James Harden was traded away from the Nets to the Sixers in a move that didn’t really surprise anyone.
He now gets to team up with Joel Embiid creating a duo that should compete for a championship.
There have been many rumors on why Harden wasn’t happy in Brooklyn, from not liking how Steve Nash coached him and Kyrie Irving differently to a difference of philosophies with Kevin Durant.
GM Sean Marks is here to tell you exactly why, though.
He says Harden was upfront from the start and let them know that he needs to win a championship and didn’t feel like Brooklyn was the place to get that done.
This was after the Nets leaked. Harden was a fatty who couldn’t stop going to strip clubs.
FROM THE MOMENT Harden reported to training camp this fall, the Nets knew they could have trouble. Durant arrived in San Diego at a world-class level, fresh off brilliant springtime playoffs and summer Olympics performances and ready to commit to the Nets and his co-stars with a new extension for the next four years.
It was not reciprocal. Harden was heavy and out-of-shape, and intrigued with the idea of free agency for the first time in his career.
Relationships with NBA stars can be delicate, but rarely are they mysterious. Little stays a secret within the NBA community, and Harden was quickly hedging on his future with the Nets, sources said. He kept telling owner Joe Tsai and Marks he wanted to stay long term, but simultaneously started canvassing player agents for advice on an eventual exit strategy to Philadelphia.
Harden’s conversations with various agents and third parties returned to Brooklyn quickly — which happens when you seek professional advice without paying for it.
Co-stars can only help so much. They have to be available, first of all, but Harden also had to change his lifestyle and help himself. It wasn’t lost on teammates that Harden continued his late-night social habits, especially on the Nets’ last Western Conference trip this month. His play, often dispassionate and sloppy, culminated with a four-point performance in a loss to the lowly Sacramento Kings. Maybe Harden could keep this lifestyle up in his 20s, but it wasn’t working now. For a player purporting to have a hand and hamstring injury, this wasn’t inspiring confidence within a team in freefall.
It does make sense, though. Kyrie won’t be able to play a full series, and Joel Embiid is playing the best basketball of his career, so the team-up makes perfect sense.
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