Mike D'Antoni has already put some thought into how to make the most of the Houston Rockets' star pairing of James Harden and Russell Westbrook. The veteran head coach already made it known he plans to utilize his best players' strengths and plans to keep either Westbrook or Harden on the floor at all times.
The 68-year-old coach knows that when Harden is on the floor, he will have to make use of his half-court mastery and slow the game down to allow him to operate — though as soon as he leaves the floor, the tempo will greatly change.
“I’m gonna push it,” Westbrook said to Gerald Green in between full-court drills, according to Kelly Iko of The Athletic.
The strategy seems confusing at first, playing at two polar opposite paces within the same game, but D'Antoni is hoping it's more of a headache for his opponents to keep up with.
“That’s the plan,” he laughed. “We have to take advantage of it. But we’ll be able to throw different speeds at them for sure.”
Harden noted that while he and Westbrook are similar players, they’re also starkly different in their style of play.
“Oh yeah,” D’Antoni nodded. “They play at different paces. They rely on different skills. One of them is probably the greatest athlete we’ve ever had, and the other is probably the greatest skilled player we’ve ever had. They definitely are different.”
Admittedly, the tough part for D'Antoni will be to put his best players on the floor during crunch time, and making the best of their abilities with Westbrook and Harden on the floor.
“The tricky part, a little bit, is how you finish games out,” he said. “The last five minutes. How Russ and James are going to be able to divide up what they do. But that’ll come just from playing. And to be honest with you, it should be fairly easy because they both want it. When you want that, then they’ll figure out a way.”
The strategy to play at different speeds might take some trial and error, but if the visions of general manager Daryl Morey and D'Antoni's coincide, they should eventually find a way to make the most of both skill sets.
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