James Harden and the NBA's Most Egregious Floppers

Whether you believe that flopping is an intolerable act used to bait NBA officials into cheap foul calls, a savvy, veteran move that has to be acted to perfection like Michael Fassbender’s performance in Prometheus or just a part of the game that we have to live with, flopping is certainly a big storyline.

If the NBA does intend to crack down on the league’s most egregious floppers and flopping in general, as NBA commissioner David Stern has already hinted at, how should they go about doing so?

There are the extremists out there, like former NBA head coach Jeff Van Gundy, who believes that players should be fined "$10,000 to $15,000 or more" for a single flopping offense. Sounds ridiculous, but it would certainly rid the game of players going for Academy Awards instead of championship titles.

Regardless of whether you believe flopping should stay a part of the game or be eliminated entirely, Stern and company should already have a pretty clear list of players to look out for should they start cracking down with penalties.

Here’s a list of NBA players who are guilty of being repeat flop offenders. Perhaps they've been watching too much soccer.

(Note: Although this list is numbered for your convenience, it's not in a particular order.)

Enjoy!

10. James Harden

It would prove pretty difficult for someone to justify this flop from James Harden in the 2011 NBA playoffs as “part of the game.”

Well, technically Mark Jackson tried to defend the act against Jeff Van Gundy’s tirade in the video, but I find it incredibly difficult to agree with him. Your head coach, Golden State Warriors fans!

Anyway, there’s simply no place for this kind of flop in the NBA. Harden made the basket, so all he had to do was head back up the court to play some defense. Instead, he ran repeatedly into the awaiting chest of Tyson Chandler like a broken iRobot Roomba Vacuum before falling like a sack of flour to the court, clutching his face as if he’d lost an eye.

This equally egregious flop, while defending a Dwyane Wade back-down, is just another from Harden’s repertoire.

The shame of it all is that Harden is a fantastic NBA talent—the best 22-year-old in the game by my calculation. Yet he chooses to stain the game with plays like these.

In all fairness, however, it’s pretty difficult to place all the blame on Harden when the referees are the ones getting fooled and blowing the whistle like a lifeguard during a water slide accident.

9. Shane Battier

Shane Battier is a heady basketball player with fantastic defensive intangibles.

With that said, he’s also a notorious flopper.

In a piece written by Sporting News, Battier ranked seventh on a list of the 20 smartest athletes in sports, so we’ll give an invisible point to all basketball fans who defend flopping as a smart play.

Nevertheless, the Eastern Conference finals Game 4 flop by Battier against Paul Pierce (see video) was particularly heinous.

Most fans don’t want to see flopping in the NBA period, but on one of the biggest stages in basketball? How could the refs reward that flailing lunge that would have earned Battier a 0.0 score as an Olympic diver?

Beckley Mason of ESPN appropriately nominated it the “Flop of the Night.”

Apparently old habits die hard, because there’s even a YouTube clip of Battier flopping as a collegiate star at Duke University.

It’s a shame that Battier is seen as an infamous flopper when you consider that he’s one of the game’s best perimeter defenders.

He hounded Kevin Durant 25 to 28 feet from the basket throughout the NBA Finals, forcing Durant to have the quietest 28-point night and 32-point night we may ever see.

To use Internet meme language: “Shane! Y u flop so much?”

8. Derek Fisher

Once again we have evidence of a clear flop that Mark Jackson defends. We may have found our opposite flopping extremist to square off against Jeff Van Gundy in the Octagon.

Van Gundy defends referee Joe Crawford here by explaining that he had a “bad angle,” but I think it’s fair to say that Crawford is just a bad referee (take no offense Joe; keep in mind I’m a bitter fan myself).

Derek Fisher knows how to play to his strengths. He knew that he had a pretty poor chance of finishing off that transition layup (since he can’t throw down like LeBron James or Kevin Durant), but he sold the flop well, as he’s been doing for over a decade.

