Philadelphia 76ers: James Harden has to evolve his game

Harden has to evolve his game: The issues

The reason for these dips in these stats is his loss of a half step due to that hamstring injury. It’s unclear if he will ever get it back, but if he continues to play the way he does, it will shorter the length he can play at an All-Star level for the Philadelphia 76ers and his overall career too.

Currently, he plays with a lot of pick-and-rolls with the intention of attacking the basket and drawing fouls. While he’s still averaging 9.8 free throw attempts and shooting 89.1 percent on those attempts, there are far too many times where he doesn’t get the call or get his shot blocked.

When he does take 3-pointers, Harden usually goes to his patented step-back outside shot. There are games this type of shot is hotter than others. However, he can’t just rely on that as his bread-and-butter now that it’s becoming harder for him to create space.

These issues will only get worse as he becomes older so what’s the solution? The most important is that he has to get healthy this offseason, if he gets 100.0 percent healthy then this may become a moot point. However, if this becomes a long-term issue, then there are three major changes that Harden has to make.