James Harden certainly has his detractors, but there are few players in NBA history more efficient at putting points on the board than the Los Angeles Clippers star. He reached an important milestone on Saturday.
In the third quarter of a game against the Minnesota Timberwolves, Harden, 36, passed Carmelo Anthony for 10th place on the NBA’s all-time scoring list with 28,290 points. LeBron James (first) and Kevin Durant (eighth) are the only active players ahead of him.
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Fittingly, given his style of play, Harden did it with a free throw.
Harden finished the game with 34 points on 10-of-18 shooting, 6 assists, 5 rebounds, 4 steals and 4 turnovers. The big night wasn’t enough to earn the struggling Clippers a victory, as the Timberwolves took the game 109-106.
Los Angeles’ record now stands at 6-18, second worst in the Western Conference. Between the scandal surrounding Kawhi Leonard And the dysfunction of Chris Paul’s situationit’s hard to imagine a worse start for a team that entered this season intending to compete.
Harden has scored in droves since his trade to the Houston Rockets, who turned him into an analytical monster by focusing on generating 3-pointers and free throws. It’s a style of play that’s unwatchable for many fans, and one that’s been emulated by many around the league, but it’s also made him an MVP and perennial All-Star.
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Fittingly, Harden is already second on the all-time 3-point list (behind only Stephen Curry) and fifth on the all-time free throw list (Karl Malone, James, Moses Malone, Kobe Bryant). He’s also 13th on the assists list – and fourth on the turnovers list.
When trying to explain James Harden, you could do worse than simply figuring out where he ranks in the statistics above.
Where could Harden end up on the roster? Since leaving the Rockets, he has averaged 21.0 points per game and 68.5 games in four full seasons. If he were to maintain that average pace for three more seasons, that would equate to 4,321 points, enough to put him past Michael Jordan for fifth place and within striking distance of Bryant for fourth.
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All-time NBA scoring list
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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 38,387
