Has James Harden become a top 5 SG all time?

What's up, YM Sportsmen, it's Lamont and we are back with another podcast episode. I mean, today we got I mean, we haven't done one of these in a long time, but we got our first player comparison video of 2022. And I thought this one would be best because it stems from a conversation that I was having over on you three sports in a conversation was between two players. Clyde Drexler and James Harden. I felt these two players were fitting. I feel like their career trajectories were kind of similar, not in necessarily their style of play, but kind of the outcomes. We've seen both struggle, especially when they were leaders of their own team to a certain degree. Get close, but not make it all the way when you're talking about championships. But when you're talking about individual accolades, individual success in the NBA, both of these players experienced a lot of success in the NBA and they both could be considered top five players with regards to the shooting guard position. So that's what we're going to be talking about today. James Harden and Clyde Drexler, man. We're really going to do a strong analysis of the two players. We're going to break down what other NBA players say about them. We're going to break down the analytics, the stats, the accolades. Right. And we're going to try to bring everything to totality to see if we can come up with who is the better player between Clyde Drexler and James Harden. I think we'll get an answer today after today's video. Before we get started, make sure you guys like, comment and subscribe. Hit the notification bill if you haven't done so already. And if you are struggling to get the notifications here at FYF Sports, look, all you got to do is follow us on social media to all my links. Link is right there in the description. Follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. We drop notification for all videos and all live streams on those platforms. And if you want the notifications on YouTube and you're not getting them, just make sure you unsubscribe, resubscribe and then hit the notification bill again. And that usually does the trick to fix that notification issue. So today we just got to get to it. Clyde Drexler and James Harden. And, you know, we'll just start with just kind of summarizing both players. We all remember, you know, let's let's just start with Clyde Drexler. We can do that right now. We're going to start with Clyde Drexler. 90s player, when you talk about one of the greats, right, one of the greats of the 90s, one of the most memorable players of the 90s because he had some of the most electrifying dunks. Right. He came into the NBA in 1983 as the fourth 14th pick out of Houston. Everybody remembers what he did in Houston, winning a championship down there. But he gets drafted to the Portland Trailblazers. Right. And this is where he becomes an all star for that team. Right. Multiple years in Portland, multiple trips to the finals. Never won the chip in Portland, especially as the leader of that team. But Clyde Drexler was able to get traded to the Houston Rockets in that trade to the Houston Rockets. He joined up with the already one time champs in Hakeem Olajuwon and those guys in a year where they desperately needed them. And we're talking about a Houston rocket team that was reeling after after the year before winning the championship. It almost looked as if that rocket team was probably going to miss the playoffs had it not been for making this trade for Clyde Drexler that year. And luckily, he was able to join that roster, give them the boost that they need to make the playoffs. They actually made the playoffs as a succeed. And behind Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler was able to play second fiddle. Obviously not a finals MVP that was always going to go to Hakeem. But I think it would be safe to say if you're just being honest and unbiased about this particular situation, this particular player. I don't believe the Houston Rockets win that championship without Clyde Drexler on that roster. That's how important he was to that team. All right. So we're going to be breaking down on that. So what we can start with first with Clyde Drexler is what do other players say about him? Right. So I put together a compilation of clips that I believe kind of detail. Not just what today's players. I want to focus on what the players that he played with. What did they say about this game? How did they feel about him? We're going to go ahead and get to that video now so we can break down Clyde Drexler first. Clyde Drexler, three out of seven for nine. It's quite a matchup between these two. And earlier I talked about it with Michael. Well, Clyde is somewhat of a mirror of me in a sense. I mean, he's so versatile. He plays offense. He plays defense. He's good with assists. He can score. So you got to respect him in all areas of basketball. I'm just going to try to contain him as much as possible. Try to force him to shoot the outside shot. As most people try to force me to shoot the outside shot and force him to his weaker hand, which is left. And that's what people do to me. So hopefully it can work against him. Clyde to Glyde says we're the two best in the game, but I'm not getting into a war of words with Mike. Clyde was a threat. You know, I'm not saying he wasn't a threat, but me being compared to him. I took offense to that. I remember being in the eighth, ninth, tenth grade watching Clyde Drexler play. Sitting on my couch and really starting to have an attraction for the game of