James Harden didn't want to stay in Brooklyn anymore, and his former teammates on the Nets immediately "drew a line" with him with action. Kevin Durant did not pick Harden until the end of this year's "All-Star Draft" and let him go to the LeBron James team.
Such a scene occurred on February 10, US time, just a few hours after the mid-season trading deadline of the season. On a day full of big deals, Harden's departure from the Nets and being traded to the 76ers is undoubtedly the most eye-catching deal. Despite all the kinds of retentions, although repeatedly stressing that there would be no trade, the Nets management pulled the trigger on the trade at the last minute.
After such a blockbuster transaction appeared, the rest of the wave also spread to the subsequent All-Star Draft. As in the past 4 years, this year's NBA All-Star Game will continue to be captained by the "ticket king" of the East and West - James of the Lakers and Durant of the Nets this year - and then the captain will select 4 starters and 7 substitutes through the live draft to form his own All-Star team.
Speaking of which, James and Durant are old acquaintances of the All-Star Draft. Last year, the two had a head-to-head confrontation on this stage. Durant became captain of the All-Star for the second time in a row, and James is the fifth in a row — he hasn't let the captainship fall by the way since the All-Star rebrand.
Moreover, James not only participated in the All-Star Draft a lot, but also had a fairly high winning percentage. In the previous 4 drafts, James and Curry had a showdown, twice with the "alphabet brother" Antetokounmpo, last year was the first time to play with Durant, from the final All-Star game results, James's first 4 drafts were very successful, and his team also maintained 4 consecutive wins.
Therefore, before the start of this year's All-Star Draft, an important topic of concern for fans is whether Durant can learn from last year's experience and lessons, and create some pressure and trouble for James in the selection process, thus laying a solid foundation for the subsequent All-Star game. However, if you only look at the results of the All-Star Draft, the strength of the James team seems to be slightly higher.
Since James is the most popular player of all-Stars this year, he gets the right of first choice during the starting selection phase. And he almost wasted almost no time, and immediately picked out the "alphabet brother" Antetokounmpo. In James's own words, Alphabet Brother is "the hardest player in All-Star history to play the main game", which is also an important reason why he picked Alphabet Brother with the first pick.
Subsequently, Durant's first pick was somewhat unexpected. Last year, in order to take care of the feelings of teammate Irving, Durant did not pick out Curry, who was very good in form and strength, with the first pick. This year, Durant still did not pick the former Warriors teammate, but chose Joel Embiid, who has performed well with the 76ers this season and is about to become a teammate with Harden. With Durant injured and unable to play in the All-Star Game, Embiid became the first starter for Durant's team.
Seeing Durant's choice, James did not hesitate and immediately picked out Curry, and everything was like a repeat of last year. James, Alphabet and Curry joined forces again to become teammates in the All-Star Game for the second year in a row. James' other two starters were DeRozan with the 5th pick and Jokic with the 7th pick. Durant picked Morant and Tatum (replacing the injured Durant) after selecting Embiid, and Trey Young and Wiggins joined Durant together.
Judging only from the results of the starting five-man team, the James team seems to be slightly better in terms of the strength of the players and the combination of the lineup. In the subsequent substitution selection, the two captains came and went, constantly increasing the depth of their team's lineup.
Durant has the power to pick the bench, he picked out the Suns' Booker, and James chose the Lone Ranger Doncic. After Durant selected Towns, James picked Garland, the first-time All-Star, because of his deep inner "feelings for Cleveland," in James's own words.
Since then, Durant has picked out Zach Lavin, Desontay Murray, Middleton, and Lamelo Ball, while James has chosen Paul, Jimmy Butler, Donovan Mitchell, and VanVleet. The All-Star Draft is here, and only two players have not yet belonged, namely Jazz's center Gobert, and Harden, who has just been traded to the 76ers. And the order of selection, it is Durant's turn.
At this point, the situation mentioned at the beginning of the article occurred, and Durant did not hesitate to say Gobert's name. James on the other side of the camera, and laughing so hard that he couldn't help himself, holding his noteboard, blocked between the camera and his face. But his laughter still came out through the microphone. Later, he simply took away the note board and laughed wildly at the camera.
Logically, Harden's strength would not have fallen to the final selection, but James may have guessed that Durant would not choose the player who had just become his former teammate, so he has always kept Harden in the draft pool. His smile may be the joy after the success of the "plan".
Charles Buckley, who is in charge of the live commentary, also did not forget to add fuel to the fire, "When someone wants to leave, you let them go, and never let them come back," Barkley also laughed.
In the face of such a scene and atmosphere, Durant still maintained his cold face. At the same time, he also hopes to link this selection move more with basketball considerations. "I chose because I needed some tall players, especially against opponents like Giannis and LeBron James," Durant explained, "I needed my teammates to play against them, so I chose Rudy Gobert." ”
Whether Durant's reasons for choosing the man were really as he described, James Harden eventually fell into the James team. Although James' Lakers have been in poor form and form recently, they have also been busy for a long time before the trade deadline and finally achieved nothing. But at least on the day of the All-Star Draft, James seemed to have the upper hand again in the second consecutive year of wit with Durant.
On February 21, Beijing time, the All-Star Game will kick off in Cleveland. Whether Team James won five straight wins or whether Team Durant ended the Emperor's unbeaten run after the All-Star remake will be known.