The James Harden trade: Five years later
It’s also important to give the Rockets credit for making this move and developing Harden. A good number of franchises would never have traded so many first round draft picks. The Rockerts, who were in desperate need of a franchise player at the time, clearly saw potential in Harden. Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey, who pulled off the trade, also deserves major credit for steering Harden’s career back in the right direction.
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After a disappointing 2016 season, where the Rockets finished just 41-41, Morey hired Mike D’Antoni to be the team’s head coach. D’Antoni was coming off two underwhelming stints as coach of the Knicks and Lakers, and looked as if his coaching career would come to an end. But, Morey saw what D’Antoni, an offensive minded coach, could do for Harden. He turned the Rockets star into a point guard and helped make Houston one of the best offenses in the NBA. Had it not been for Westbrook’s historic season, Harden would have been last year’s MVP, taking the misery of this trade to a new level.
Here’s an unpopular opinion I have. It would be a lot worse if Harden and the Rockets won a title instead of Durant and the Warriors. The basic reason for this is that Durant’s decision was out of the Thunder’s control. It’s becoming more evident Durant was pushed by his friends and representatives to make this move. We’ll learn how much he really wanted to leave the Thunder as the years go by. But with Harden, this was all in the Thunder’s control. Not only did they trade Harden, they traded him to what has now become a major conference rival.
Teams are starting to realize that it is a better idea to ship stars out of conference, in order to avoid getting snake bitten. For example, the Pacers could have gotten a much better return on the Paul George trade by sending him to either Cleveland or Boston. However, new management wanted George out of the east, in an attempt to avoid playing him on a consistent basis for years to come.