basketball. Even though I was outside playing it, you know, maybe 20 minutes early, I would come in, watch the game for a little bit and go back out and play again. I could never sit in front of the TV and watch it. But then when they started saying Clyde Drexler in the show, when he dunked the ball or anything great he did, I was attracted to the TV. It made me want to sit there and watch it. When he almost jumped from the free throw line, I'm thinking he was playing the Lakers. And, you know, both his feet up in the air. That was his signature, you know, dunk. One hand came down the lane. He floated. When Clyde dunked, Clyde came up with both his legs. I used to always pick my legs up. I used to always say that, you know, when I did that, I was Clyde Drexler. And the Bucs with numbers. Brandon up top. Ray Allen to slam. Gorgeous alley-oop. A lot of people don't realize that Clyde is 6'7", you know, 6'7", 6'8". He had, like, a 44-inch vertical. You know, he was jumping out of the gym. 18 to 11. Long pass to Drexler in the alley-oop. He climbed the Golden Ladder for that. Ball toppled to Pete Thompson. Now, he has to touch it home. You're not supposed to be able to do that. A lot of credit went to Michael Jordan for him being able to do things he's done. But Clyde Drexler was doing it alongside Jordan at the same time. We knew Clyde was a great player. A Hall of Famer. But we had known what we could do with the basketball team we had. We won a championship last year. So now, the opportunity seemed like it was being taken away from us. Also very happy when I see what we're getting. My old teammates, you know, we talk about this all the time in the All-Star break. If we can play together again, you know, oh, it would be so much fun. Just like a dream. One time we was playing, you were in Portland. I said, I'm going to get Clyde's stuff. Because I know he's going to do that spin with his head down. And do that finger roll. Man, I dang near put my arm out of soccer trying to swing at it. And the ball just says, shoot, right over my face. Like, how the heck did he see me? It's like he spent just a little bit more to get it over me. I was like, come on, man. I'm going to get it one time. Can definitely talk about the 92 Finals. Had a chance to play with a guy that, you know, idolized Young. And had a chance to play against Clyde in the Finals. And I must say, I was very afraid going into that series. Because it was that moment, really, where Clyde was probably one of my biggest challenges as far as a small forward in the game. A guy that played a lot like me. A lot of speed, athleticism, can handle the ball, make plays. So it was a big challenge for me to be able to have to run up against, you know, a guy like Clyde. It was a lot of fun, a lot of great memories that I take from playing against that Portland team, especially against Clyde. Nice play by Kersey. It's a three-on-one. Drexler, yes, and it counts. A gorgeous move. He has four fouls. Drexler a little hesitant to take it all the way to the basket. So he's pulling up right now, trying to knock out the jumper. Drexler with the spin. Oh, what a move by Kersey. Michael's going to go for the steal, so you have to use that pull-back reverse. There's the steal attempt. There's the pull-back reverse. And then the beautiful finish with the... Oh, getting a license plate number. I think it starts with 22. They're looking for Clyde. Here it is. All right, and there we have it with Clyde, the glide, Drexler. Look, you're talking about a guy who was a perennial all-star. I mean, aside from his rookie season, I mean, he was able to elevate his scoring. I mean, he went from averaging 7.7 points per game in his rookie campaign, jumping that up to next year by 17 points, and really never looked back after that as an amazing athlete. You guys heard what his contemporary said. These are all players that played against him. I mean, you guys even saw the clips of him not just playing against the Chicago Bulls, but going right at Jordan chest-to-chest, multiple moves, attacking Jordan with the speed, with the quickness. You guys obviously saw the strength, able to knock Jordan, you know, one of the stronger guards of the 90s, able to knock him off balance, multiple moves, get into the rim easily, on arguably one of the best perimeter defenders of the 90s. So again, we're talking about a guy, look, this is no shade towards neither player, right? We're talking about two great players, and we're simply trying to break down and analyze, okay, who is potentially the greatest, right? You guys may have a different opinion by the time it's all said and done and we come to a conclusion on this. But again, either way, there's no doubt that Clyde, the glide, Drexler was a great player. Like I said, being a part of that most, that famed Olympic dream team is, you know, obviously that's an accolade that just a standing alone right there, just being a part of that team. That's something that a lot of people can't match. But again, he ended his career by joining Oscar Robinson and John Havlicek as some of the only players in NBA history to top 20,000 points, 6,000 rebounds, and 3,000 assists right there. I mean, that's an achievement, right, that you have to take recognition of and you have to pay your respects to Clyde, the glide, Drexler, man. One of the greats, obviously one of the top 75 players of all time. Now, where you rank him, again, that's up to you. But right now, we're debating these two shooting guards. So, we've kind of summarized Clyde, the glide, Drexler. You guys have heard