The fact that Fisher is adored in Los Angeles and just about nowhere else is due to his flopping pedigree.

When you think of “egregious floppers,” whether you’re a Los Angeles Lakers fan or not, Fisher has to be on the list somewhere.

It’s ironic that we find another grizzled, flopping veteran on the list who made it to this year’s NBA Finals.

Here’s another clip of Fisher flopping for good measure.

If I had a dollar for every time Fisher flopped to the ground running into a perfectly legal screen, there’s a chance I’d have earned the equivalent of Fisher’s $2,329,545 salary of 2012.

7. Anderson Varejao

Anderson Varejao is an absolute pest. Like the Shane Battiers of the world, Varejao is a guy you love to have on your team but hate to play against.

A major reason for that, once again, is flopping. (By the way, look at Derek Fisher’s flop by association in the video.)

To his credit, Varejao is one of the best rebounders in the NBA and knows exactly how to take a legitimate charging foul. However, it’s difficult to exclude Varejao from a list of floppers.

The guy even flops in preseason…

6. Chris Bosh

All right, so maybe Chris Bosh doesn’t belong on a list of “most egregious floppers,” but I’d argue he deserves to be here simply for this putrid acting display.

If Bosh were ever to land a Hollywood acting gig based on his flopping, he’d likely equate to this gem from the box office smash hit Troll 2.

Apparently Reggie Miller is a big fan…“You’ve got to sell it!”

Anyway, if David Stern indeed decides to oust flopping from the NBA (or at least try), this will go down as one of the most pathetic in history. And the kicker? The referee called a foul on Carlos Boozer! He was standing right there!

This is the classic case of “getting hit by a sniper.” Boozer’s elbows are both back down at hip level before Bosh decides to bring out the acting chops, snapping his head back like he lost a duel in a low-budget cowboy movie before toppling to the hardwood.

The best part is Bosh crinkling his nose down on the offensive end like he actually suffered damage. Overactor!

5. LeBron James

Let me preface this by saying that I believe LeBron James to be the best player in the NBA right now by far. It’s not even an argument.

However, even being the best in the game hasn’t stopped “King” James from flopping when he finds a suitable opportunity.

James is a 6’8”, 250-pound behemoth of a small forward. He's built like a Mack truck with unrivaled athletic ability to boot. I have an extremely hard time believing that James can be knocked off course by another NBA player.

In fact, if LeBron were to stand in front of an oncoming train, I think the locomotive would bounce off his body like a pinball and recreate the train crash scene from Super 8. I’m still only 90 percent sure that he isn’t a basketball-playing android.

To his credit, unlike the NBA Finals a year ago against the Dallas Mavericks (see video), James cut down the flops this year against Oklahoma City and was all about business. He clearly took his game to another level and could very well rattle off championships for years to come.

It’s hard to blame a guy who is protected so fiercely by the referees for flopping his way to free trips to the charity stripe. However, these two flops against the New York Knicks in Round 1 of the playoffs are ridiculous.

I will, however, place more blame on the refs for tagging Tyson Chandler with a flagrant foul on a perfectly legal set screen. Is it Chandler’s fault that none of LeBron’s teammates warned him of the brick wall he was about to run into? No. The refs should be ashamed of that terrible officiating display.

Bottom line: I want James to continue playing at the absurd level he played at during the Eastern Conference finals and NBA Finals.

No more flopping, LeBron. Okay?

4. Chris Paul

It’s pretty obvious why flopping in the NBA is such a prevalent problem when the best player in the game (LeBron James) is a repeat offender. Now we have the best point guard in the game showing off his own acting skills.

The fact that Chris Paul is often the shortest player on the basketball court doesn’t fool many when he flops to the floor like a wounded quail. Heck, even in the video he couldn’t draw a foul call from the referee, which we’ve already seen can be a near-guarantee when you fall to the ground and flail your arms a little bit.

