Update: On Thursday, December 10th, Shams Charania reports that Harden now has the Bucks, Heat, Nets, and 76ers on his preferred destinations.
Don't give up on the idea of the 76ers acquiring James Harden, just yet.
ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski is reporting that Harden would be "open" to being traded to the Philadelphia 76ers, or other contenders.
However, Woj also reports that, "The Rockets and the Sixers have had no substantive talks about a potential Harden deal."
New Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey—who of course acquired Harden in a blockbuster trade while he was running the Houston Rockets' front office—has talked this offseason about his desire to keep both Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons.
On November 24th, Morey told 94WIP's Jon Marks & Ike Reese that he believes the Sixers are title contenders.
"Yeah, I do think this is a team that can contend," Morey said. "I like that, teams are—feels like we're coming from the underdog part of it. You don't have to go back about one year—towards the end of the season the Sixers were forecasted to be right there with Milwaukee in the East and everyone obviously did not play quite as well as that. I prefer to be in this spot, where everyone thinks we're like the sixth best team in the East and we'll shock people. So, I'm excited for that."
From a Houston standpoint, the Rockets just traded Russell Westbrook for John Wall to pair with Harden. Woj reports "the Rockets have been adamant that they will not be rushed into trading Harden."