what his contemporaries have said about him. Now, we kind of have to flip the script and we have to get over to James Harden. How does James Harden's contemporaries, how do they feel about him, right? So, let's kind of just talk about James Harden just to start. James Harden, obviously 6'5 guard, played at Arizona State University, started his career with the Oklahoma City Thunder. We all remember that team getting to the NBA Finals, playing the Miami Heat, losing to that experience-laden Miami Heat team. Although the Oklahoma City Thunder were favorites, I think a lot of people picked the Heat doing that because the experience alone was just going to be overwhelming for that young team and that's ultimately what happened. Obviously, that OKC team had done a great job of drafting players, KD, Russell Westbrook, and then also James Harden coming off the bench as a sixth man. But in a very odd decision, that Oklahoma City organization decided to part ways with James Harden and allow him to walk over approximately $2 million and he ends up signing with the Houston Rockets and I think it was with the Houston Rockets where we all saw the peak of James Harden and who he could be in this league. And when he got to the Houston Rockets, he really, really opened up his bag and turned into one of the game's most elite ISO scores of not just this generation, we have to say of all time. I mean, like no other. So, again, just like we did with Clyde Drexler, before we get to some of the stats, the accolades, the analytics, let's hear what James Harden's contemporaries, players that he deals with night in and night out, what do they have to say about James Harden, the electric scoring guard? Yes, man, let's go ahead and hear what they have to say about him. He can rank among the NBA's best players right now. I feel like I'm the best player. I just know, literally. You know, James is a, he's such a fantastic player. And, you know, all I can do is sit on the sidelines and just shake my head. You know, like some of those plays he's making, shots that he's making. Those are difficult shots for 90% of the players in the league. And he makes it look effortless. Who's the most unstoppable player in the league right now? The guy's averaging 39 and a half points. In the streets, that's 40. That's James Harden. I mean, he's a lefty. You want a mid-range pull-up, you want a floater, you want a layup, you want a dunk, you want a free throw. He's legendary for his step-back. You can say that it's a travel, you can say it's not a travel. Ref doesn't call it, so I'm all for it. Find a way to stop it, travel him out. All records are a sense of pride for the work that you put into the game. So, you know, yeah, I'm happy to have it because I think it showcased what I, actually how much practice and effort that I put into it. I think what you're seeing with James Harden is the same. You know, he's not doing this off the whim. It's something that he's worked and he's perfected to a point where the results are starting to show. He's good enough, and he's definitely, you know, one of the most unguardable players that this game has ever seen. But, you know, a lot of mistakes are putting their hand in that cookie jar. You know, it's something that we've talked about, something that, you know, we knew we couldn't do, and we did it a lot, you know, so that's the mental focus part of this season, you know, that, you know, we've struggled with. There are only three humans on Earth who have had these crazy scoring streaks of 30 points or more over and over and over again. You had it 14 games in a row. You had it 16 games in a row. And James Harden, of course, crazy streak this season. What do you think of what he's doing right now? I think he, I'm not a fan of in terms of winning championships. I don't think that style is ever going to win championships. But at the same time, you have to keep your team's head above water to win games. You have to do what you have to do to win games, and he's doing that, right? Now, I think... So, are you saying you don't think James Harden and the Rockets, as constructed, can win a title? Not with this style of play, it won't win, right? With one player dominating the ball. Now, when you have Chris Ball come back and you have more movement to the offense, where you move guys around, where you're harder to find... And Chris Ball's back, but you mean more in the... Yeah, because, listen, if you take one player, you put him at the top of the key, or you put him on the wing, and you're running screen rolls, you're always in front of the defense. The defense can key on that, particularly in the playoffs. And that's easy to defend. It's easy to defend. Now, what he's doing is absolutely remarkable, though. And I think it's a testament to how remarkable it is because people are now trying to minimize what it is that he's doing. I mean, he's doing some phenomenal stuff. You may know that James Harden is also evolving the game right now. Is that level of criticism that he's getting, is that warranted for how he's playing? No way. No way. I mean, that man has so much talent, and he's so great, and he deserves all the praise that he gets. You know what I mean? There's always going to be a critic out of there. There's always going to be somebody out there saying you can do something else better than what you're doing. But, you know what I mean? I think he just keep his foot to the pedal and keep his foot to the floor, I meant, and keep rocking, man, and doing his thing because I know his teammates love having him in their foxhole