James Harden has been one of the most consistent and dominant forces in the NBA today. He has played on the biggest of stages and performed at the highest level. However, the generational talent that is James Harden has become a problem… a big problem.
Harden was drafted by the Oklahoma City Thunder and formed a young big 3 between himself, Russell Westbrook, and Kevin Durant. However, he was then traded to the Houston Rockets after a few years and at first it was not the best of fits.
The Rockets struggled mightily and lacked an identity. So what did James Harden do? He went to Daryl Morey, the Houston GM at the time and demanded for a coach that fit HIS playstyle. So Morey went out and got Coach Mike D’Antoni, an offensive guru who thinks the best defense is a great offense. This made James Harden very happy.
From 2016 till the end of Harden’s tenure with the Rockets he was the NBA’s top scorer and broke records left and right. But Harden kept falling short, so he demanded another superstar to play with. Houston then proceeded to appease their MVP and acquire Chris Paul.
The two led the Rockets to a game short of the NBA Finals. But that wasn’t enough for Harden. He proceeded to throw a tantrum till Chris Paul was out and he got his old friend Russell Westbrook on the team.
Eventually, Harden got what he wanted and got Westbrook and got similar results. At this point, this is where things with Harden really go off the rails. He proceeded to miss practices and not be with the team, he also requested a trade. This then enters a common theme for James Harden and that is the “fat suit” technique. He began to get bigger if you will, and pretty much threw his health away in order for the Rockets to have no choice but to trade Harden to the Brooklyn Nets.
This Nets team or “the hypothetical Nets” were supposed to be one of the greatest teams ever. However, Kevin Durant was coming off of an achilles injury and Kyrie Irving was a locker cancer. The Kevin Durant aspect Harden assumedly knew, but the off and on court problems of Kyrie really sent Harden into a frenzy.
The three only played 17 games with one another. These issues on top of the horrendous coaching Steve Nash led to Harden to request yet another trade. However, he wanted one place in particular.
He wanted to be reunited with Daryl Morey in Philadelphia and play for the 76ers. For a while the Nets refused to do business with their rival, but eventually, James Harden got his way yet again. He was sent to the 76ers for essentially Ben Simmons (the Nets got fleeced on this trade).
So at this point, James Harden has asked and received everything he has asked for from his teams, but has always wound up throwing tantrums and leaving. That brings us to today, James Harden had played with the NBA MVP in Joel Embiid last season and both choked in a game 7 to the Boston Celtics.
James Harden then demanded a trade abruptly and was shipped to the LA Clippers for again… nothing. These antics by Harden should be seen as a cautionary tale. That tale is don’t give superstars to the world, they’ll just leave you no matter what.
These instances with James Harden should be bad marks on his legacy. He along with Kyrie Irving (you could write a book on dissecting Kyrie) have been constant locker room cancers and headaches.
We are already seeing it with Harden on the Clippers, the team has yet to win a game since the trade, meanwhile the 76ers have gone unbeaten since the trade. If I am an NBA general manager, I would avoid James Harden like the literal plague. He’s manipulative, a whining complainer, and an out right crumb of a player. James Harden has become an absolute joke of an NBA superstar, he doesn’t want to win, he wants to have everything he wants. That’s the take.