James Harden explained his remarks about being “on a leash” with the Philadelphia 76ers during his first press conference as a member of the Los Angeles Clippers. “I think the game and I’m a creator on the court… [I need] somebody that trusts me, that believes in me, that understands me, that I’m not a system player,” Harden said. I’m a structure. Joel Embiid, Harden’s former teammate, was questioned on Thursday night over his use in Philadelphia under Doc Rivers.
Embiid gave a long answer on Harden’s comments today. Lot of Harden praise.
“We allowed him to just be himself, and we gave him the ball on every single possession. Because he’s really good. He’s an amazing player. I’m not that great of a passer, [so] we gave him the ball.” pic.twitter.com/biB7peKXKL
— Kyle Neubeck (@KyleNeubeck) November 3, 2023
“In my opinion, we gave him the ball every single possession, because he’s really good,” said Embiid. “He is a fantastic player. Given his exceptional passing ability, it goes without saying that we would give him the ball on every possession so he could just go off and do his thing. From there, he had to decide whether to look out for himself or open himself to guys. However, I felt he did a very decent job of setting up an offensive and just tossing the ball to open players. He was the assist champion last year because of this.”
Embiid doesn’t seem to disagree with Harden’s evaluation totally, but it also doesn’t seem like he has any animosity against him or his emotions based on what he said.
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