Harden has his way moneywise and repays the confidence with a stellar night against the Pistons...
Its official - James Harden is at the Houston Rockets for the long haul.
The reigning sixth man of the year and the Rockets have agreed to a five-year, $80 million contract which will effectively see the shooting guard play at Houston for the next six years.
"We have him for this year and five more, so six years," an elated Houston coach Kevin McHale said after the development. "Our goal is to do a good enough job as a staff that we win, make the playoffs, develop the young guys and
that we never, ever, ever come to camp again with 13 new guys."
James was acquired by the Rockets in a sensational trade with the Oklahoma City Thunder on Saturday night, and had vowed to be a part of the Rockets for the years to come.
Harden is among the top five shooting guards in the league, but had moulded himself into a supers-sub role at the Oklahoma City Thunder to cater for the team requirements. In the last three seasons, he started only 7 games, and
ended last season with impressive figures 16.8 points, 4.1 rebounds and 3.7 assists for the Thunder.
The guard started for the Rockets in their season opener against the Detroit Pistons and erupted with 37 points, 12 assists, 6 rebounds, and 4 steals as Houston pulled off a last quarter heist to seal a 105-96 win at The Palace
of Auburn Hills. He is now being considered as a franchise player at Houston and seemed quite satisfied with the new role after his debut game;
"It's a new role for me. I think everybody knows that. My job is just to do the best I can every day, whether it's in a game, in a practice, whether it's off the court, charity events, whatever the case may be. I just have to be
a leader out there." Harden said post game.
The arrival of Harden can be start of something special for the Rockets, who had been in desperate hunt of a superstar ever since the Yao Ming era. They tried mighty hard to somehow lure in Dwight Howard this summer, but failed.
Now that they have a star in their roster and few potential All-Star level players in Jeremy Lin and Omer Asik, the Rockets might just be able to land more talent and re-emerge as one of the elite teams from the deep Western Conference.
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