James Harden is the NBA’s reigning MVP and was undoubtedly the hero for the Houston Rockets the entire 2018-19 regular season.
Since joining the Rockets before the 2012-13 season, Harden has led the team to the playoffs every season.
But, the Rockets have never made the NBA finals, and have actually been eliminated by the Golden State Warriors four of the last five seasons.
The Warriors always seem to have the Rockets number in the postseason.
And that stat gets more dismal when you look at Harden’s plus/minus.
Tim Kawakami of The Athletic reported that Harden has never had a positive plus-minus in four closeout games against the Warriors:
In four series-ending losses to the Warriors, Harden was -4 in Game 5 of the 2015 conference finals, -27 in Game 5 of the 2016 first round, -13 in last year’s Game 7 (after his -19 in Game 6 of that series) and -10 on Friday.
Harden scored 31 points in Game 5 — the Rockets lost — but made just one bucket in the final 10 minutes and scored just five points in the fourth quarter. Then, in Game 6, which was an elimination game at home, Harden turned the ball over twice in the final two minutes.
Harden has been continually questioned as not being clutch, and this may just be another notch against him.
