Nets general manager Sean Marks insists that talks with 76ers team president Daryl Morey did not start until the days leading up to the trade deadline, and not escalating until hours prior.
But reports linking Harden to Philadelphia have been circulating for weeks, with reports or Harden’s frustration in Brooklyn leading to a desired reunion with Morey, who was in the Rockets front office for much of Harden’s Houston tenure.
One report from Chris Haynes of Yahoo! Sports indicated that multiple teams were ready to file collusion complaints if Harden were to land in Philadelphia with Morey, but Marks didn’t express any visible frustration with the process, rather deferring to whatever the league decides to do about Harden’s road to the Sixers.
“I’m not going to start making accusations at everybody else,” Marks said. “This particular set of circumstances was played out in the media far earlier than any conversations were ever had. If this is where it ends up, that would be completely up to the league to look into these circumstances.”
Morey and Harden were linked in potential tampering violations when Morey sent out a tweet on the one-year anniversary of Harden breaking the Rockets’ all-time assists record, which resulted in a fine given Morey was no longer with the team. Harden, reportedly seeking his way out of Houston at the time, had listed the Sixers as one of his preferred destinations. But Marks didn’t express much frustration about any potential tampering.
“Unfortunately, the world we live in right now, so much of this is being played out in the media,” Marks said. “Whether it’s scuttlebutt, hearsay and so forth, it’s just the nature of the beast. It’s the nature of the world we live in.”
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