On February 11, Beijing time, the last day of the NBA trading deadline, there were a number of personnel transactions, of which there were the most concerned about harden and Ben Simmons as the main transaction, and finally, the Nets and Philadelphia reached an agreement, Harden and veteran Millsap were packaged and sent away in exchange for Ben Simmons, Cescuri, Drummond and multiple draft picks.
Harden, in the end, said goodbye to his big brother Durant.
In fact, Harden's departure signal has long been clear to the outside world, on February 11, the Nets against the Wizards, Harden and Millsap announced early that they would not go with the team to the away game and stay in Brooklyn to train. In addition, according to Wo Shen, the reason why the Nets will trade Harden is to learn that Harden will join Philadelphia this summer, rather than letting Harden leave in vain, it is naturally more conducive to the development of the Nets by actively trading. From the perspective of the trade plan alone, the Nets exchanged an All-Star (Simmons), a shooter that is the power (Cescuri), an interior thickness increase (Drummond), and a number of draft picks left, which is the biggest exchange reward for the Nets in theory. Durant once again teamed up with members of the Curry family, and like his brother Steve Curry, Cescuri has superb shooting skills, and I believe that at Durant's side, Curry Jr. has the opportunity to play the best performance of his career.
At the same time, in this deal, Harden as the dealer determined that he would execute the player option for next season, which meant that Harden took the initiative to show favor to Philadelphia and intended to stay in Philadelphia for a long time, and when this contract ended, Harden was most likely to sign a large contract of nearly $270 million for 5 years. Moving to Philadelphia, Embiid, who has the first center candidate for active service, as a teammate, can also get a big contract, Harden made a move to win the chess of life, and sent a championship to complete his career.
But for durant, a good brother of the Nets and Harden, this deal means that the Nets' operation in the past year ended in failure, and in the middle of the 20-21 season, the Nets spent a lot of effort to negotiate with the Rockets, in exchange for Harden, and Irving and Durant formed the Big Three, but unfortunately due to injuries and other uncontrollable factors, the Big Three only played a total of 16 games together, unable to exert the expected power. Going round and round, Harden hurried away without any honor for the Nets, and the story didn't end well.
Kevin Durant was even more unhappy in the whole process of the deal, Harden was basically sure that on the eve of being traded, there was a deal about Harden on social media, and Durant personally appeared and liked it. After Harden was completed by the transaction, Durant and James live-streamed the All-Star Game selection together, until the end Durant did not choose Harden, even if James and the host were joking about Durant at the time, but it was enough to reflect Adu's mood, he was not satisfied with Harden's departure, and produced some angry emotions.
Looking back on Harden's career, he never had the opportunity to work with superstar players, leaving the Thunder for the first year, the first partner was Jeremy Lin, and then the Rockets chose Harden as the core, sent Jeremy Lin away, signed Howard at the end of the peak, and the two partnered together to reach the Western Conference Finals, but finally broke up. In the middle of playing for the Rockets, Harden has been helped by superstars many times, first Chris Paul, and then Westbrook in the MVP period, but he has not been able to achieve his championship dream. Now it is more cooperation with Durant and Irving, but less than a year to break up the gang (even if Irving does not fight for a long time, just partnering with Durant is enough to be strong), poor compatibility is a very serious problem for Harden.
Since playing for the Rockets, Harden has always been the darling of his team and the star of the league, only as a player, has won a number of scoring kings and MVP, is a player full of honors, but if it comes to teamwork, the resoluteness and attitude of the impact of the championship, from the current situation, at least Harden is problematic, and it is a key point that cannot maximize active sacrifice. Joining Philadelphia, partner Embiid is almost hardened in the theoretical personal peak of the last superstar player to work with, I hope he can seize the opportunity, strive to impact the championship, complete the career championship 0 breakthrough!
(Lin Xiaoxiang)