After James Harden initial passive aggressive protest against playing for the Houston Rockets, it appeared as though that Harden had chosen to act professionally and play out his time as a Rocket.
However, as the first stent of this regular season played out, it became overwhelming clear that James Harden was unmotivated and disinterested in giving this iteration of the Houston Rockets a chance, despite the overachieving performances of John Wall and Christian Wood.
Heading into last night's game against the Los Angeles Lakers, Harden had recorded under 20 points in 4 consecutive games, an unheard of stretch for a guy who has consistently averaged over 30 points per game over the last 3 years and is widely recognized as the best scorer in the NBA today, and one off the greatest scorers to ever grace the basketball court.
Harden's nonchalant behavior in addition to the Rocket's Tuesday night's 117-100 blowout lost to the Lakers clearly pushed Harden and his teammates over the edge.
After the game John Wall told the media "when you have certain guys in the mix who don't want to buy in all as one it's gonna be hard to do anything special, to do anything good as a basketball team." While Wall didn't mention Harden by name, it was clear as daylight that the comment was targeted at the disgruntled superstar.
Harden had his own words for the media following the blowout loss, "we're just not good enough … I love this city. I literally have done everything that I can," Harden said. "I mean, this situation is crazy. It's something that I don't think can be fixed." While Harden's intentions were well know in the NBA world, his straightforward comments still came as a surprise to NBA officials. Nonetheless, Harden's comments made it evident that he had no intention of putting on a Houston Rockets jersey again.
Harden's comments forced the Rockets hand, sparking reports that the Rockets were trying to trade actively trade James Harden as soon as possible. A multitude of reports surfaced today stating that the Philadelphia 76ers and the Brooklyn Nets were the frontrunners and were in constant contact with the Rockets. Later reports came out saying that Brooklyn Nets were putting together a trade package involving as many first-round pick as possible, whilst the Rockets were expecting a package involving Ben Simmons, Tyrese Maxey and draft compensation from Philadelphia.
Further news came out reporting that the 76ers had pulled out of the race for James Harden because they viewed Ben Simmons as an indispensable asset, and not much later ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski broke the news that Harden was on his way to Brooklyn as a part of a four team deal.
The deal will see the Nets acquire Harden, while the Rockets will receive Victor Oladipo, Dante Exum, Rodions Kurucs, four first-round picks – including the Milwaukee Bucks' 2022 first-round pick from the Cleveland Cavaliers — and four Nets pick swaps.
The Cavaliers will get Jarrett Allen and Taurean Prince and send a 2024 second-round pick to the Rockets, and the fourth team, the Indiana Pacers, will get Caris LeVert and a second-round pick.
All of the picks and pick swaps Houston is receiving from Brooklyn will reportedly be unprotected.
Whilst this trade involves four teams, the core impact of the deal revolves around the Brooklyn Nets and the Houston Rockets, so lets breakdown the trade from each teams perspective.
Houston Rockets perspective :
For Houston, I believe this was a great return for a generational superstar considering their circumstances. Look, for teams who trade a franchise player of the caliber of James Harden, it is extremely hard to win any trade. However, considering the publicity of Harden's unwillingness to be in Houston, I believe that the Houston Rockets did as well as they possibly could. Obviously, Ben Simmons would have been the crown jewel in any Harden trade, but after he was declared untouchable by the 76ers, I believe that the Nets offer was the next best thing.
The Rockets now have control over Brooklyn's draft for the next eight years, which is a substantial amount of draft assets, especially considering that a huge portion of those assets are over half a decade into the future, when Kevin Durant and James Harden will most likely be on the brink of retirement.
The Rockets are hoping their trade with the Nets plays out similarly to the trade the Celtics made with the Nets in 2013, where the Celtics traded away two aging stars, Paul Peirce and Kevin Garnett, in exchange for a plethora of draft picks which eventually turned into the ascending young duo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
Victor Oladipo is also a very good player to acquire for the Rockets. After struggling for a majority of last season due to injury , Oladipo has presumably returned to his old form, averaging 17.4 points, 4.6 rebounds and 3.9 assists. Additionally ,acquiring a good player in not detrimental to the Rockets future plans because they are not similar to a traditional rebuilding team from the standpoint that they have no real incentive to tank as they owe all their draft picks to OKC for the foreseeable future.
Brooklyn Nets perspective :
For Brooklyn, this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to assemble three All-NBA players on the same tram. This trade obviously makes the Nets overwhelming favorites to represent the Eastern Conference in the NBA Finals , but I would argue that the trade is even more valuable because it provides them insurance for Kyrie Irving.
After Kyrie Irving was paired with his best friend, Kevin Durant, in his hometown of Brooklyn, many assumed that many of his personality issues and mood issues would resolve themselves. Unfortunately for the Nets organization, the reality has been far from that.
Irving has not participated in the Nets past four contests and has been reportedly "off the grid" and has not been in contact with the Nets organization or any of his teammates. This has cause obvious frustrations in NBA circles, with First Take host Stephen A Smith even declaring that Kyrie Irving " should retire today because he clearly doesn't love basketball enough."
Recently, reports have even came out stating that Kyrie Irving has reportedly been “furious” at the Nets for not giving him “more input” on their head coach hiring and was “not in favor” of Steve Nash His recent relationship with Kevin Durant recently has also been described as “very distant.”
Therefore, acquiring James Harden is a more valuable move for the Nets because not only does it create arguably the best big three in the league, it also provides them with insurance in the event that the hassle caused by Irving continues.
From an on-court perspective, this trade catapults the Nets into the top tier championship contenders and makes them the primary threat to the Los Angeles Lakers, but this trade also comes with immense pressure. Considering the shear volume of assets the Nets gave away in exchange for James Harden, the Brooklyn Nets are now in a must-win mode for mode.
Considering that Kevin Durant and James Harden are 32 and 31 years of age respectively, this gives the Nets a five to six year window as a perennial championship contender and now its up to the players to bring home a , if not multiple championships.
If they are able to capitalize on this opportunity, the juice will be worth the squeeze. However, if they fail to bring a championship parade to the city of Brooklyn, the Nets may find themselves in a very similar situation to the one they were in for a majority of the last decade, at the bottom of the barrel with no way out.
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