On March 11, Beijing time, the NBA regular season ushered in a focus showdown, Durant and Irving led the Nets away to the Philadelphia 76ers, the two sides have previously had a big personnel trade, the Nets used Harden as the main trade to Ben Simmons, Cescuri and Drummond and other chips. Before the game, Philadelphia home fans booed Simmons wildly.
But the game process is not as exciting as the outside world imagines, Harden performed poorly, in the case of Embiid and Durant's strong smell of garbage talk, Harden handed over the data is that the first half of 15 shots 3, the third quarter did not score, and finally the whole game 17 out of 3, plus or minus -30 dismal performance. It can be said that Harden played the worst game since joining Philadelphia, or in the face of the former owner nets to do, which is disappointing.
As a contrast, Cescuri, who also faced the old owner, scored 24 points and 2 assists on 10-of-14 shooting, and Curry Jr. played a convincing performance, showing his ability to the Philadelphia 76ers. However, Harden did not perform the same as Curry Jr., disappointing fans who liked him. In the end, Philadelphia also lost to the Nets by a big score, losing 100-129, a full 29 points.
After the game, the official account of the Philadelphia 76ers was attacked by fans, and many fans were criticizing Harden's performance, and even some fans bluntly questioned the previous post-game training was posing? Fans specifically said: "After the game, the pre-game practice is all posing? Playing like this is really soft" "Can stand and lose Can't kneel to death Lose can be understood So pulling crotch is really incomprehensible" "A hard fight to pull qua, Harden or which Harden" "I am a Harden fan, but please spray him together today, really can't see it, losing can but not soft"
It is clear that philadelphia 76ers fans are unhappy with Harden's performance, so bad in a key battle, as the core of the team, this is not allowed, O'Neal also commented after the game that Harden has not stepped forward in a key game for a long time, Barkley said that he did not ask for a big explosion, but it could not be so bad. It can be seen that after this game, Harden once again entered the center of public opinion, which was the object of key criticism, and the competitive sports dish was the original sin, and it was necessary to bear such criticism if it was not played well.
It is worth mentioning that since Harden became an NBA superstar level figure so far, he has indeed failed to play properly in many key games, of which, the most impressive is the 17-18 Western Conference Finals, when Harden played for the Rockets, partnered with Chris Paul, in the case of Paul fighting to a leg injury to bring the Rockets to the series 3-2 big score lead, Harden did not play well in the key games of G6 and G7, resulting in the final Rockets were eliminated 3-4, that year, It was the closest Harden came to the championship as a leader in his entire NBA career, but he did not succeed in the end, which has a lot to do with Harden's performance in key battles.
Now, 4 years later, Harden is still at the superstar level, this time in Philadelphia with MVP-level Embiid, once again has the possibility of impacting the championship. But Harden still hasn't proven to be able to play well in key battles, which is believed to determine whether the Philadelphia 76ers can win the championship.
(Lin Xiaoxiang)