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A couple of months ago, it was hard to imagine James Harden was going to be a member of the 76ers for much longer based on the falling out between the two sides. It does seem like those tensions have cooled down a bit, but there are still some issues to iron out based on what happened when he tried to hop aboard the team plane for a road trip earlier this week.
There aren’t many players in the NBA who’ve been the source of more internal friction in recent years than James Harden, who forced his way out of Houston in 2021 before joining the Nets. However, he only spent a little over a year with Brooklyn before asking for another change of scenery and got one when he was sent to the Philadelphia 76ers in a trade involving Ben Simmons.
One of the reasons Harden was interested in taking his talents to Philly was that it gave him the chance to reunite with former Rockets executive Daryl Morey, who serves as the president of basketball operations for the 76ers. Unfortunately, that reunion didn’t exactly pan out as he’d hoped.
Over the summer, Harden agreed to opt into his player option with the 76ers with the apparent understanding the franchise would attempt to trade him before the season kicked off. However, it was unable to find any suitors, and we were treated to a very public falling out between the two men after Harden branded Morey a “liar” and said their relationship had reached the point of no return.
There were plenty of people who assumed Harden would either skip training camp or show up and cause a scene, but there was a fairly surprising lack of drama when he eventually reported prior to the start of the current campaign.
As things currently stand, it appears Harden will be suiting up for the 76ers this season. However, he won’t be in attendance when they kick off their year against the Bucks on Thursday night despite his best efforts.
According to Bleacher Report, the 76ers told Harden they wanted him to stay in Philadelphia to keep working on his conditioning instead of joining them for the two-game road trip. While he apparently interpreted that as a suggestion, he learned that was not the case when he tried to board the plane to Milwaukee:
“Harden proceeded to participate in portions of the session with the intention of joining the team on the flight to Milwaukee that afternoon.
After practice, Harden arrived at the fixed-base operator airport to board the team flight, but he was stopped by a security official who notified him that he was not permitted to accompany the team, sources say…
Harden, frustrated, departed the airport without further incident.”
It seems like there’s a chance Harden will be ready to play when the team heads back to Philadelphia to face off against Portland on Sunday, but we’ll just have to wait and see how this entire situation pans out.