David Adelman compares Clippers star to Peyton Manning: ‘he’s in slow motion’

DENVER — The last time James Harden played a playoff game in the Mile High City, the Nuggets’ leading scorer was Ty Lawson — so long ago that current Denver bench boss David Adelman jokes it’s one of the three careers the former MVP has had in the NBA.

Harden, 35 and now in his second season with the Los Angeles Clippers, is not the heliocentric entity that he was when he won an MVP but is still one of the league’s best guards. This season, Harden was still 20th in the league in points per game, fifth in assists per game, while being eighth in total steals this season among qualified players.

He’ll be dishing it out to Kawahi Leonard, Ivica Zubac and Norman Powell a bit more than the creating for himself that he was known for in the past. While his rate of getting to the rim and line has dropped quite a bit in the last few years as he’s also shooting fewer threes, Harden is still getting off nearly nine triples and seven free throws a night while shooting 10% of his shots at the rim, which is a great profile.

“Yeah, you can’t show James the same thing all the time, and I don’t even think you can show him one adjustment,” Nuggets interim head coach Adelman said on Wednesday. “He reminds me at his age now of some of the great drop-back quarterbacks, a Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, where they’ve seen it all and they decipher things so fast and it’s almost like he’s in slow motion. He’s letting you rotate, he’s letting you do what you want to do, letting your game plan happen, then taking advantage of it.”

The 11-time All-Star and three-time scoring champ tallied 22.8 points a night on 41% shooting, 35% from deep, and 87% from the line. It’s his 16th season in the league, and his next postseason game will be his 167th. But like Manning was known for at times, Hard is more famous for his failures this time of year than his successes. His teams haven’t made a run since his Rockets crashed out of the 2018 playoffs, losing a Game 7 to the top-dog Warriors by missing 27-straight threes.

“I have enormous respect for him and his career. This is almost like his third career that’s going on right now,” Adelman said. “We have to work hard to be prepared to show him different looks. And like I said earlier, these aren’t just good players, these are first-ballot Hall of Fame players we’re going against. We have to be creative, we may have to try some stuff out of the box we haven’t done before, especially when we see lineups we can take advantage of that and impact him because I can’t let him just walk around the court and make plays, spray the ball, walk down the lane shoot floaters throw lobs step back and shoot threes. This guy’s an all-time player, so we have that respect that and we have to work to get ready for him. I’m excited for the challenge.”

The challenge will likely be Christian Bruan’s to start. The Nuggets’ starting shooting guard is their main point of attack defender. He struggled earlier this season with other Clippers guard Norman Powell, but Braun’s defense has improved, and Powell’s offense has cooled since those four matchups.

Braun, who is one of the best transition players in the league can tired Harden out a bit with tempo and cuts but stopping him will be tough. Braun needs to focus on getting over screens and not fouling. Harden drew the third-most shooting fouls in the NBA this past season, and Braun is the Nuggets’ only real hope at slowing The Beard.

Look for Peyton Watson to get some time on Harden’s actions, as well as a splash of Jamal Murray. If Denver can stop Harden and hold him to a tour-date-shooting night, they’ll likely break the Clippers.