Bold Predictions for James Harden's 2014-15 Season

The 2014-15 NBA season will be James Harden's biggest test yet.

Thanks to a borderline disastrous summer that saw Chandler Parsons, Jeremy Lin and Omer Asik all skip town, the Houston Rockets will be relying on Harden to shoulder a huge burden this year. Harden's taken a lot of heat over the past few months (more on that later), and it'll be interesting to see how he responds to his critics and to the added pressure being placed on him.

So without further ado, here are some bold predictions for Harden's upcoming season.

Break 30 Points Per Game

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Harden attacks the rim like few players in the league.

Harden's never broken the 26-point barrier, but even so, 30 points a game (and a legitimate run at the scoring title) isn't out of the question this season.

The biggest thing going for Harden is simply increased opportunity. With Chandler Parsons and Jeremy Lin out of the picture, Harden's usage is almost certain to get a generous bump, and that alone may be all he needs to join the 30-point club.

It's borderline impossible to score 30-plus without using roughly one-third of a team's possessions—only Adrian Dantley has accomplished the feat in the three-point era, per Basketball-Reference. Next year, Harden's usage should trickle over that threshold for the first time, putting him in position to do some serious volume scoring. 

Another thing that could help Harden's cause, strangely enough, is Dwight Howard's inefficient scoring down low.

It's clear that Kevin McHale is fond of getting Howard plenty of touches on the low block, but there's simply no way to justify that at this point.

Howard was brutal in the post last season, ranking 128th in the league in scoring efficiency there, per Synergy Sports Technology (subscription required). The Rockets cannot afford to punt away possessions like that, especially considering how much offensive talent they lost over the offseason.

I'm taking a leap of faith and predicting that McHale replaces a hefty chunk of Howard's post touches with Harden-Howard pick-and-rolls, thus giving Harden's chances of scoring in bunches (and Houston's offense) a hefty boost.

Fall Under League Average from Three

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Harden won't have the luxury of catch-and-shoot threes anymore.

This may seem strange considering the previous prediction, but James Harden's percentages appear set to drop from deep.

Harden's a 37 percent career outside shooter, but the absence of other playmakers on the roster could really hurt him from deep. Nearly 60 percent of Harden's three-point attempts were assisted last season, per Basketball-Reference. With Parsons and Lin's shot creation now just a distant memory, it's hard to see him getting anywhere near that number of catch-and-shoot looks in 2014-15.

Barring some serious offensive growth from Patrick Beverley, the bulk of Harden's spot-up threes will come off Dwight Howard post-ups and offensive rebounds, neither of which are overly reliable methods of generating shots. Harden will probably be firing a much larger chunk of his threes off the dribble and out of pick-and-rolls this season, which spells trouble for his percentages.

Harden's not a bad off-the-bounce shooter by any means—he hit 35 percent of his pull-up threes last season—but it's far from a reliable way to score for anyone not named Stephen Curry or Kevin Durant. Maybe Harden joins that elite company of shooters this year, but the smart money is on him hitting around 34 or 35 percent from downtown.

Become Slightly Underrated

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Harden deserves credit for his phenomenal offense.

Labels like “underrated” are tricky things to lock down, but all signs point to James Harden being on his way into that club.

Perhaps no NBA player has taken the reputation hit that Harden has over the past eight or so months. Some of that boils down to the ill-advised comments he made this summer, but the bulk of it is thanks to his laughably bad defense, which has spawned an epic 11-minute highlight reel and has failed to escape international attention.

All of that criticism is valid and totally deserved. Harden is a hugely damaging defender. He comes in at a whopping 397th out of 437 in ESPN's defensive real plus-minus metric and rates similarly in other plus-minus variants. He's very, very bad, and his particular brand of ball-watching and nonchalant off-ball movement is especially easy to notice.

It's fun to mock Harden's defense. It should be mocked! But all the jokes are distracting from the fact that he is, above all else, a phenomenal offensive player.

Harden's one of the most gifted and versatile offensive wings on the planet. He's a strong shooter from outside, a terror in the pick-and-roll and he gets to the line at will.

For the past two seasons, Harden has averaged more than 25 points and five assists per game on over 60 percent true shooting. Only one other guard has ever put up those kind of numbers, per Basketball-Reference, and he happens to be the greatest player of all time.

Harden's combination of efficient scoring and playmaking is nearly unprecedented. He's without doubt one of the best players in the league. Unfortunately, his defense is starting to turn him into a basketball caricature, and unless he starts playing passably on that end (unlikely), he won't be recognized as the genuine superstar he is.

Lead His Team to a Playoff Series Victory

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Harden has yet to win a playoff series in a Rockets uniform.

The Rockets have taken a step back this summer, and just getting to the postseason itself can be difficult in the murderous Western Conference. Still, this Houston team looks too good not to win a playoff series.

The Rockets' terrible postseason showing last year obscured how excellent the team was overall. Houston finished with the fifth-best point differential in the league (on a per-possession basis), and it won a whopping 28 games by more than 10 points, including 10 games by more than 20. 

In fact, you could make an easy case that last year the Rockets just ran into some bad luck in the form of a LaMarcus Aldridge buzzsaw.

Though Aldridge eventually came down to earth, in the first two postseason games between the Rockets and Portland Trail Blazers, he averaged 45 points and 13 rebounds on 65 percent true shooting. He was lights-out from mid-range, missed just three shots at the rim and generally made Terrence Jones look like a small child. He even hit two corner threes!

Something that crazy is unlikely to hit Houston this coming year. The offseason hurt, but Trevor Ariza looks to be a terrific fit in Houston, and an extra year of experience together should do wonders for James Harden and Dwight Howard.

As unfair as it can be, superstars tend to be judged on what they do in the playoffs. Harden ran cold last April, but here's to thinking he gets back on track and helps lift Houston out of the first round.

All stats courtesy of NBA.com unless specifically stated otherwise.