Boston Celtics trading for former MVP on trade block ‘may harm team’s dynamic’
Former MVP James Harden, who is currently one of the top names on the NBA trade block, would only be harmful to the Boston Celtics’ team dynamic on the floor and in the locker room according to Inside The Celtics’ Eric Jay Santos.
“On paper, Harden joining the Celtics looks solid,” the Inside The Celtics writer prefaced before saying, “In practice, the move may harm the team’s dynamic, which is centered around the provenly-successful pairing of Tatum and Brown.”
EJS was responding to NBC Sports’ Kurt Helin including Boston in the running for Harden — with the idea being to swap him out for Malcolm Brogdon on the Philadelphia 76ers’ end of the deal — with the vision of the Cs having four-fifths of an elite starting lineup and finding that final piece with “The Beard.”
“The Celtics have an elite four-fifths of a starting lineup — Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, Kristaps Porzingis, and Robert Williams III/Al Horford — and adding Harden would make them a formidable offense. With Marcus Smart gone, there is a hole at the point guard spot,” Helin wrote. “The trade can be made with Malcolm Brogdon as the core and more (Robert Williams works, but the Sixers don’t really need another center).”
The Boston Celtics already have that elite fifth piece
Mr. Helin, with all due respect, the Boston Celtics already have their fifth piece in an elite starting lineup: Derrick White. Coincidentally, White is the exact reason that Harden isn’t at all necessary on the C’s roster.
It’s not that the two players are equal. Far from it. Even into his mid-30s, Harden is one of the league’s top stat sheet-stuffers and was helped nearly knock out the Celtics in the 2023 postseason before the Miami Heat eventually played the role of exe-Cs-cutioner, if you will. But White plays the perfect complementary role to Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown which has led to deep postseason runs and improved regular season performance for a season and a half since arriving to the Celtics. And Kristaps Porzingis is another high-usage player himself.
Adding Harden would give the Cs a Phoenix Suns-like core, and the Houdini isn’t sure that is the formula to success in the modern NBA, where a deep Denver Nuggets squad just raised the Larry O’Brien Trophy, and will hang its first banner in franchise history this fall.