[Pompey] It’s official. The NBA has fined James Harden $100,000 for public comments.
[Pompey] It’s official. The NBA has fined James Harden $100,000 for public comments.
The NBA announced today that Philadelphia 76ers guard James Harden has been fined $100,000 by the NBA for public comments on August 14 and 17 indicating that he would not perform the services called for under his player contract unless traded to another team. The league's investigation, which included an interview of Harden, confirmed that these comments referenced Harden's belief that the 76ers would not accommodate his request to be traded.
Who would take him at this point? The common factor in years of James Harden drama is... James Harden.
He's basically on Kyrie's level now. Still a good player as he showed last season, but his trust level is through the floor. Can't be trusted to perform under pressure, can't be trusted to play on a contract he just opted into, makes trade demands not requests. And for they kind of money he's expecting? Who wants that?
ETA: this is a dumb emotional take, but as a Sixers fan I'd rather have Kyrie at this point lol. I'm sure I would regret that though.
Everybody thinks they want Kyrie until they have Kyrie. Look inside yourself. You know it to be true.
$100K is a huge amount of money for me. For Harden, not so much. Compared to the PG-13 crap players are routinely fined tens of thousands of dollars for (which I don't necessarily agree with), $100K seems surprisingly little for how unprecedented Harden's comments were - although I'm not sure of what technical grounds the league has for fining him. If they wanted to hit him with a harsher penalty, they'd suspend him, but they can't do that without Harden's team (6ers, I presume) taking a massive collateral hit
Usually the amount of fines the league can collect is defined in the CBA.
He shouldn't have taken the player option.