Houston Rockets: What life will be like without James Harden

The Harden Effect

That being said, they’ve also never had a Hall-of-Fame caliber guard to lean on in case of a Harden injury until now. Chris Paul has been the ball-dominant, number-one option his entire career prior to coming to Houston, so in that aspect, this is nothing new for him.

When Harden went down in the fourth quarter against the Los Angeles Lakers, CP3 took control of the offense seamlessly en route to a double-overtime victory. Now obviously that’s a small sample size, but upon delving further into the numbers, CP3-led lineups without the Beard have fared well, to say the least.

In 368 minutes of action together, the Harden-Paul duo has a net rating of 8.8, which is quite good. However, in 196 minutes with Paul running the show and Harden on the bench, the Rockets have a staggering net rating of 21.5, which would rank best among the league’s elite.

Now, to suggest the Rockets are better off without Harden is outright lunacy. Most of Paul’s numbers without Harden are against opposing team’s second units, and a good chunk of those came during a weaker stretch of the schedule.

Harden is the league leader in points, three-pointers, free throws, usage, win shares and player efficiency rating. Not even in the furthest depths of your imagination can the Rockets replace those contributions. I’m just saying that over the next two to eight weeks, it’s not unreasonable to suggest the Rockets can survive.