Harden’s triple-double helps Rockets over Wolves 123-118

I know that will be my responsibility. Go out to your garage or nearest Home Depot or Lowe’s and find your nearest pitchfork. Perfect, because I’m destined to incite a riot by trying to settle the NBA Most Valuable Player debate. They want to win the franchise’s first National Basketball Association title since 1995. With two sixth man of the year candidates in Eric Gordon and Lou Williams, along with Ryan Anderson, Trevor Ariza and Harden, they fired an unbelievable 40.1 three-pointers per game in the regular season – making an National Basketball Association record 1,181 of them. Harden, Westbrook and James are better at it than Leonard. But in all seriousness, that stat-line is absurd.

In the interest of full disclosure, the conversation with D’Antoni was the latest PR move driven by team officials who want so badly for their star player to win the award. They were just 18-21 this year when Russ had over a 40 percent usage rate and they were 0-2 against the Rockets.

“You got to be happy”, Beverley said. If Westbrook’s unmovable mass can help the Thunder steal a game on the road, all bets are off in what should be one of the playoffs’ highest scoring series. With the aforementioned Anderson finally back in the swing of things after missing six games toward the end of the regular season, the Rockets’ second-highest paid player could be a difference maker in Game 1.

With Serge Ibaka on an expiring contract, the Thunder made a play to bring in Victor Oladipo, Ersan Ilyasova and also secured the draft rights to Domantas Sabonis. Last season, Harden felt he needed to do more for a team that slipped into the postseason as the No. 8 seed with a 41-41 record.

Just because Malcolm Brogdon and Dario Saric played all year doesn’t mean they were better rookies than Embiid.

The NBA just wrapped up a terrific regular season, and it’s anyone’s guess who will be crowned as the league’s MVP. At three is the Houston Rockets, the L.A. Clippers at four, the Utah Jazz at five, the Thunder at six, the Memphis Grizzlies seven and the Portland Trailblazers closing it out at 8.

Houston exceeded expectations this season. Expectations were blatantly low for the franchise in the highly competitive and ever-improving Western Conference.

How did Harden and company respond? Years later, Olajuwon would concede that Robinson deserved the MVP that season.

Shortly after the Thunder wrapped up their regular-season finale, Russell Westbrook grew tired of talking about individual accolades.

The MVP award may be slipping out of James Harden’s grips. Kris Dunn had 10 points with 16 assists. It usually wears players down and we’ve seen players that carried their teams on their backs suffer crush a knee or a back, but Westbrook being such a physical phenomena somehow managed to play out the entire season without slowing down.

We had a similar race at the conclusion of the 1961-62 season, when Bill Russell beat out Wilt Chamberlain and his 50-point scoring average, Robertson and his triple-double season, Elgin Baylor’s 38-point scoring average and Jerry West’s 30-point scoring average.

He is squarely focused on what’s ahead: the Thunder’s playoff series with Houston that begins Sunday night – and postseason success. This particular game is symptomatic of Westbrook’s issue as an MVP candidate. His usage percentage was 41.7, which is absurdly high for one player. He’s also the first to do so since Tim Duncan in 2001-02 season and 15th overall.

Just five years ago, Westbrook, Harden and Durant were young guns on an Oklahoma City team that lost to Miami in the NBA Finals.

Without LeBron James, the Cleveland Cavaliers still make the playoffs.

The Rockets don’t have a “Big Three” like the Warriors or Cavaliers, and their second-best player isn’t almost as good as LaMarcus Aldridge is for the San Antonio Spurs.

Houston enters the series as a trendy dark horse to break the hold that the Warriors and Spurs have had on the Western Conference in recent memory. What James has done, what Russell has done is over the top. There are usually multiple players who could make a strong case for being deserving of the award.