and rocking with him night in and night out. So, James, keep doing your thing, man. What excites you the most about playing against him in particular? Well, just the skill level. Obviously, he has a lot of respect of everybody in our league. So, we understand how talented he is and how well they play when he plays well. So, for us, it's just about playing great team defense, making sure we're staying disciplined on both ends of the floor, but making sure that we play our type of game and make them adjust to us. So, it's the physicality of the game. He sat him down, as my kids would say. He sat him down. So, that was a nice move. I'm just glad I'm not that guy that failed. Well, that was very disrespectful, but that was a great move. You know, part of it was the free throws, but he has a 50-point triple-double. When a guy has a performance like that, how hard is it to overcome that as an opponent? You can't put him on the line. We put him on the line 20 times. He's already talented offensively. You can put the ball in the hole multiple ways, drive, setback threes, but you give him easy points. We put a guy like that on the line. You can't put KD on the line for 20 free throws. You can't put him on the line for 20 free throws. You can't put any of our scores that we have in our league on the line 20 times because they just see the ball roll. I mean, James is one of the best ISO, one of the best pick-and-roll threats, one of the best off-the-bounce shooters. You just got to keep your body on James. He can get hot and get hot fast, so you just don't let him get easy ones and start to torch because then it's not much you can do, whether he's throwing a lob or he's coming off those pick-and-rolls to finish or he's stepping back for his three. You just can't allow him to get hot. Harden faced criticism as the team struggled to reach the playoffs and then lost in the opening round. The Rocket offense is crushing them. Turnovers, missed opportunities. The wins aren't there, so people are saying, you know, he's getting his stats, but they aren't winning. You know, what is it? What's going on? Whether it's, you know, he can't play defense or, you know, he doesn't pass the ball or he's not a winner. I hear it all. I don't pay attention to it. Great leaders and Hall of Famers aren't built when things are going extremely well. And there we have it right there, man. You guys heard it, all the players, a number of his contemporaries, guys that go against this man night in and night out. I mean, they're just letting you know. These aren't just average players. You're talking about Paul George, LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard. I mean, you're talking about elite, not just offensive players, but you're talking about elite defensive players really breaking down how tough it is to guard this man, James Harden. I mean, when Jimmy Butler's sitting here talking about how people complain about his moves and how he re-innovated the step back and took it to another level, look, when you're creative enough, you figure things out. And James Harden ultimately created a new move that's extremely hard to duplicate, that's made him essentially unstoppable and extremely hard to guard when he catches fire, just like Paul George in his making shots. Now, the true knock, before we go into some of the stats and analytics and really start to dig in and compare these two players, is the true knock against Harden, even after he has all the scoring titles and all those things right there, is, I mean, unlike Clyde the Glide, the one thing we saw with Clyde the Glide is there was playoff success. James Harden has time and time again came up short in the playoffs. Now, you're gonna have some people on multiple sides of this. They're gonna be multiple facets to this logic. Some people are gonna say, okay, that's team, right? When we look at some of James Harden's playoff failures, Dwight Howard maybe didn't show up a year in Houston. CP3 gets injured when the Houston Rockets look like that team to get out the West. When he's now in Brooklyn, the year that everybody believes Brooklyn can win it all, KD and Kyrie are hampered with injuries and he's just kind of left to fend for himself and he also gets hurt himself. So then that's injury riddle for him as well. So, excuses aside, the playoffs are gonna be something that's just gonna loom over his head like a dark cloud. And until he silences those concerns, there are gonna be many people who are gonna be skeptics and they're gonna refute this man being better than a lot of the great shooting guards of all times. And we're talking about the likes of the Kobes, the Jordans, the Jerry West and those players like that. But the one thing you want to keep in mind is James Harden is over 30 years old. But when we put this into context, players like Wilt Chamberlain, he didn't win his first championship until he was older than 30. I mean, it happens like that sometimes, right? And now that Wilt was able to get those two championships, even though it was later into his career, right, we look at him as a winner now. So James Harden, still in his prime, he's still playing great basketball. Now with the 76ers, it's looking like this year, I mean, if there's any year that they can do it, now that he's with a healthy Joel Embiid, that Sixer team looks re-energized, revamped, and they look built to get out the West. I mean, if anybody can beat the Bucks this year, if that Buck team can get to the Eastern Conference Finals, it is the Philadelphia 76ers with the newly added James Harden. So right