On the eve of the NBA market deadline, the exchange between James Harden and Ben Simmons had become the NBA version of Schrödinger’s cat paradox. After a long Bleacher Report article had sparked speculation about Harden’s future, defined as discontent with his situation in Brooklyn, The Athletic had upped the ante by claiming that the Nets and Sixers had already begun to discuss a trade before the market deadline. After a few days of rumors and controversies, a sort of stalemate was reached: the trade was both very close to its realization (according to what was claimed by Brian Windhorst of ESPN) and far from even discussing it (according to what Adrian Wojnarowski said instead. , curiously also from ESPN).
It’s all part of the great “Game of the Parties” that becomes the NBA market when it mixes with US journalism: on the one hand, Windhorst was trying to push the water towards the mill of Daryl Morey, GM of the Sixers who used all his influence against insiders to put pressure on Brooklyn; on the other hand, Sean Marks has tried to ingratiate himself with the number 1 of NBA insiders like Wojnarowski to try to control the narrative around the exchange.
The point of no return came on the Italian afternoon yesterday, when Woj – on a clear cue from Marks and the Nets – opened the day of the deadline with the bomb that everyone was waiting for: Harden had made it clear that he wanted to be sold by the Nets, but he had not made an official request “for fear of the backlash in terms of image in asking to be swapped for two consecutive years”. One spin artfully published just to have that effect there, as if it hadn’t already been clear to everyone with his horrific on-court performance against Sacramento last week that his days in Brooklyn were over.
“I’m told that James Harden wants a trade to the 76ers. He wants it to happen today prior to the trade deadline. But he has resisted formally requesting that trade with the Nets organization.”
—@wojspn pic.twitter.com/Qo954XH0vg
— Get Up (@GetUpESPN) February 10, 2022
As much as they tried hard to make it seem like it wasn’t – even sending Steve Nash to the slaughterhouse and making him say “We won’t trade James Harden” at the press conference while his nose stretched like Pinocchio -, the Brooklyn Nets paradoxically had more pressure. to make this trade right away compared to what the Sixers had. Between the two teams the one that could not keep it the status quo it was certainly Brooklyn: since Kyrie Irving returned and Kevin Durant got hurt the team is in disarray from the point of view of chemistry even before that of results, and the results tell us that they have lost their last nine games in row of which eight with double-digit differences, collapsing miserably to eighth place in the Eastern Conference.
In this period of time, James Harden has made it clear, with facts rather than words, that he no longer wants to stay in Brooklyn. We had some reasons why their marriage fell apart already written last week, and from that moment on things have only gotten worse, so much so that his stay in the team would have proved an even worse problem than the headaches they already have to deal with for the Irving affair. If the problem of having a disgruntled Harden in the locker room (and even more disinterested in defense than he already was) is also added his free agency coming in July (with the possibility of losing him a zero after spending on him players of the level of Caris LeVert and Jarrett Allen just a year ago, plus the beauty of seven top picks and pick swaps), you get a cocktail too hard to swallow for Sean Marks and owner Joe Tsai, who is spending an amount of money on this team that only people so rich can afford that the very thought hurts.
However, Harden’s upcoming free agency also meant that teams to converse with were greatly reduced, not to say that only one remained: the Philadelphia 76ers. A fact that Daryl Morey has exploited to his advantage, with a sort of insider trading that certainly has not calmed his relations with the leadership of the Nets. Gradually Marks found himself forced to argue with Morey about the trade, because any alternative would probably have been worse: even in the best case scenario, that is to have the whole team and win the 2022 title, the Nets should have however, to re-sign Harden with a five-year $ 270 million. And considering what his health has been in the last calendar year, the relationships with the other two stars are not exactly idyllic (let’s not turn around: if Harden is no longer in Brooklyn it’s because Kevin Durant and Irving were fine with it) and first signs of a slowdown in his performance level (sometimes stellar, but not * inevitably * stellar as it was in Houston in the regular season), the swap now ended up being the most rational decision to make.
Kyrie Irving was ready for James Harden to move on, @joevardon writes.
“When Irving heard Harden was in fact hoping to be traded, a well-placed source says he was eager to see it come to fruition.”
More details on the Nets’ breakup: https://t.co/fSqt1axErZ pic.twitter.com/PsVNuZmWlZ
— The Athletic NBA (@TheAthleticNBA) February 10, 2022
The relationship between Irving and Harden, as it was obvious, was not exactly a bed of roses.
