James Harden Responds After Klay Thompson Claims to Be NBA's Best Shooting Guard
Golden State Warriors sharpshooter Klay Thompson hasn't been quite the prolific scorer he was during a breakout 2014-15 season, but he hasn't hesitated to exude confidence during the defending champions' record-setting start to the 2015-16 campaign.
On Dec. 19, Thompson told the Bay Area News Group's Diamond Leung he believed he was the best 2-guard the NBA had to offer when asked to name the league's best player at each position.
"I'm going to go with myself," Thompson said. "We're 26-1."
Not surprisingly, Houston Rockets shooting guard and 2014-15 MVP runner-up James Harden disagreed with Thompson's assessment, according to the Houston Chronicle's Jonathan Feigen (via B/R NBA):
Of course, neither player is going to belittle his own skills. That simply doesn't happen, nor should it when scorers of this caliber are presented with questions like that.
Statistically speaking, Harden has been the superior player from a basic box-score standpoint. Entering Wednesday night's action, Harden ranks tops among shooting guards with a 28.4 points-per-game scoring average, while Thompson clocks in at sixth with 19.6 points per game.
Harden is also averaging 6.9 assists, which is No. 1 among shooting guards by a margin of 1.8. Nicolas Batum ranks second with 5.1 dimes a night. That said, Thompson has been more efficient from a shooting standpoint.
| James Harden | 38.1 | 28.4 | 6.9 | 6.1 | 1.6 | 41.6% | 33.8% | 24.8 |
| Klay Thompson | 32.1 | 19.6 | 2.4 | 3.2 | 0.5 | 46.4% | 43.2% | 17.8 |
While Harden is shooting 41.6 percent from the field and 33.8 percent from three, Thompson is drilling 46.4 percent of his shots and converting 43.2 percent of his long-range attempts. There's also something to be said regarding Harden's ability to draw fouls and mask his poor shooting percentages with bundles of points at the charity stripe.
At present, Harden is averaging a career-best 10.6 free-throw attempts per game and is converting 9.2 of them.
There's also the matter of defense, as CBS Sports' Matt Moore pointed out:
"something something same reaction to harden’s defense something something https://t.co/29Fy9lB3FY
— Hardwood Paroxysm (@HPbasketball) December 30, 2015"
To Moore's point, just look at the difference in the advanced on/off splits for Thompson and Harden so far this season, courtesy of NBA.com's stats database:
| Rockets with Harden on Floor | 104.6 | 106.1 | -1.5 |
| Rockets with Harden on Bench | 96.5 | 99.8 | -3.4 |
| Warriors with Thompson on Floor | 116.5 | 96.6 | 19.9 |
| Warriors with Thompson on Bench | 105.5 | 98.4 | 7.1 |
As the chart indicates, Thompson is a net positive for the Warriors on both ends of the floor. Harden, meanwhile, is a serious wet blanket on the defensive end for a Rockets team that has struggled with consistency all year.
Each player has pros and cons associated with his game, and the argument in either Thompson's or Harden's favor is ultimately subjective. So for now, let's just call it a draw until the two meet on the floor Thursday evening in Houston to try to settle things after the Warriors squashed the Rockets in last season's Western Conference Finals.
Stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com.