now with James Harden, the book is still open, right? And so as we compare these two players, there are a lot of things we really have to contextualize because we have to compare the active career of James Harden to the complete career of Clyde Drexler, and then try to make our best case analysis on who the better shooting guard is, maybe add a bit of trajectory into it, but I don't want to do too much predicting or projecting. We really just kind of have to base this on what these guys have done now. So when we get to the breakdowns, right, when we get to just some of the most basic breakdowns, when we talk about championships and championship seasons, now, as I said before, it's really hard to put a lot of this into context because James Harden is an active player, and it looks as if he's going to have at least another three to four years of prime high-level basketball in him, but James Harden is in year 13. It's close. That's close to what Clyde Drexler did, who played 15 years. Clyde will always have that championship. Now, the one knock that you could put on Clyde Drexler is that when he won that championship, he was no longer the man, right? His skills were starting to fade as to a certain degree with Portland. Portland wanted to go in another direction. They made the decision to trade him, right? But when Clyde left Portland, he was all over the record books, literally almost owning almost all of the scoring records. So he left his mark on Portland and then immediately comes to Houston and helps Hakeem Olajuwon get that team out of the trenches, become the sixth seed, and not just become the sixth seed in the playoffs, but they win the championship. So similar in seasons. All right, James Harden's made the playoffs 12 times. So for James Harden, that's pretty good. 12 playoffs out of 13 years. But when you look at Clyde Drexler, 15 years in the league, 15 times in the playoffs. Now, all-star games right there. James Harden's played fewer years. He's already at 10 all-star games. Clyde Drexler only made 10. So again, if we project a little bit, safe to say James Harden is gonna make two to three more of these all-stars, so he's probably gonna surpass Clyde Drexler in that particular category. But when we're talking about championships and championship seasons, you have to ultimately give the slight edge to Clyde Drexler. Why? He made the playoffs and had an impact every season he played, 15 out of 15 years, and he's an NBA champion. Even though he wasn't the leader of that Houston Rocket team, I honestly believe they don't win it without him, as opposed to James Harden, as we just said, who's had championship-level teams for whatever reason, whatever excuses you want to use, whether you want to blame that on Harden or not, those teams fell short when they have had overwhelmingly massive opportunities to get to the finals, yet they found a way to kind of blow those opportunities, albeit other players getting injured, James Harden not showing up, not being a great leader. You have to give the knock on James Harden for that. He has suffered and failed to a certain degree in that aspect, or when we're talking about this particular category with championships and championship seasons. If we move on to honors and awards, now, honors and awards start to become a bit more individual, right? They're a bit more individual, right? For as great as Clyde Drexler was coming into NBA in 1983, he's never been an MVP. That's an individual accolade. That's, you know, was he ever considered the best player in the league? Was he even ever considered the best player in his conference as far as the guard position goes? I don't know. It's kind of tough to say that he was, right? Clyde Drexler, again, another knock. When you're talking about individual greatness, Clyde Drexler only made an All-NBA First Team one time in his career. One time in his career. All right, James Harden has done that six times already in his 13-year career, right? When we talk about All-NBA Team selections, right, selections outside of the First Team, Clyde Drexler was able to do that five times out of a 15-year career, which I kind of have to knock Drexler for that because that tells me right there there were multiple shooting guards not named Jordan. There were multiple shooting guards not named Michael Jordan. There were other guys that NBA at that time, the voters and the media felt, they felt that there were other players better, right? James Harden at the shooting guard spot, it's, you'll be tough. You'll be extremely hard-pressed to find another shooting guard of his equivalent, especially now that James Harden is in his prime. Now, when we talk about scoring leaders, right, the shooting guard, the shooting guard throughout the history of basketball has generally been a position where you're talking about high-level scores, right, from Jordan's to Jerry West's, right, to the Oscar Robinson's, who some may consider him a small forward, not even a true point guard, but I would say he's a big shooting guard slash point guard. For Clyde Drexler to have zero scoring titles, we're talking about individual success at your own position, Clyde, he, that just simply eluded him. Now, you can blame Jordan, but he had 15 years to just get one or two. He was not able to do it one time. All right, and then when you go to assists, James Harden, as a shooting guard, who was a de facto point guard, especially in Houston, when he needed the ball, his usage rate was so high, he has led the league in assists. I don't, even with the usage, I don't know if Clyde the