Good No Call Or Did James Harden And The Rockets Get Boned?

There two ways to look at Game 1 between the Rockets and Warriors. One is that it lived up to the hype and was every bit the battle we were hoping for. A full 48 minutes of high drama and two teams that really hate the shit out of each other. Huge performances from star players and just a preview of what’s to come. The other way to look at it is instead of talking about all the important parts of the game, the strategy, the chess match all that stuff we’ll all be talking about how this game ended more specifically whether or not James Harden got fouled on his final shot attempt of the night.

Now here’s the thing, right off the bat you have to factor in that there’s a large portion of the internet that hates how James Harden plays. They see a situation like this unfold and they’ll be quick to call it a good no call just because they’re bitter against Harden for whatever reason. Here’s what we know, we know that the NBA pretty much gave the offensive player this foul a large percentage of the time during the regular season. This wasn’t the worst example of a Warrior jumping into a Rocket’s landing space, but we have seen this called a foul a shit ton of times during the year. It’s also true that James Harden jumps forward and does not jump and land in a straight up fashion. Draymond is straight up, but he definitely travels into Harden’s space. It’s a bang bang play and I can see both sides. You don’t want to reward Harden for baiting the foul but Draymond’s activity has been a foul all year.

Personally, I’m calling this a foul. To me even with Harden having his feet forward, Draymond still went forward into his space even if he was straight up.. I think of it like if this play happened to the star player on your favorite team, you would probably think he got fouled. Even if the officials tried to set the tone and make this not a foul all game, by the letter of the law you can’t be doing stuff like this. Kawhi’s ankles didn’t die for these to not be fouls. It also didn’t help that CP3 got tossed in a big spot but I think that’s mostly because he made contact with the official.

So I’ll ask you. Where are you leaning, foul or good no call?