Unfortunately, CP3 was acting long before he was shipped to Hollywood in the non-vetoed trade, as evidenced here from his days in New Orleans. Apparently he’s ready for his close-up, Mr. DeMille.

Paul is also the undisputed champion of dribbling up the court, brake-checking opponents like a driver looking for a big insurance claim and drawing cheap fouls 50 feet away from the bucket.

Hopefully David Stern will stop quarreling with Jim Rome long enough to find a solution to the flopping problem that falls partly into the laps of two of the league’s best players.

3. Blake Griffin

“He’s babied.”

That’s what DeMarcus Cousins had to say of Blake Griffin’s lackluster flopping performance earlier this season following a phantom foul call (see video).

It’s no secret that Cousins and Griffin have somewhat of a feud going on, but the Sacramento Kings’ young big man isn’t the only person to accuse Griffin of being a flopper.

Lakers forward Matt Barnes (who is a free agent this summer) has also referenced Griffin’s flops as “a part of his game.”

Some Los Angeles Clippers fans will defend Griffin by saying he’s targeted by other players and, as a result, takes some of the hardest fouls of anyone else in the NBA, so he deserves to flop now and again.

I counter that argument by saying that Griffin chooses to go for the highlight dunks every play down the floor. When he succeeds, he stares down cameras, fans and opponents while striking a pompous pose, which will not endear you to many people.

Showing up opposing crowds and teams by puffing your chest out and showboating isn’t good sportsmanship. I have a feeling that opposing teams are trying to send Blake a message with those hard fouls.

Sure it’s fun for the highlight reel and for Clips fans, but fans around the league and other NBA players take offense to his showboating.

Seeing that Griffin can hit himself in the face, flop and then stare at the referee in disbelief that no foul was called is proof enough that he should garner a spot on this list, babied or not.

2. Pau Gasol

Pau Gasol has without question mastered the “flailing arms” technique when flopping. Usually he throws in a banshee-esque scream for good measure, just to make sure he gets the point across that he was indeed “fouled.”

The funny thing about Gasol is that even when he’s legitimately fouled beyond a shadow of a doubt, he still makes the concentrated effort to yelp and thrash his arms like a wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube man.

Again, it’s a shame that flopping is such a prevalent part of Gasol’s game considering he’s such a fantastic player, but that’s the NBA world we live in.

There’s also Gasol’s prevalent “soft” label, so maybe he’s really trying his best to stay on his feet.

1. Manu Ginobili

What’s your favorite Manu Ginobili flop?

How about the “we have evidence that he’s been doing this forever” flop?

Perhaps you’d like the “boy who cried wolf” flop?

Maybe the “filmed from the crowd” flop?

Or the “defended by my coach even though I had no business guarding Josh Smith in the paint” flop?

What about mixing it up with a “fall forward on my face” flop?

Possibly you'd enjoy the “filmed like the movies Cloverfield or The Blair Witch Project, but still shows the finished product of classic Ginobili” flop?

Or even “Infloption” (AKA a flop within a flop), as we see with Ginobili and Harden in this slide's video, remixed by this link?

After compiling this list of floppers, I asked as many of my basketball-loving friends as I could to come up with some floppers of their own. Every single one of them said Manu Ginobili. Some of them even listed him twice (or more).

One list was as follows:

Ginobili.

This particular friend of mine could not even think of anyone else worthy of this list, because Ginobili truly is the undisputed flopping king.

So a sarcastic congratulations is in store for perhaps the greatest flopper who ever lived, Manu Ginobili.

I suppose now we know precisely why James Harden is drawing comparisons to the Argentinian southpaw.

Players who should have made the list according to comments:

"Everybody," Dwyane Wade, Reggie Evans, Kobe Bryant, Paul Pierce, Dirk Nowitzki, Tony Parker, Raja Bell, Luis Scola, Mario Chalmers, Danilo Gallinari, Russell Westbrook and the Suns Gorilla (and I only made up one of those).

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