Glide was that talented of a passer individually. We're talking about individual skill sets to come close to leading the league in assists. I think James Harden, as a passer, is going to be far superior. That's a skill set that I don't believe Clyde mastered. Now, was Clyde a good passer? Yes, but could he be considered an elite passer like that of James Harden? No, so we have to give honors and awards. We have to give that to James Harden. All right, because again, he, in his 13-year career, has amassed enough hardware to usurp that of Clyde Drexler, who has a completed career, and James Harden can potentially collect more hardware because he's still playing, so I think James Harden gets this one on this particular category. Now, if we just go to stats, now, a lot of people are going to say, okay, well, James Harden's stats are a bit inflated because this era, there's a lot more scoring. Again, we cannot throw the excuses in. All right, Clyde the Drexler, well, yes. Was he a great scorer? Yes, I consider Clyde a great scorer, but the one thing is there were major holes in his game, right? He struggled. As Michael Jordan said, you heard how Michael Jordan said he would try to guard Clyde. He said, sag off of him. Turn him into a jump shooter. Jump shooting was one of his biggest weaknesses. Three-point shooting was probably an even bigger weakness. Also, efficiency kind of hurt Clyde the Clyde Drexler to a certain degree because his efficiency suffered because of his poor shooting percentages from the outside. He was able to make up for that with his ability to attack the basket. So, he ended his career, I think, shooting about 40%. All right, but when you talk about points per game, obviously, James Harden is the superior scorer. We've seen James Harden score on almost every level possible, right? When you look at his shot chart, his shot chart is just filled with either buckets at the rim or buckets at the top of the key. Now, does he have a, I give him the slight edge on versatility there, being able to score anywhere on the floor. Now, the one thing you might be able to give Clyde is he was able to attack the basket from multiple areas on the floor where with James Harden, his game is more vertically centered. And you see a lot of his attacks are straight line attacks from the top of the key down. And as Kobe Bryant and Tracy McGrady said, that starts to become extremely easy to guard, especially when you get into the playoffs. That could potentially be a knock on Harden because he does lack the ability to create an attack from multiple areas on the floor, but he's still a dynamic scorer that it just seems that for as easy as Kobe, what Kobe and Tracy McGrady made it sound, it doesn't sound like anybody's really found the keys to stopping him. It almost looks as if James Harden has to have these mental blocks where he stops himself by shooting the ball too much, not being a great leader. And those are some of the things that have affected his team in the playoffs. Assists per game, Clyde Drexler 5.6, James Harden 6.7. Steals per game, Clyde Drexler 2.0, James Harden 1.5. I put these guys on the same level defensively. Clyde was never looked at as a great or superior defender. James Harden, on the other hand, and this is gonna go against popular beliefs, he is looked at in the NBA as an elite post defender. Say what you want about his perimeter defense. We all seen the Shaqton the Fool videos where you see people blowing and walking right past him on a perimeter. Albeit, he has been looked at as an elite post defender in the NBA. You have to give him credit for that. But Clyde Drexler does get more steals per game at 2.0 to 1.5. Clyde Drexler with the blocks, 0.7 to James Harden, 0.5. So when we go to stats, when we go to efficiency, that all has to go to James Harden. You're talking about James Harden who's shooting the better field goal percentage, free throw percentage, three-point percentage, efficiency numbers, plus the higher volume of scoring. That's gotta go to James Harden as well. And then when you look at, even if we go to the analytics, even if we go to analytics, we can put those on the screen as well. Let me go ahead and put that up. Okay, so we'll go ahead and start with the analytics. Obviously, the analytics are gonna be very important because the analytics put the stats, the accolades, the winning, the things that it's hard for us to really contextualize because we're not watching every single game. But analytics help you determine, okay, the things that this player are doing on the court because we have so many people that are so quick to say stat padding and just very odd conclusions based on what a player does just to denigrate what they do. The analytics put all of that into perspective, right? Do these numbers have an impact on winning, right? Is your value irreplaceable? When we look at Clyde Drexler, so these are Clyde Drexler's analytics. I think the most important analytic to look at, especially when you're talking about a star player with a lot of usage, is Clyde Drexler. Clyde Drexler, for a career, has a value over replacement, and we see it right here. A value over replacement is a box score estimate of his points per 100 team possession that a player contributed above a replacement-level player, right? And for his career, Clyde Drexler stands at 70.2, and that's a 50-year career. Remember, all 15 of those years, Clyde Drexler made the playoffs very impressive, very solid, right? When we look at box-plus-minus, it's a box-plus-minus of 5.4 for a career. When we look at his