In the end, trading a disgruntled star for a package consisting of Ben Simmons, Seth Curry, Andre Drummond and two first picks in the Draft (one now or in 2023, one in 2027 protected 8) is a more than substantial return for a player in the game. expired in a few months that he no longer intended to stay. Of course, it is not a risk-free exchange, both because the Sixers are divisional rivals (by the way: mark the challenge of next March 11 in Philadelphia on your calendar) and there is a very good chance that they will cross paths in the playoffs in the coming years, and because Harden he still remains one of the 75 best players of all time.
But Simmons is seven years younger, he still has four years on his contract beyond that (which makes him a asset on the market in case everything goes wrong), and is perfect for the defensive scheme of coach Steve Nash who wants to change on all the blocks, giving a versatility that probably no other All-Star could have given the Nets. In attack, then, he can both be useful with the ball in his hands to push in transition (even if in the roster there are not many players able to run with him) and take advantage of a very open field with shooters of the caliber of Durant, Irving, Curry, Patty Mills and Joe Harris (currently injured and at risk for the season), a battery he has never been able to play with in his career. And even without the ball in his hands, Simmons could fill the role of Bruce Brown, bringing blocks to the ball for Irving and Durant to play in the open spaces.
This obviously speaking of the version ideal Simmons, as at the moment we only know that “he is anxious to join the team and to step up his path to get back on the pitch,” according to his agent Rich Paul to ESPN. We have no idea, however, which version of Simmons will show up on the pitch, or when he will show up on the pitch, or how much the dross of the terrible series against the Atlanta Hawks last July has remained on him. Will he still be afraid of throwing free? Will he play so badly in attack that he won’t be deployable in the finals? Is he okay with being third star alongside Irving and Durant, and having to change roles in home games where Kyrie isn’t available (due to New York City regulations)? One of the many reasons why he wanted to leave Philadelphia was also because he finally wanted to try to have a team “all of his own”: this cannot happen in Brooklyn.
Turning instead to the Philadelphia side, you must first take off your hat in front of the perseverance of Daryl Morey, who from the very beginning claimed to want to sell Simmons only for a star of the same level or higher and in the end he succeeded, a goal that in several moments in the past few months (not to mention last July) just seemed impossible. However, it must be said that numerous planets have lined up in favor of him: the team did so well that they were fighting for first place in the East (if they too had a streak of 9 defeats in a row, perhaps the pressure would have been different); having let so much time go by has erased a bit the memory of Simmons’ faults, making him remember above all his merits; his close relationship with Harden (who also has ties within the Philadelphia property) made the Sixers the only viable option, excluding the other 28 franchises from a possible auction for his services.
Strengthened by all this and the hustle and bustle within the Nets caused by Harden himself, Morey completed the trade without having to relinquish either Tyrese Maxey or Matisse Thybulle, whose divestments would likely have raised the NBA’s hottest supporters. Very badly, that is, with Harden who leaves in 2023 (by the way: to complete the exchange he exercised his player option for next year and can extend for 223 million in four years in six months), the Sixers in the future will still have this year’s team without Curry (also a free agent in 2023) and without Drummond (who at this point in their career he is basically a 15-minute rebound specialist in regular season and zero in the playoffs), with two fewer first picks in the draft. All in all, an affordable risk to greatly increase one’s chances of the title in those that represent Joel Embiid’s best seasons.
There remains just one aspect of the story that is not much discussed: are we really sure that Harden and Embiid are so complementary on the pitch? If in the offensive half they still have so much talent that they can find a way to make themselves unstoppable for the opposing defenses (although Harden has never played with a long man who swallows so many balls like Embiid and vice versa, and without Curry the spacings will be from reinvent), it is in the defensive half that they seem just incompatible. At this point in his career Harden can only function in a pattern that changes on all blocks by playing from 4 “de facto”, but Embiid is at his best when he can play “drop” and obscure the view with his mammoth body while the outsider returns to his man bypassing the block. Two styles that clash philosophically even before technically and to which Doc Rivers will have to find a remedy, perhaps counting on the motivations of Barba who, however, when involved, as in last year’s playoffs (even on one leg), in his best days in Brooklyn is not seemed totally unsustainable in defense.
What emerges as irrefutable from this exchange is that both teams, for various reasons, needed to leave the problems of recent months behind and move on. Both agreed that it was better to do it now rather than drag Harden and Simmons’ two situations into the summer, giving the environment a modicum of serenity (oh my God, the Nets still have to deal with Irving’s part-time job. , on which hangs a non-irrelevant percentage of the probabilities of the next NBA title) and trying to get out of the negative spiral in which they had ended.
