CAMDEN, N.J.–Before becoming the leader of the Philadelphia 76ers out on the floor, James Harden was a member of the Brooklyn Nets. He was on a team with Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving and the three of them were expected to put up some historic numbers while leading the Nets to a championship.
Instead, due to a variety of reasons, the trio played a grand total of 16 games together across two seasons. The Nets were 13-3 in those games and they were 5-1 in games that all three played in the playoffs.
At the 2022 deadline, Harden was the first of the trio to leave as he was sent to the Sixers in the Ben Simmons deal. Fast forward to this playoff matchup between the Sixers and the Nets, and Durant and Irving are now gone as well.
“I don’t really wanna go into that, but there were a lot of internal things going on,” Harden said at practice on Friday. “It was one of the reasons why I made my decision and everybody talked down on me and gave me negative feedback or whatever you wanna call it, but now, fast forward to today, nobody’s saying like ‘Oh, James was smart’ or ‘James knew what he was doing’.”
Wth that being said, Harden is not one to ask for any credit. He just wants to move on and play basketball and do what he does for the Sixers. He also doesn’t have any ill feelings toward the Nets. He is happy with the haul they got for both Durant and Irving.
“I don’t want credit, but I’m happy where they are now,” The Beard added. “Best of luck to those guys and Joe Tsai and that organization. They turned what they had into something really good. They’re in the playoffs and nothing but great talk about those guys in the organization.”
In terms of what Harden sees in the Nets at the moment, he discusses how versatile they are as a group.
“Athletic, long, a lot of really good shooters,” he stated. “They do a really good job of spacing the floor, Nic Claxton is a lob target and versatile in defending 1 through 5, so we gotta be on point from the tip of the game tomorrow (Saturday’s Game 1) to the end of the series.”
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