defensive box-plus-minus, he's at a defensive box-plus-minus of 1.3, offensive box-plus-minus of 4.1, where we have his win shares per 48 minutes, remember? And so that's breaking it down even farther. He's at a .173, which is pretty solid in and of itself. His win shares stand at 135.6, and then his defensive win shares, 49.9, offensive win shares, 85.6. So again, we put all these numbers, especially the offensive numbers into perspective, but I like how this also breaks down the defensive numbers as well, because remember, we saw Clyde to glide with those two steals per game. Yep, yet he has a defensive win share of 49.9. So let's go ahead and we can head over to James Harden's. So when we look at James Harden's numbers, first thing we want to look at is his value-over-replacement. He edges out James Harden in value-over-replacement at 7.1, box-plus-minus is 6.8, which is also higher than Clyde the Glide Drexler. Defensive box-plus-minus stands at .9. Again, remember, when you're talking about the defensive stats and numbers, the lower the number, the better. He's better once again here, even though we're not talking about two elite defenders. Offensive box-plus-minus, 5.9. The win shares, he has a better win share per 48 at .222. His win shares overall is going to be 147.3. Once again, higher than Clyde the Glide Drexler. Defensive win shares, 36.7. He outdoes him in that category as well. And then offensive win shares, I mean, and it doesn't even come close here, 110.7. Man, he beat him out right there. And obviously James Harden has an extremely high usage rate, especially those years with the Houston Rockets. I think that's kind of simmered down now, now that he was with Brooklyn, and then it's definitely going to cool off a little bit more now that he's with Philly playing with Joel Embiid. But when you go to the analytics, the analytics also kind of put these stats, everything that we've seen, puts them into context and they paint a picture for you. And the analytics therefore also favor James Harden as well. Now, the last thing we got to talk about is the nostalgia of the two players, right? Recency bias of the two players. The most recent things that we've seen and heard from James Harden have generally been negative. He doesn't really have a very popular, he doesn't have a popular outlook from sports fans right now based on how he left the Houston Rockets, really left that team high and dry, sold them short. A lot of people will argue that he did things the wrong way to leave Houston. Then he landed in Brooklyn, created a super team. So many people against super teams say these players are stacking the deck, making it too hard for other teams to compete. He's created a new base of fans that hate him just for that move alone. And then when the going got rough in Brooklyn, Kyrie Irving didn't want to play. Kevin Durant injured, right? Players in and out the lineup. Steve Nash's ability to coach was criticized, not just by James Harden, but other teammates on that roster. I mean, that team was starting to combust badly. They needed to move James Harden ASAP because it started to look like, once again, similar to what he did in Houston. It looked like he gave up on his team and was simply waiting on the Brooklyn Nets to move him somewhere else that just was more favorable, not just his style of play, but to his mental from what I've heard and seen. But now the question would be is that, being that Clyde Drexler, I mean, Clyde Drexler was a guy that, I mean, every time you looked at him in the huddle, he was intently focused. When you're talking about coaches like Rick Adelman, intently focused on what the coaches had to say. He could arguably be looked at as the better leader between these two players, primarily because of the example he set, his falling in line, just listening to the coach. I mean, Tim Duncan showed everyone that that trait alone is highly valuable. You don't have to be this big, crazy vocal leader that galvanizes the troops. If you just fall in line as the best player, that can be a great example of itself. And I think Clyde Drexler did an excellent job of that in his career. So when you're talking about leadership and some of those intangibles that you just really can't record or see in a stat, okay, one might say we can give that to Clyde Drexler if you're being honest and non-biased. So we take all of these things, take what we've seen about Clyde the Clyde Drexler, the analytics, the stats, what other teams and players said about him, take everything that we've said about James Harden, contextualize these things, bond them together, try to figure out what's what. Who is the better player? After really researching, looking at all of these things, I have to say that James Harden is the more superior one. We're talking about Clyde Drexler and James Harden heads up in what we've been discussing today. I believe that James Harden stands now currently as a top five shooting guard of all time. I believe that when things are all said and done, he could potentially find himself at the three spot right behind Kobe Bryant. Obviously, you got Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant locked into those two spots. It's gonna be extremely hard to usurp those guys unless Harden is able to do something miraculous. But as it stands right now, James Harden is a top five shooting guard of all time. James Harden is still playing and he can add more to his book. Similar to Wilt Chamberlain, we saw how Wilt Chamberlain was able to win two championships. You know, after going through the