Harden and his saga are a product of an entertainment conglomerate that has spent the last two decades prioritizing individual stardom over collective legitimacy.
Are we a sport? Or are we pure entertainment?Do we care about the portion of our audience that still watches professional sports for the sports? For the teams? For the name on the front of the jersey instead of the names on the back?I’d like to blame James Harden for the sheer ridiculousness that has unfolded over the last month. For declining a chance to become a free agent and then demanding to be set free. For calling in a favor and then throwing a tantrum when it wasn’t immediately granted.
The Sixers were expecting all of this. They’d spent three months preparing themselves for Harden to make their lives difficult. His people telegraphed it. Go back and read the reporting. Harden’s leverage was the narrative. The backchannel message to the Sixers was, “Don’t make us make this uncomfortable.”
I’d like to blame Harden for all of that. Bad advice, sure. But the company a man keeps is one of the few things he can control. Harden has surrounded himself with people who are either giving him bad advice or who care more about what he can provide them. Either way, they are not very bright. They have allowed Harden to destroy his legacy.I know that sounds hyperbolic. Let me defend it. History tends to judge things in threes. Strikes, stooges, Bronte sisters, denials of the Messiah.
The guilty party is obvious. Harden is an adult. He has a job, an employer, a contract, all of the things that come with being part of adult society at 33 years old. We call those things responsibilities here in the adult world. They can be a royal pain in the ass. But Harden accepted them, and now they are his.
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