Dwight Howard and James Harden's leadership skills just continue to come under fire.
Typically, you'd expect the two stars on a team to involve the rest of the roster. You'd want them to take the young players—and the experienced veterans who are fulfilling specific roles—under their wings and help them grow, both as players and as people.
But such isn't the case for the Houston Rockets. As CBS Sports' Matt Hammond rightfully explains, "It's worth noting, this is just one player's opinion, from just one player's vantage point."
However, what Donatas Motiejunas has to say isn't exactly a positive in a summer filled with foot-in-mouth statements by the bearded shooting guard and his superstar teammate:
In addition to that, we have the whole Chandler Parsons saga.
"It won't affect us at all," D12 explained to The Associated Press, via ESPN.com, after his former teammate left for the Dallas Mavericks. "We have myself and James. We have the best center and the best two guard in the game on the same team. It's on us."
Surely Harden had something more sensible to say, right?
"Dwight and I are the cornerstones of the Rockets," Harden told Joaquin Henson of The Philippine Star, refusing to acknowledge the significance of losing Parsons, Jeremy Lin and Omer Asik. "The rest of the guys are role players or pieces that complete our team. We've lost some pieces and added some pieces. I think we'll be fine next season."
The Parsons stuff wasn't good. The role player comment was worse.
Eating separately from your teammates isn't just lack of knowledge on how to be a leader, it's really going out of your way to be a bad leader on purpose.
The whole Rockets organization is under fire right now from fans. To me they're the easiest team to hate in the NBA by far. I feel bad for Rockets fans who had a loveable team with Yao, T-Mac, and then just a bunch of scrappy players up until they got Harden then eventually Howard.
Now most people see them as lead by a couple of prima-donnas and a GM that sees players as nothing more than economic assets. I think Morey makes good moves and he almost snagged Bosh which would have been huge for them.
But I root against the Rockets every time they play (unless they play the Lakers of course).
*BTW*
I should note that this whole thing was totally taken out of context. He just said he eats different food, not that they wouldn't eat with him.
5) The truth. On a Reddit thread about the initial Tweet, a Lithuanian user went back and listened to the actual radio interview the "quote" was from. And transcribed it a little better—or at least a little fuller. Here's what Donatas Motiejunas actually said:
Q: When communicating with Howard and Harden, what do you talk about?
A: Basically I say just "Hello" and "Goodbye" to them.
Q: They don't invite you to barbecue or something?
A: No, they eat different food than me.
Q: What? Do you mean they eat oysters?
A: No... being European, I am more likely to eat oyster than them. They eat fast food.
This just challenges Hardin and Howard to step up their game and take responsibility for the Rockets winning or losing.
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