Houston Rockets guard James Harden has a notorious reputation for being a lousy individual defensive player. Though there aren’t any statistics that perfectly measure a player’s actual impact on the defensive end of the court, there are a few that help paint the picture a bit more clearly.
One such stat, which weighed heavily in San Jose Mercury News sports writer Tim Kawakami listing Harden on his 2014 NBA No-Defense Team, is Defensive Real Plus-Minus (DRPM). DRPM, as defined by ESPN, measures a player’s estimated on-court impact on team defense in points allowed per 100 defensive possessions.
Over the course of the 2013-14 NBA season, Harden yielded a DRPM of -2.84, ranking him 398th in a league that has only 450 available roster slots. That’s pretty bad.
The Dallas Cowboys defense is also notoriously bad. Last season they finished last in the NFL in yards allowed and 26th in points allowed. They ranked 32nd — dead last — in total defense.
Coming into this season, the Cowboys defense is expected to be worse, as they lost their best defensive player to the Denver Broncos in free agency and have lost their next two best defensive players to injuries. They surrendered 28 first-half points in Sunday’s season-opening home loss to San Francisco, although some of those scofres were set up by turnovers and Dallas did pitch a shutout in the second half.
The combination of both Harden and the Cowboys’ defensive struggles has brought life to a comical meme circulating the internet, which Denver Nuggets guard Ty Lawson shared via Instagram.
The appropriate caption, as written by Lawson, reads: “Cowboys defensive coordinator #Rp”
If you question the relevancy of the meme or Harden’s DRPM, feel free to peruse YouTube. There is an abundance of video clips highlighting his defensive ineptitude, like this 11-1/2 minute “highlight” reel.
There has been talk among Team USA executives throughout training camp and the World Cup that Harden’s defense isn’t as bad as everyone has made it out to be. In the World Cup, he does lead Team USA in steals, which isn’t necessarily a good defensive stat but isn’t a bad one. Perhaps playing in the World Cup and being surrounded by top tier talent has given him the ideal circumstance to work on improving his defensive play.
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Michael Brumagin writes the Tweet of the Day for SheridanHoops.com and is also a correspondent for BleacherReport.com. Follow @mbrumagin
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