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When the Oklahoma Metropolis Thunder made the 2012 Finals with a younger Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden, the widespread assumption was that they’d be a drive for years to come back.
As an alternative, OKC traded Harden for varied function gamers three days earlier than the next season started.
Harden nonetheless had one other yr left on his contract, however the Thunder have been decided to get one thing for him earlier than they discovered themselves paying huge cash to all three of their stars, in addition to a hefty luxurious tax invoice.
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The commerce instantly grew to become one of many NBA’s nice what-ifs and is commonly nonetheless talked about to at the present time.
Kevin Durant was even requested about it as not too long ago as this week throughout a podcast with JJ Redick.
“The [trade] speak hit me out of nowhere so I didn’t actually know take care of it at that time,” Durant stated.
“So I’m simply targeted on doing my job. So I used to be identical to, whoever’s coming right here to play, that’s cool… Then you definitely see [Harden], as a result of James got here off the bench for us, and you then see how he performs as a starter, it was identical to, maintain up, was {that a} good transfer?”
Durant later stated that if he was older on the time he would have spoken up and insisted the Thunder pay Harden and any ensuing luxurious tax.
He additionally famous that whereas he had a superb relationship with Oklahoma Metropolis normal supervisor Sam Presti, the 2 of them tended to not focus on the make-up of the roster.
After all, Durant would later reunite with Harden in Brooklyn, and earlier than that Harden performed with Westbrook in Houston. However neither state of affairs labored out.
Apparently, the basketball gods in some unspecified time in the future determined any mixture of these three guys was simply not meant to be.
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