LeBron James—have attempted more shots since the start of the 2009 season. Of the top 15 scorers since then, only Ellis has not appeared in an All-Star Game.

Ellis is probably the most "snubbed" and the most likely to play "snubbed" so he'll be the one playing with the biggest chip on his shoulder for the remainder of the year.