gauntlet, going through all of those years battling Bill Russell, he was still able to get two chips after the age of 30. I believe that James Harden could do something similar. And then even when we look to Clyde Drexler, when Clyde Drexler was the man with Portland, he was unsuccessful at winning that championship. And when he had his opportunities, he failed, right? And he was able to get that championship as a second tier player beneath Hakeem Olajuwon. I believe James Harden could do something similar. I think this year is the possible, the year that we could possibly see him get that championship and hopefully open the eyes of a lot of the people that hate him because of some of the things that he's done with regards to switching teams, giving up on teams, quitting on teams. You can judge him outside of basketball for that as a person, but when you're talking about the game of basketball, James Harden stands as a top five shooting guard of all time. Hey, and there we have it right there, man. James Harden, I believe, is the superior player in this particular debate. The analytics, the stats, the accolades, the hardware, the potential, the trajectory, I think it all favors James Harden. And then when you're just talking about just individual dominance and how your peers respect you, I think that goes to the Harden, especially with the MVP. And he could also go down as, I mean, you're talking about just having elite, pure elite skill sets. I mean, James Harden is gonna go down as being, if not the best, one of the best ISO players of all time. When we're talking about Clyde the Glide Jackson, we're talking about an elite skill. What elite skill did Clyde possess, right, that you could say stood above all? I mean, if you wanna consider athleticism a skill, I necessarily don't. But I think Clyde was good at a lot of things, but never elite or great at one individual thing. And as an NBA player, I think that hurts you when you don't have that one go-to skill. It's gonna stop you from being in that upper echelon of players. And ultimately, that's what hurt him at Portland, his inability to shoot the ball, his inability to stay consistent from beyond 10 to 15 feet. Those are the things that hurt that Portland Trailblazer team, and this is why we saw them fail. Oh, now, again, Harden has not had success as well. He hasn't even been able to get his team to the finals, just like Clyde Judrexa was. But again, I believe that James Harden will get there, so I'll have to project a little bit. You guys may disagree, but you know what, just spam up the comments. Let me know what you think about this particular debate, James Harden or Clyde Judrexa. Who do you have, right? Did I miss anything, right? Again, I know a lot of people wanna bring in finals and all this stuff right here. Again, I try not to mix in too much of the team accomplishments. Although at the beginning of this, I definitely gave Clyde Judrexa credit for the championship and for his ability to get his team to the playoff. 15 out of 15 years while he's in the NBA, that's something to say about a player. And then you also have to give him the leadership. But outside of those things, there's really not much I can give him over James Harden. And I believe when it's all said and done, James Harden will be looked at as a far superior player to Clyde Judrexa. So you guys, spam up the comments. Let me know what you think about this. Let me know your thoughts on both players. If I'm wrong, when we go live again, it's your opportunity to come in and drop the max ether on me. But I don't know. I don't think you stand much of a fight if you're arguing for Clyde Judrexa in this one. There's not too many numbers that favor you. But again, you're welcome to come into the live chat and have it out the next time we go live. Hey, but it's FYF Sports, man. It's been another great podcast episode, man. We're gonna be doing these player comparison videos a lot more. You guys requested it, so we gotta go ahead and give it to you. I love doing these breakdowns, really digging deep into these players, looking at the analytics, and it really makes you study what made these great. And it was just good for me to hear what players thought about these two guys because we hear so much disrespect in these streets for players. It sounds like on every video, on every channel we go to, it's just some form of toxicity, talking down on this player to big up this player, going at this guy to push a certain narrative. I mean, it's just so much negativity. So I think when you go to these player debate videos, we don't really have to harp on the negatives. We can really talk about the positive of both players and then just make a decision based on that. So that's one of the things that I appreciated. We don't really have to tear any players down to get to the bottom of who's better. But it's FYF Sports, another great positive video. Great video, obviously. We'll be back with more sports and news. Make sure you guys are tuning in for all the videos. Make sure you hit the notification bell. If it's not working for you, unsubscribe, resubscribe, hit it again. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter for all notifications. Remember, we're going to be dropping more videos soon. A lot more podcast videos. And again, if you have any special requests, make sure you let us know in the comments or in the live chat whenever we go live again. Hey, it's FYF Sports, man. Another great podcast episode. We're going to be back with more sports and news. But until then, it's FYF Sports. And we out.