James Harden says if teams want to keep him off the free throw line, they should 'stop fouling'
Houston Rockets guard James Harden has been the league’s premier free throw artist for the better part of the last decade, infuriating opposing fans and slowing down the pace of games.
Harden has led the league in free throw attempts each of the past five seasons and dipped below 10 attempts per game just once since the 2012-13 season. And once he gets to the free throw stripe, he’s shooting 85.4 percent, never dipping below 84 percent since his rookie season.
But how has he perfected the art of drawing fouls? Harden has one idea.
I just asked James Harden what he says to people who are mad that he gets to the freethrow line so much. He said, dead serious, “Stop fouling. It’s simple”. #Rockets
— Rosalyn Gold-Onwude (@ROSGO21) January 2, 2019
The six-time All-Star may be deadpanning, but that’s certainly one way to look at it.
Harden knows how to draw fouls
Harden has a wide variety of moves he can use to draw fouls, although some are more questionable than others. One of his most effective moves has been eliciting fouls on 3-pointers by drawing contact if defenders keep their hands up. In the 2016-17 season, he alone drew more fouls on three-point shots than any other team.
Lately, the Los Angeles Lakers were among the teams particularly infuriated by his foul-drawing acumen. Second-year players Lonzo Ball and Kyle Kuzma spoke out about how hard it is to defend Harden because “you can’t touch them” without getting a foul called.
“How hard is it to play defense like that? It’s tough,” Lakers head coach Luke Walton said, via ESPN. “I think they were just trying to make a point: ‘We’re not using our arms here. Stop calling fouls.’”
Putting Harden’s free throw numbers into context
As of Thursday morning, Harden leads the league in free throw attempts at a career-high 11.1 attempts per game. That’s the fourth-highest mark in the league since the turn of the century and the best since Dwight Howard shot 11.7 free throws per game in 2010-11, albeit at a 59.6 percent rate.
Since Harden first eclipsed double-digit free throws per game seven years ago, Russell Westbrook (10.4 in 2016-17) and DeMarcus Cousins (10.2 in 2015-16) are the only other players to also do so. And, again, Harden has reached 10 free throws per game six times.
Harden’s career-high rate of free throws coincides with a career-best 33.3 points per game, which also leads the league. Free throws have long been an integral part of his scoring, as he’s even made more free throws than field goals in six different seasons.
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