Rachel Nichols

James Harden's, like, stats, career stats, I don't think people take them into account.

This man is an 11-time All-Star, 8-time All-NBA player, 3-time scoring champ.

MVP, two-time assist champ, sixth man of the year, is ninth all-time in scoring.

I believe NBA put out a stat yesterday talking about that he's been in the playoffs every year of his 17-year career, and there's only five players in NBA history who have done that.

So his reputation as sort of being a playoff choker, which is what a lot of people think of him as, is just not backed up by everything he's done in his career.

Do you think that if these playoffs, that reputation can go away or at least be mitigated if he has a good playoffs here and people can focus on all those other stats I just read off?

And Danny, I think those endings have been affected by just the example you just gave, right?

Chris Paul goes down.

He's in Philadelphia and he's supposed to be the second guy and role change and everything.

But Joel Embiid goes down.

And Harden was great at the beginning and middle of the series.

I think it was against Boston, but he petered out in six and seven.

The load on him has historically been a problem of why he's had trouble late in playoff series.

Donovan Mitchell is going to be taking off so much of the load on him.

I think we may see a different James Harden.

We'll see.

We'll see.

You have a high standard.

I get it.

Let's go over the football.