Has there ever been a player in the history of the NBA as talented — yet frustrating — as James Harden?

Harden is a former MVP and one of the most unstoppable offensive juggernauts the game has ever seen.

Harden is back with the Clippers this season and set to play a pivotal roleGetty

He’s also a largely terrible playoff performer who’s come up short time and time again in the postseason.

How many times have we seen Harden dazzle with a 40-point outing in one game before shooting 20 percent from the floor in the next?

(Fun fact: Harden has attempted ten or more shots in a playoff game while making just 20 percent or fewer of said attempts thirteen times in his career — an NBA record.)

For a future Hall of Famer, Harden’s postseason résume makes for bleak reading.

Since making the 2012 NBA Finals with the Thunder and leaving Oklahoma City that same year, Harden’s teams have reached the conference finals twice, the last time in 2018.

Harden’s prime MVP years came in Houston during the mid 2010s, which happened to coincide with Golden State’s dominance. Much like everyone else out West, he couldn’t solve the Warriors puzzle.

An expensively assembled Brooklyn Nets superteam subsequently failed to take off and a bust-up with 76ers president of basketball operations Darly Morey ended his time in Philadelphia.

As Harden cycled through teams, his rivals, contemporaries, and former teammates were winning basketball’s biggest prize.

Now with the Los Angeles Clippers, 35-year-old Harden’s championship window is rapidly closing.

According to Jonathan Feigen, a longtime Rockets and NBA beat writer for the Houston Chronicle, that window may already have slammed shut.

His peak years came in Houston between 2012 and 2021Getty

Harden’s time in Brooklyn alongside Durant and Irving was a spectacular failureAP

“Well, that’s not very likely [Harden winning a title before he retires],” Feigen exclusively told talkSPORT.

“He is one of the most fascinating players of his era in a lot of ways because there’s so many contradictions.

“His legacy, assuming the Clippers are not a championship team, will always be those that point to his failures in the postseason.

“Some of it gets exaggerated, but some of it is fair.

“I used to say he’s never been bad in a close out game. He’s been either good or horrible.

“And that’s part of his legacy that there’s been some of these
disaster, closeout games.

“The numbers overall when facing elimination are just really bad,
that’s part of it.

His relationship with the 76ers president of basketball operations ended in time in PhillyGetty

Playoff disappearances and woeful inefficiency has been the name of the game for the man who once boldly claimed, “I am not a system player. I am a system.”

Harden has played in 166 games in 15 postseasons during his career, which includes 30 separate playoff series.

His teams have won 15 of those series and lost 15, amounting to a less than earth-shattering 87-79 career playoff record.

The former Sixth Man of the Year’s numbers have also taken a hit on the big stage.

The shooting guard has averaged 24.1 points, 7.1 assists and 5.6 rebounds in 1,072 regular-season games during his career.

He’s averaged 22.7 points, 6.4 assists and 5.5 rebounds in 166 games in the playoffs in his career — all down on his regular-season career averages.

Harden’s most recent playoff disappointment came last season in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs at the hands of the Dallas Mavericks.

Harden was largely the best player and go-to guy for a Kawhi Leonard-less Clippers for most of that postseason.

But old habits die hard, and once again he failed to deliver when it mattered most.

Harden finished with seven points, seven assists and four rebounds on 2-of-12 from the field in a Game 5 defeat to the Mavs, before going 5-of-16 from the field and missing all six of his three-pointers in a Game 6 elimination.

Feigen thinks Harden’s championship window is closedGetty

The Clippers and postseason failure is a tale as old as time.

This season they will hope to change that narrative. They’ve already made a number of roster changes, most notably shipping Paul George to the 76ers.

Harden will now be asked to play even more of a pivotal role than before in support of Leonard, something Feigen thinks could suit the ten-time All-Star.

“He’s got a lot of things that are in place in LA right now,” he said.

“He’s got a great coach. The ball will be back in his hands and that’s where he’s at his best.

“He is a genius offensively and he sees things people just do not see as a point guard.”

It’s now or never for HardenGetty

Harden’s flash, flair and scoring prowess is beyond question.

Few players in the history of the game could get a bucket as easily as ‘The Beard’, while his trademark stepback 3-pointer remains one of the deadliest shots in professional basketball.

Whether Harden’s ball-dominant iso style of play can actually translate into winning basketball remains up for debate, though.

Likewise, Harden’s status as an an all-time great player, rather than just an all-time great scorer, is still very much up in the air.

Winning a title this season would certainly go a long way in ending that debate, but in the loaded Western Conference, a Clippers championship banner seems nothing more than a mere pipe dream.

Feigen ultimately thinks Harden will be remembered as one of The Association’s greatest offensive players — just not one that could deliver a championship.

“I think in time his history will be more understood that there was good and bad in the playoffs, but offensively there were stretches where he was one-of-a-kind that he was a very special, rare offensive player.

“But winning a championship? Yeah, I don’t see that happening.”