Brooklyn Nets: James Harden trade a necessary gamble

By shipping out the farm in exchange for James Harden, the Brooklyn Nets are wisely doing all they can to capitalize on their championship window.

Three rotation players and four overall. Three unprotected first-round picks and four-pick swaps. That’s the haul it took for the Brooklyn Nets to acquire James Harden from the Houston Rockets in a four-team mega-trade on Wednesday.

One of the league’s most questionable defenses just got a whole lot more puzzling. A weak frontline has thinned out even more. But the Nets are 6-1 when scoring at least 120 points this season. Those concerns are likely to be masked while they push past 130 every night.

Harden joins Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving to form the most potent offensive trio in NBA history. Steve Nash can assemble a rotation with at least two of this generation’s deadliest isolation scorers on the court at all times, all of whom have experience playing off teammates of similar levels of greatness.

Superstars win championships, which is why parting with Caris LeVert, Jarrett Allen, Tauren Prince and Rodions Kurucs was a no-brainer trade-off for a player like Harden. And yet the inherent risks that come along with are tough to ignore regardless.

The Nets are the last team that needs a refresher on the dangers of mortgaging the future in favor of boosting odds in the present. Such bold decision-making cost them the possibility of drafting Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum and Collin Sexton. Though that deal for Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett, which included only three first-rounders and one pick swap, pales in comparison to the near decade-long absence from the draft that now awaits the Nets.

While these two deals are similar in principle — forfeiting a haul of draft capital in pursuit of immediate championship glory — they couldn’t be more different below the surface.

Pierce and Garnett were 36 and 37, respectively, during their first season in Brooklyn in 2013-14. Both would retire by 2017. Giving up all those draft picks didn’t make sense for two players winding down their Hall-of-Fame careers. Coming off his third consecutive scoring title with 34.6 points per game, the 31-year-old Harden remains squarely in his prime with a skill-based style that should extend those years longer than most.

Many tend to assume the best with their team’s draft picks, unreasonably holding firm that the next Draymond Green or Tony Parker is headed their way. In reality, not even a top-five pick guarantees even a starting-caliber player, much less an All-Star or someone remotely close to the caliber of Harden. If you have the chance at the real thing, capitalizing on the tangible sounds far more appealing than attempting to bank on the hypothetical.

It’s a simple equation: Would you prefer seven 0.000005 percent chances at a player like James Harden? Or the bearded man himself in a Nets jersey?

The Nets are on a shortlist of teams with a legitimate shot at a title this season. That’s barely a fraction of a step in the journey towards realizing that potential because so many other things must go right to get there.

It’s not enough for a contender to have the prerequisite talent. Chemistry is a necessary component to accentuate all those abilities. Coaches need to devise a gameplan that does the same while having plenty of modifications at the ready. The unpredictability of the injury bug has to look the other way. None of it might matter if other teams do so at a higher level — think about how every soon-to-strike championship hopeful felt when Golden State signed KD.

Harden probably contributes to the one area where Brooklyn was set (talent) but his presence widens the margin for error on all the others. On a team led by stars with dicey injury histories, a level of cohesion still in development and a first-year head coach calling the shots, Harden will function as one of several bail-out options when those issues inevitably arise. No contender ever believes in having too many, especially not one as potentially volatile as these Nets.

When KD and Kyrie signed with the Nets two summers ago, an incredible championship window opened up in Brooklyn. It won’t remain forever. Heck, it might not even last beyond 2022 when the two All-Stars have player options they could simultaneously exercise.

Durant Irving might be willing to commit long-term. But in the age of exacerbated player movement, nobody is guaranteed to stay anywhere beyond the length their deal contractually obligates them to — and even then, players with certain authority find a way.

What we know is Brooklyn has these two years before that concern even matters. Once they’re up, anything is on the table. For a franchise still looking for its NBA championship, that isn’t an opportunity you want to waste, especially when you don’t know when/if it’ll come again.

So, you bring in Harden, who can also enter free-agency at the same time as his former teammate. Doing so means relinquishing the future, opening the door to a potential reality the Nets surely hoped they’d never have to consider revisiting.

A head coach not 15 games into his coaching career must now determine how to best use three elite scorers who each rank top-20 all-time in usage rate — ironically a job description eerily similar to his days as a Hall-of-Fame floor general. The task also falls on said players to make the inevitable sacrifices at both ends with that purpose in mind.

This blockbuster happens when Brooklyn’s All-Star point guard remains out of action for a period of time unknown to his team and a pandemic continues to seep further into and throw out of whack rotations across the league.

The answer to those issues will largely determine the outcome of this season and shape Harden’s tenure in Brooklyn. None, however, will lend a verdict to this deal even years down the line with the full range of ramifications in our clear line of sight. Because no such transaction guarantees results. They can only better position a team to reach their desired outcome.

The Nets had every reason to secure those bolstered odds not knowing when they’ll next be in a position to do so on this level.